Environmental Council Meeting
January 7, 2003
Meeting Minutes
Present: Helen Young, Andi Lloyd, Diane Munroe, Gail Smith, Charlotte Tate, Connie Leach Bisson (Vice-Chair), Nan Jenks-Jay (Co-Chair), Megan Smith, Nick Benjamin, JS Woodward, Suzanne Nagi, Jesi Warren, Ben Wessler, Doug Dagan, Katy Saunders, Andrea Hamre
Missing: Ben Brouwer, Mikey Azzara, Mandy Helwig, David West
- Review of December 3, 2002 minutes. No changes were requested.
- Discussion of College Handbook sections related to Environmental Council
- Environmental Policy
- Environmental Council (Purpose & Membership)
After general discussion of the two documents and some history of each provided by Nan Jenks-Jay, the EC concluded that it would be beneficial to rework both documents to ensure that there is some consistency between these documents (and the Environmental Peak documents), that they speak to the current environmental mission, and that they each reinforce the other. Connie will set up a meeting with Eric Davis to discuss the latitude the EC has in reworking the documents within a framework acceptable to the College.
Nan Jenks-Jay, Suzanne Nagi, JS Woodward, Charlotte Tate and Connie Leach Bisson volunteered to meet to work on these documents and then bring new drafts back to the Environmental Council for discussion.
- Announcements/Updates
JS announced that he is organizing a film screening of "Empty Oceans, Empty Nets" that will be co-sponsored by Cook Commons for January 28th.
Nan highlighted good PR for the College including a Charles Osgood File 3-minute interview to a national audience focusing on the deconstruction of the old science building; a story on the back page of the current issue of the Chronicle for Higher Education on Beeken Parson's furniture that highlights furniture made for Middlebury; and a Burlington Free Press editorial commending Middlebury's model in stimulating the local economy by contracting with the Island Pond Woodworkers to produce the carrels and end stacks for the new library.
The J-term class ES010 The Scientific and Institutional Challenges of Becoming Carbon Neutral has started and has about 15 students.
The Carbon Reduction Initiative Working Group will hold two meetings in January and participate in two presentations of the ES010 Carbon Neutral class.
Doug Dagan will be presenting the College's emission inventory data to the CRI Working Group on January 15th.