Eco-Metropolis 2005 Schedule as of 11/1/05

 

FRIDAY 11/11:
(This day will feature many programs relating to youth eco activism and environmental education)

Panels and Workshops:

12:30-2:00 pm
-Youth and Gardens with host Brian Johnson, Education Officer for the U.S. program of Botanic Gardens Conservation International; Patricia Hulse, Manager of the Children's Garden and Family Programs at Brooklyn Botanical Garden; Tom Goodridge of Harlem's PS 76's Garden Project; and Mike Steffens, site manager of the Gateway Greenhouse Education Center

-Greening the Campus: with David Levine, Director of Continuing Education & Public Programs, The Graduate Center, CUNY; Jaimie Cloud, Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education; Susan Szensay, Editor-in-Chief, Metropolis Magazine; and Jean Gardner, Senior Faculty, Dept. of Architecture, Interior Design, and Lighting, Parsons School of Design

-Information Technologies for Mapping and Analyzing the Environment with: Steve Romalewski of NYC OASIS (Open Accessible Space Information System Cooperative/CMAP); and Mark Becker from CIESIN (Center for International Earth Science Information Network at Columbia U)

-The Nature of New York “Green Teams”
Professor David Rosane and six of his students will explain the work of the Nature of New York course’s green teams, which provide CUNY students with extra-curricular resources in urban ecology and job and internship opportunities in studying the NYC environment.

-Eco Youth Internships and Trainings with Linda Richards, Education Director of Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, Jeannine Cahill, Clearwater's Onboard Educator and organizer of its Urban Outreach Internship; Ludger Balan, the Executive Environmental Program Director of Urban Divers; and Central Park Conservancy’s Terri Carta.

-Design Science Youth Program-a collaborative effort aimed at developing and disseminating strategies for achieving the UN Millennium Development Goals, including reducing global poverty, hunger, and other unmet human needs in environmentally sustainable programs; co-sponsored by the Buckminster Fuller Institute (BFI), and the United Nations International School (UNIS); and hosted by co-founder of the World Game Institute, Medard Gabel and BFI Executive Director Elizabeth Thompson, with prize-winning young designers

2:15-3:45

- Voluntary Simplicity/Reducing Consumption with Mary Barknecht; and Tim Keating, co-founder and Executive Director of Rainforest Relief

-What Are We Thinking? Shifting the Paradigms of Un-Sustainability: a workshop with Jaimie Cloud, President of The Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education. In this interactive session we will experience and explore some of the mental models that result in unsustainable structures, behaviors and choices and explore what is required to make the shift toward a sustainable future.

-Restoration through Recreation with: host Roy Arezzo, Chair of the Science Dept. of The New York Harbor School; Recycle-a-Bicycle’s Karen Overton; Gowanus Dredgers’ Owen Foote, and Rocking the Boat’s Adam Green

-Re-naturing Urban Youth with Glenn Phillips of Prospect Park Audubon; Tom Goodridge of Harlem's PS 76's Garden Project; Mike Steffens of the Gateway Greenhouse Education Center; and a Sierra Club youth outings representative

-The Garrison Institute: The Hudson River Project
River Conversations-The River as Legacy for the Future
Hosted by Rev. Patricia Ackerman, Garrison Institute; with: Jean Gardner, professor of architecture, New School University; Kristin Marcell, Hudson River Estuary Program, DEC; Shannon Murphy, faith-based “social sculptor” and activist; Ryan Palmer, Hudson River Watershed Alliance, Clearwater; and David Rothenberg, environmental philosopher

-Recycling/Re-use and Zero Waste; hosted by Christine Datz-Romero, co-founder of the Lower East Side Ecology Center; with Timothy Logan, lead organizer, NYC Zero Waste Campaign; Robert Bangiola, Deputy Director of Materials for the Arts (MFTA), representing the Reuse Alliance (RA)-a support network of and for NYC's re-use organizations; and Justin Green of Build It Green

4:00-6:00
-Eco Youth Activist "Show and Tell Congress” and networking. In this session a number of young activists from a wide range of grassroots groups will give short (under 10 minute) presentations about their organizations’ youth-centered programs. With: Jose Felix of Added Value; Elizabeth Johnson (b-healthy); Murad Awawdeh of UPROSE; Isamar Liz from Recycle-a-Bicycle; and young reps from: Central Park Conservancy; Rocking the Boat; Open Road; SustainUS; NY Harbor School; and the Sierra Club
This event will be hosted by Anushka Shenoy, a sophomore at Columbia and on the steering committee of SustainUS, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization of young people advancing sustainable development and youth empowerment in the United States. Anushka will be assisted by co-hosts Meliza Pena and Maurisa Hunte of Rocking the Boat

Note: A youth activist networking session organized by activist Kelly Cox and SustainUS' Samuel Krevor will take place from 6 to 7:00pm, right after the "congress." All young activists and students are invited.

