Tuesday, April 25, 2023
7:00-9:00pm
North Water Brewing,
101 Crain Ave, Kent, OH 44240
Join us for another World Café style Crooked River Environmental Network event, this time over your favorite beverage!
The World Café is an opportunity to talk and network with others. Each table will have a sign with the name of a topic. Choose a topic that interests you and meet like-minded folks
No pre-registration is needed.
Date: Wednesday, April 19, 2023
Time: 7:00 PM
Location:
UU Church Sanctuary (in the church building)
228 Gougler Ave
Kent, OH 44240
This event is free and open to the curious.
Our Speaker: Ted Auch
Ted has been researching the environmental, social, and economic impacts of oil and gas development including the mechanisms by which oil and gas get from where it is produced to where it is consumed and processed for plastics and export.
He has written on the interaction between energy production and water scarcity, the primacy of regulatory agencies like Ohio’s Department of Natural Resource, data inconsistencies across states with a history of fossil fuel production, and the demographics of natural gas pipeline resistance and support.
His writing has appeared locally in The Cleveland Plain Dealer, Crain’s Cleveland Business, Belt Magazine, and The Warren Tribune Chronicle. Ted’s photography has been published in countless articles and documentaries about the impacts of oil and gas development from The Wall Street Journal to the recent documentary “Hellbent” about the plight of the endangered Hellbender Salamander in Southeastern Ohio.
In recent years, Ted has increased his focus on the role that rail plays in the transport mechanisms for fossil fuels including the economics, labor, and environmental impacts of moving raw commodities and extremely volatile substances by rail.
He is an adjunct faculty at John Carroll University, a member of the NAACP Ohio’s Environmental Justice Advisory Board, the US EPA Environmental Justice Screen Science Advisory Board, and the Midwest Program Director for the FracTracker Alliance, a non-profit collection of researchers, cartographers, and big data analysts working to address the massive information asymmetries that exist between communities and the multinational corporations looking to extract resources by any means necessary.
He received his PhD from the University of Vermont modeling climate impacts on forest processes. Prior to that , he pursued an MS at Virginia Tech identifying best practices for optimizing reforestation on strip-mined lands in Central Appalachia.
Ted and his family reside in Shaker Heights.
The Portage Park District Foundation’s 2023 Environmental Awards Dinner will be held on April 22, 2023, beginning at 5:30 p.m. at the American Legion Hall.
The awardee is honored at the Portage Park Foundation dinner in the Spring.
2023 Edith Chase Conservation Award Nomination Form (Due Monday, February 20, 2023)
The Portage Park District Foundation is seeking nominations for potential awardees to be honored at the April 22nd Environmental Awards dinner at the American Legion Hall in Kent.. Nominations should include the nominee’s name and contact information, along with a paragraph or two describing his/her/their contribution to environmental conservation in Portage County.
Nomination categories include:
2023 Nomination Form (Due March 3, 2023)
Tuesday, January 24, 2023
Hobbs Hall
Unitarian Universalist Church of Kent
217 N. Mantua Street, Kent, OH 44240
The KEC board is excited to be hosting another in-person World Café style Crooked River Environmental Network event after its annual meeting. (We did something similar at 2020’s annual meeting, just before the pandemic.)
The World Café is an opportunity to talk and network with others. Each table will have a sign with the name of a topic. Participants can choose a topic that interests them. After about 45 minutes, participants can move to a different table and topic, or network with some of our partner organizations.
5:00 p.m. – Community Potluck (Please bring a covered dish to share – Table service provided)
6:00 p.m. – World Café with Topic Tables (including renewable energy, bike/pedestrian-friendly community, permaculture, wetlands/clean water)
7:00 p.m. – More World Café Topic Tables or Networking with Partner Organizations
7:45 p.m. – Harvesting Insights and Connections
8:15 p.m. – Cleanup/Safe Travels
Registration for the event is required. On the registration form, please indicate the environmental issues that are most important to you.
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| If you are interested in being a community partner organization in the Crooked River Environmental Network, please contact Renee Ruchotzke reneeruchotzke@gmail.com |
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Kelly Clark from Kelly’s Working Well Farm in Chagrin Falls is the featured speaker at the Kent Environmental Council’s Fall Forum. Clark will talk about how she incorporates permaculture in the design of the farm, the educational programming the farm offers, and her vision for navigating changing times.
Wednesday, November 2, 2022, 6:30pm
Kent Free Library, 2nd Floor meeting room
312 W Main St, Kent, OH 44240
The event is free and open to the public.
For more information about Kelly’s Working Well Farm, click here.
To download the flyer, click here.
Saturday, June 25, 2022 1 – 3 pm
Starting at the Thomas-Anderson Memorial Garden
1110 Walnut St., Kent, OH
In these times of lost habitat and food supply disruptions, the Kent Environmental Council is encourgaging people to “Wild Your Yard.” (Last year we sponsored a wildly popular tour of gardens in the Crain to Main neighborhood.)
This year, we are sponsoring another free tour, this time of the Historic South End of Kent (with a few gardens east of South Water Street).
