Hurray! We recently received a $5,000 grant from the Arizona Recycling Coalition to work in cooperation with the City of Phoenix Public Works Department to bring Pollution Solutions to youngsters in Phoenix, beginning with more than 15 summer programs at the libraries.

Pollution Solutions also is in the running for our local public television station's "Be More Awards." The People's Choice Poll allows citizens to vote for their favorite nonprofit. Support us by voting for Resources for Health here: http://kaet.convio.net/site/PageServer?pagename=peoples_choice_poll THANKS!!

Pollution Solutions is ever evolving with input from our community. By summer (funding permitting) we will add reusable cotton drawstring produce bags from Eco-Bags to our giveaway. Note the diary entry on January 7th about the customer with her own shopping bags, but a dozen plastic produce bags!

Besides reusable produce bags and biodegradable trash bags, the next logical step inreducing your trash, is composting your food scraps. No matter what size home you live in, earthworms can help with that! In your yard, on the backporch of an apartment, or under the kitchen sink, vermicomposting does not smell like regular composting. Ron of Worm Drive the Musical (www.wormdrivemusical.com) wants to work with us to create a series of interactive workshops, involving the Roots & Shoots kids.

Big fun ahead!

Someone posted recently on the Phoenix Permaculture yahoogroup about Ireland's success with their "PlasTax" on plastic bags. I responded with some information about Pollution Solutions, and was subsequently quoted in the Million Bottle, Bag, and Bulb blog: http://www.yourguidetogreen.com/BillionBagBlog/. It seems that someone else then picked up on that and copied info to another blog as well. I love blogs because they provide space for people to comment back and really get into some good dialogue.

The list of events where Pollution Solutions will appear is ever growing:
2/9, 10am-2pm - 5th AvenueFarmers' Market, Scottsdale
2/17, 9am-1pm - Ahwatukee Farmers' Market
2/23, 1:30pm – Yucca Branch Library, Phoenix
3/1, all day – Local to Global Justice Teach In at ASU, Tempe
3/2 - Homeschool Education Conference
3/4 - East Valley Homeschool Teens Park Day
3/28, 10am-2pm – Youth Day at the AZ Game and Fish Outdoor Expo, Phoenix
3/29, 9am -2pm – Feathered Friends Festival at Riparian Preserve, Gilbert
4/19 - Earth Day Celebration at the Arizona Science Center
4/20 - "Party for the Planet" at the Phoenix Zoo
4/26 - Earth Day at Superstition Farm
4/27 - Youth in Service for Peace on Earth Day at Steele Indian School Park
5/3 - Green Living Conference at the Phoenix Zoo
5/8-9 - CASA Vida Homeschool Enrichment Program

WOW! And all this on a shoestring budget. Just imagine if we actually get funding from the Case Foundation...

Saturday, we had a booth for the first time at a farmers' market. Our tent wouldn't go up, then our easel broke, but we managed with our three folding tables alone. One of our Roots & Shoots families had donated grapefruit from their backyard tree, so we had full bags to sell to help raise funds. One woman stopped by to talk about trash bags. It seems her New Year's resolution was to not take any more plastic or paper bags home from the store. But she was left wondering what to do with her trash. It's always great to meet someone who has taken their environmental commitment to the next level! An interesting discussion ensued about biobags made from cornstarch and composting as two ways to address the trash issue. I shared what another Roots & Shoots member told me she heard from Julia Butterfly Hill - we talk about throwing things away, but there is no "away." We live on this planet in a closed system. Another gentleman shared his frustration working in the restaurant industry. His restaurant and other businesses within their plaza do NO RECYCLING whatsoever. Everything - glass, cardboard, cans - goes in the trash. Why? Because it is less expensive to have the one trash service rather than pay for trash and recycling. Citizens - as consumers and employees - need to speak out and demand that businesses act ethically! This seems to be happening more and more in regard to big business, but the smaller businesses need to hear it too. Overall, there were clearly more customers at the market who brought bags from home than those who carried out their goods in disposable plastic. A significant change has definitely occurred in the last several years! Now, ever forward....

On January 12th, we spent an entire day sharing Pollution Solutions with the community. First, we visited Save the Family, a local organization that works with homeless families to help them get back on their feet. While the moms took a class, a Roots & Shoots youth member and I presented to their children. It was interesting to hear what these kids knew and didn't know about caring for the earth. Some knew a lot, while other knew next to nothing. One thing that seemed apparent was that their schools all focused on recycling as the most important environmental solution. They had never thought of it as just a bandaid with the first course of action being prevention - i.e. REDUCE and REUSE! We played the Lunch Box Game, decorated reusable bags, listened to environmental songs, and built creations with biodegradable cornstarch "Magic Nuudles." Both children and presenters learned a lot from each other and had a lot of fun.

From Save the Family, we continued on to the one year anniversary celebration of the Cesar Chavez Library in Laveen, Arizona. Laveen was a small farming town that has been swiftly converted into suburbia over the last couple of years. The library and neighboring park are the focal point of the community, and it seemed that EVERYONE came to this event. The 50 bags requested by the library went in a flash. The Friends of the Library, a group of volunteers that raises funds for the library, held an emergency meeting to fund more bags, which we luckily had in the back of the van! Children decorated more than 100 bags by end of day, and I was hoarse from telling our "Story about Bags" multiple times to roaring crowds.

It was definitely a day to celebrate!

The importance of our work and our conversations with people was driven home to me after our New Year's Eve event in front of Wild Oats. In line at the checkout, I pointed out to my daughter Sammi (age 11) that the woman in front of us was using cloth bags. To which she replied, "Yeah, Mom, but she has like a dozen [produce] items in plastic bags!" So had she really grasped the importance of "choose to reuse" or was she just blindly following a trend? Some of the people who have visited our Pollution Solutions booth and seen our "Story About Bags" book describing the entire lifecycle of plastic and paper bags have come back to us to say how they have been inspired to look for more reusable products, to begin composting, and to try to eat more locally grown food. WE ARE MAKING A DIFFERENCE!