If you haven't received a newsletter email from ITRC in a while, only the notice about our new Speaker Series (which is great BTW - come check it out, our first one it was a lot of fun!) it may be because we missed your email on the list we are now using for email newsletters. We have transitioned from the blog (this post) as a main newsletter tool, to an email-based newsletter from MailChimp. While Josh has most of the emails all loaded up, if you haven't got any newsletters like this one, please visit the site and use the new Newsletter signup form in the left column, or contact Josh Spiker at Inside Track.
We'll still continue to post stories and other fun notes of interest, including last minute notices or changes, here on the blog. Stay tuned and stay running!
November/December edition of On The Road, the Monthly Newsletter for ITRC
The big monthly ITRC newsletter is also here. Please be patient in downloading the November/December edition of On The Road. This file is 10mb and may take awhile. If you would like to submit info to be included in next newsletter please send info to Ted Cotti at Cotti@sbcglobal.net
Click HERE 2 DOWNLOAD
Trash Reduction
by George Arita
GREEN is the color of my true love’s hair. No, actually the color of her hair is (or was) black but now is mostly grey. But GREEN is the practice of Inside Track Running Club. This is the reason we have limited the availability of disposable cups at our meeting place and water station. We encourage members to carry their own reusable cups or bottles. And also, this is the reason why we have three boxes under the table at the meeting place: one for trash (ugh!), one for recyclables, and one for compost matter (more on this later).
On the personal side, soon after I started teaching Biology at Ventura College in 1971, I began my “Trash Project” as a student assignment, where I had my students analyze their weekly household trash, qualitatively and quantitatively, to determine the kinds and amounts of items that went into their trash bins. In those days, all the items in the trash bins were taken by the trash trucks directly to local landfills. Landfills, as large as they may seem, have a limited capacity, and most landfills reach capacity within15 years. But the simple solution back then was to seek another location and dig another hole to serve as the next landfill. Finding a proper location for the next landfill has become an ongoing problem, not only locally but everywhere in every country. After collecting data for a week, each student had to propose strategies that their household members could undertake to reduce the kinds and amounts of items they deposited in their trash bins.
About 25 years later, the state legislature finally caught wind of the problem and passed legislation that required all cities and counties to reduce the amount of trash going to the landfills by 50%. This is the reason why today we all have a trash bin, a recyclable bin and a green waste bin at each of our households. Our duties, as citizens of this planet, are to use these bins properly, as well as to reduce our resource consumption and the resulting waste production as much as possible at every level of our consumer practices.
Now back to our club activities. As mentioned above, we provide these three boxes for depositing your waste. The “compost box” is for banana peels and other fruit or vegetable material. I mix these items into my compost pile at home, and the resulting compost goes into my garden. The “recycle box” is for recyclable material such as plastics, metals, glass and clean paper. This material gets emptied into my recycle bin at home. The “trash (ugh) box” is for items that will end up in the local landfill, i.e. trash! Inevitably, we will have items in this “trash box” but I always hope for a minimum amount. I empty this box into my home trash bin.
The primary item in the “trash box” is disposable cups, which I want to eliminate by having every member carry her/his own reusable cup or bottle for procuring drinks. I fashioned my own reusable cup by cutting a plastic drinking bottle across the top and hanging it on my belt. Ask me about it and I will show you how to make one for yourself.
I hope everyone will cooperate with our club’s GREEN efforts, not only during our Saturday meetings but also in your daily lives. If there is enough interest, I can be easily urged to stand on the raised platform or box for a presentation on waste reduction. Our lives must be earth-friendly.
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