Several local residents who are growing edible perennials and/or pollinator/wildlife-friendly and edible plants will be giving tours of their gardens!
by Brad Brotje
May. It’s the month that signals to Northeast Ohioans that winter is indeed behind us and that the cycle of life continues. Take a good look around in May as life springs eternal, April’s offerings of returned abundance come to fruition and, most importantly, that abundance displays itself in the form of wildflowers of all kinds: white and red clovers, dandelions, chickweed, goats beard, fleabane and blackberry brambles to name a few. It’s also the month when we drag out our cumbersome and polluting lawn-mowing equipment. Unfortunately, a green, weed-free lawn has become a misguided hallmark of property value and has grown to represent a homeowner’s membership in a productive society. To the contrary, when we choose to mow early, we are depriving nature’s pollinators of the nectar they need to survive and to do the work that supports agriculture; without the health and abundance of these pollinators, many food crops would go unfertilized and fail to produce fruits, seeds, nuts and young plants.
Currently, 40 million acres of land in the United States is maintained as lawns, making this vegetation not only typically free of wildflowers but also the biggest consumer of irrigation in the country. In addition, these lawns often rely on fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides that eventually end up in stormwater systems and then in streams, rivers and lakes. These issues have spawned the growing national movement known as No Mow May. No Mow May is a conservation initiative first popularized by the United Kingdom-based organization Plantlife that now is gaining traction across North America. The goal of No Mow May is to allow grass to grow without a “haircut” for the entire month of May, thereby creating habitat and forage for early season pollinators. The monthlong pause in mowing is particularly important in urban areas where floral resources are often limited.
Not only are lawns burdensome for the people maintaining them, but the millions of acres they encompass also fail to provide benefits to wildlife because the traditional monoculture lawn lacks floral resources or nesting sites for bees and other pollinators. In a 2018 experiment conducted by Susannah Lerman and the USDA Forest Service’s Northern Research Station, Lerman and her collaborators explored whether different lawn-mowing frequencies influenced bee abundance and diversity. The team mowed herbicide-free suburban lawns at different frequencies (i.e., once a week, every other week, or every three weeks) in Springfield, Massachusetts. The results of the study showed that bee abundance increased when lawns were mowed every other week. Mowing every three weeks resulted in more than double the number of flowers available in lawns and increased bee diversity. The efficacy of reducing mowing may be expanded upon by altering the composition of your lawn to include more flowering species. What the researchers described as a “bee lawn” may include Dutch clover, for example, while some plants, such as native violets, may already be present and should be encouraged as they are valuable host plants for fritillary butterflies. You may even want to consider replacing that lawn altogether—planting instead a rain garden, a pollinator garden or a wildflower meadow.
Many cities and municipalities have weed ordinances that dictate not only the types of plants a homeowner is permitted to grow but also the height of any vegetation. Here are a few things you can do to avoid urban conflicts:
Finally, keep in mind the importance of minimizing your carbon footprint as you reduce your need to mow, and consider replacing your polluting gas-powered lawn equipment with battery-operated electric models. As you reduce the area you choose to mow, these electric alternatives become even more practical and efficient.
Thanks to everyone who came out or tuned in to our program last night! We had 20 people in person and a couple more dozen online.
Climate disruption, agribusiness, and big box grocery chains are making fresh and nutrient-rich food inaccessible in many of our communities, a phenomenon known as “food deserts.”
The term “agrihood” (first coined in Silicon Valley to describe edible landscaping) is now used in urban communities like Detroit to describe the repurposing neighborhood land into urban farms and community gardens.
Local leaders will share their stories and vision of how this movement is happening in our communities.
Co-sponsored by the Portage County NAACP.
Doria Daniels, Chairwoman of the Kent Historic South End Association.
Doria will share the story of the Thomas-Anderson Memorial Garden, located near the corner of Walnut and Dodge in Kent.
Kashava Holt, Executive Director of Akron Urban Agriculture.
Kashava’s passion is creating a local food network of locally-raised, fresh, quality food, especially in food deserts.
Richie Jones, President of the McElrath Improvement Corp. in Ravenna.
Richie’s fond boyhood memories included enjoying fruit from neighhood vines and trees. Part of his vision for the McElrath neighborhood includes a community garden.
Thursday, February 17, 2022
5:45 pm – Kent Environmental Council Annual Meeting
6:30 pm – Speaker Presentations
This is a hybrid event!
In Person:
Kent Free Library
312 W. Main St.
Kent, OH 44240
Or on Zoom
Save the Date!
Saturday, June 26, 2021 11am – 1:30pm
Walls / Crain to Main Neighborhood
“Chances are you never thought of your garden–indeed, all of your property–as a wildlife preserve that presents the last chance we have for sustaining plants and animals that were once common throughout the U.S. But that is exactly the role our suburban landscapes are playing.” -Douglas Tallamy, author of Bringing Nature Home: How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants
This year, the Kent Environmental Council is encourgaging people to “Wild Your Yard.” Several local residents who are growing edible perennials and pollinator/wildlife-friendly and edible plants will be giving tours of their gardens!
More Details to come!
