The Sustainability Council of Cabrillo College Needs You!
If you care about the environment, local and worldwide, if you want to be part of the solution to the myriad environmental problems besetting the Earth, rather than a contributor to those problems, then this is the campus organization for you! We of the Sustainability Council are dedicated to making Cabrillo College a green and earth-friendly institution. Last semester, the Sustainability Council initiated a petition drive to rid Cabrillo College and Santa Cruz County of plastic take-out, single-use bags. We held a Bag the (Plastic) Bag Event on March 21, the first day of spring, to gather signatures on petitions directed to Cabrillo Hawk Shop management, the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors, the Santa Cruz City Council, the Watsonville City Council, the Scotts Valley City Council, and the Capitola City Council. We collected well over a hundred signatures, despite a torrential rainfall and very chilly temperatures that day.
We continued our ban-the-plastic-bag efforts during Earth Week, April 18-22, on both the Aptos (April 18-21) and Watsonville (April 22, Earth Day) campuses, and gathered even more signatures directed to just the Cabrillo bookstore.
With support from Cabrillo’s Permaculture Club, Outdoor Club, and Bicycle Cooperative, we next pushed the matter with a resolution to ban plastic-bag use by the bookstore. We took our resolution before the Inter-Club Council (ICC) and the Student Senate. Both student governmental bodies passed our resolution! We now await action on the part of the bookstore management to heed the will of the Cabrillo Student Senate, the Cabrillo Inter-Club Council, and student, faculty, staff, and visitor signatories of our petitions to stop using plastic bags!
Please do your part as a citizen of the Earth by refusing a plastic bag at the Cabrillo bookstore! Use your backpack, your own reusable bags, or your arms! And, by the way, the Sustainability Council will be selling Cabrillo College GreenSteps-logo Chico Bags for $6 each outside the bookstore on the Aptos campus the first week of school, Monday through Thursday, August 29 through September 1, from about 9 AM to 1 PM. Proceeds benefit the Sustainability Council! And don’t stop there! Tell the bookstore you want to see the plastic bags go away forever! Fill out one of their suggestion forms to let them know you won’t miss plastic bags!
The Sustainability Council also co-sponsored with the Permaculture Club, Outdoor Club, and Bicycle Cooperative another resolution for a sustainable purchasing policy at Cabrillo by Cabrillo organizations. Both the Inter-Club Council and Student Senate also passed this resolution and put money where their mouths (and hearts) were. Together, the two student governmental bodies devoted $3000 toward the purchase of shelves and a variety of biodegradable or recyclable food-service ware for student clubs and other organizations to use for food-giveaway and food-sale events associated with Cabrillo College, on or off campus. Thank you, co-sponsoring student clubs: Permaculture, Outdoor, and Bike Co-op! Thank you, ICC and Student Senate for passing this resolution, binding all student clubs and the Student Senate to it, and for purchasing this great store of earth-friendly food-service ware for student organizations to use for their events!
As if these efforts were not enough, the Sustainability Council also won a grant from the Monterey Bay Unified Air Pollution Control District to hire AlterNetRides, an online carpooling service to network Cabrillo community members who want to carpool. Because of deep budget cuts that Cabrillo must make under a much-reduced state educational budget, Cabrillo cut its subsidization of student bus passes. Do your part to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases, traffic congestion, and parking woes at Cabrillo by carpooling! Go to www.CabrilloGreenSteps.org and click on the link to enter your information to the Cabrillo carpool network. It’s FREE! Make friends! Save gas! Save money! Save the Earth!
If you want to be part of this dynamic, tree-hugging, dirt-worshipping group at Cabrillo College, please join us on www.WiserEarth.org/group/cabrillostudents. We need everyone who wants to help us lower Cabrillo’s carbon footprint, who want to go organic, go local, eliminate plastic trash, and who love our beautiful California central coast, the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, and our planet Earth. Do it now! You know you want to!
* Please contact the clubs directly for accurate meeting times.
ICC & Club Advisor:
Flor Chacón
| Inter-Club Council | |
| Advisor | Flor Chacón |
| Phone | 831.477.3508 |
| Location: | Student Activity Center East |
