Town of Rochester ECC meeting minutes, January 8, 2015

Attendance: Barbara Fornal, Stu Dorris, Angela Dorris, Laura Finestone, Chris Hewitt, Hank, Ben Ganon, Tim Ganon. Guests: Colin McDonough, Melissa Orozco, John Messerschmitt

I. Call to Order; 6:03pm

II. Business and Logistics

A.      Minutes review and approval from December meeting. Approved.

B.      Omega tour was postponed. Laura will keep us posted for when it’s a little warmer outside.

 

III. Reports

A.      Water Quality (Angela)

-There is nothing to report until spring.

B. EMC Report (Hank)

-Hank will now report to us on EMC progress.

C. Natural Resources Map (Chris)

-Chris did some research on how other municipalities write RFPs, but Larry got us off to a great start with the RFP from Wawarsing. Chris will meet with Carl to discuss all of the requirements that are needed in the RFP. He will work with Larry on any questions that come up.

D. UCRRA (Barbara)

-nothing to report at this time.

E. Water Quality (John)

-He will present a water quality spreadsheet at the next meeting. A district needs to be created for this, so maybe the Rondout Creek Watershed Council district can help with this.

F. Hudson River Watershed (Laura)

-Dan Shapley recommended that Laura and Angela attend the last meeting. Met with Maureen; they are looking for very active communities. The grants that she mentioned are matching grants. This is a common problem that can be addressed somehow. Laura wants to meet with Anu Rajanajan (sp?), director of the Farm Hub, to discuss the riparian buffer that they’re creating at the Esopus creek edge. There will be a Creek Walk with different municipalities in the future at some point. Joint ECC mtg January 15 at 7:30.

G. Rail Trail Report (Stu)

-The fence at William’s Lumber will be built as it warms up.

 

IV. New Business

A.      Progress on RFP. Carl is now the ECC liaison, so Chris will work with him on the RFP.

B.      ECC seats for young people: Angela would like to “test the waters” with any youth who would like to participate. They can be adjunct members.

C. Lecture series: Barbara would like to do something about pollinators. The “Butterfly Lady” can come do a lecture about signing up the Town of Rochester as a pollinator friendly town. It was mentioned that we can create a fauna map as part of our natural resource inventory, but a lecture doesn’t have to wait until that is done. It can happen in March, maybe for the equinox. A benefit of this subject is that it covers GMOs as a topic as well. Barbara can have GMO info available. We can also have kids making seed bombs. We can have Chris Harp, Honeybeelives, bring their see-through honeybee hive. We also like the idea of a composting display.  We also want to sign people up for Earth Day and provide orange bags. We can also sign up volunteers for Creek Week and Creek Walk. Angela recommended that we do something special for the businesses that donate. Two ideas are running an ad in local publications that highlights them, and another is to send a nice Thank You card with a picture of us. The group would like to pick a few additional topics that we’re interested in for future lecture series.

D. Event committee: Most of the group is on board. Angela and Laura will spearhead the distribution of tasks for the above event.

 

Adjourn: 6:52pm