4:00-5:30
-Environmental Education: hosted by Director of Environmental Education at the Council of the Environment NYC, Mike Zamm; with Phillip Coffin, Director of Education, New York Restoration Project; Mary Leou, Executive Director, Wallerstein Collaborative for Urban Environmental Education at NYU; Anne-Marie Runfola, Director of Education, Bronx River Alliance; and long-time science educator and educational consultant, Barry Weinbrom

-The Nature Network; an emerging coalition to preserve the tri-state area’s biodiversity-with Bill Shore; Nature Network’s President, Steve Clemants; Jane Jackson of NY Restoration Project; Al Appleton, Senior Fellow Regional Plan Association and Bob Alpern, Nature Network Task Force

-Models of Sustainability in Higher Education with Sustainable Pratt’s Amy Lesen and Frank Millero, and Parson’s professor David Bergman

-Restoring our region’s Waterways with host Carter Craft, Urban Divers’ Ludger K. Balan, the Littoral Society’s Don Riepe, and Basil Seggos of Riverkeeper.

-Environmentally and Socially Responsible Co-ops and Non-profits, with Omar Freilla of Green Worker Cooperatives, Added Value’s Ian Marvy; and Joe Holtz of the Park Slope Food Coop. Moderated by a leading figure in NYC’s “voluntary simplicity” movement, Mary Barknecht

5:30-7pm:
-Mixer; plus performers; DJ Brent “Arrow” Baker and more. Food donated by Angelica Kitchen.

-youth activist networking session

-video/film viewing: 2 talks from the 2004 Bioneers Conference and “Humane Cities,” a 22 minute film from UMass Amherst’s’ Ecological Cities project)

Evening event: 7:00-9:00-talks, music, poetry, performance, eco-art, a green fashion show hosted by Atom Cianfarani, and more: with a keynote address by the heroic young “green” Mayor of New Paltz, Jason West; Bowery Poetry Club’s Bob Holman; the harmonies of Circle of Soul; the music of philosopher and clarinetist David Rothenberg, author of Why Birds Sing; and a very special mini “ecological opera” with renowned leading edge singer, composer and performance artist Phoebe Legere; others tba

Saturday 11/12:

Plenary session: 10:00am to 12:15pm
Opening ceremony followed by presentations by four extraordinary visionary leaders in their fields: one of NYC’s legendary environmental justice advocates, West Harlem Environmental Action (WEACT) founder Peggy Shepard; Alex Matthiessen, Executive Director of Riverkeeper and one of the region’s most effective and dynamic activists; a legendary, world renowned figure in “green biology” and eco-design, John Todd, co-founder in 1969 of the groundbreaking New Alchemy Institute and co-author of classics such as From Eco-Cities to Living Machines; and one of North America’s most inspiring experts on urban agriculture and gardening and urban food security and justice, Michael Ableman, author, most recently of Fields of Plenty.

Panels and Workshops:

12:30 to 2pm
-Urban Transportation with host Aaron Naparstek;
Envisioning and imagining new ways of designing, building and managing NYC transportation and public space in the 21st century. With: Jon Orcutt, Tri-State Transportation Campaign (pending); Paul White, Transportation Alternatives; George Haikalis, President of the Institute for Rational Urban Mobility; and Alexis F. Perrotta, Senior Policy Analyst, Regional Plan Association

-Watersheds and Water Quality. Hosted/moderated by Chris Wilde of Riverkeeper; with Eric Goldstein, Senior Attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC); Tom Alworth of the Catskill Center for Conservation and Development; David Ferguson of the Croton Watershed Clean Water Coalition; and Professor at John Jay College, Joan Hoffman, who has studied the impact of the city's watershed agreement on the economy of the Catskill/Delaware Watershed.

-Visioning the Eco City; hosted by Green Ground Zero’s Neil Chambers; with Project for Public Spaces’ Ethan Kent; the Gaia Institute's Paul Mankiewicz; David Lutz, Executive Director of the Neighborhood Open Space Coalition; and Jennifer Cox, from the Dept. of Earth and Environmental Sciences, CUNY Grad Center and a geographer with the Regional Plan Association

--Food, Fairness and the Environment with host Brian Halweil of the Worldwatch Institute; Hilary Baum; Hawthorne Valley Farm's Head Farmer, Steffen Schneider; Elizabeth Johnson (of "b-healthy"); and Ruth Katz, Executive Director of Just Food

-Indigenous New York; with Evan T. Pritchard, author of several books, including: Native American Stories of the Sacred, founder of The Center for Algonquin Culture and professor of Native American history at Marist; Franc Menusan, of Creek-Metis ancestry; professor of American Indian studies at the Gallatin School at NYU, storyteller, artist, writer and multi-instrumental musical virtuoso; others tba

-Community Gardens; hosted by long time neighborhood garden activist Jon Crow, Edie Stone of Green Thumb; and Brian Sahd of the NY Restoration Project

-Neighborhood Sustainability with long-time Sierra Club and neighborhood activist, Stephan Chenault; Green Maps’ Wendy Brawer; Lois Sturm of New York Neighborhood Energy Network; and Harry Bubbins of Friends of Brook Park
Learn what people are doing at the neighborhood level to promote community health and wellbeing through issues ranging from energy to waste reduction to parks and gardens, building community arts and inter-generational relationships. Find out what's happening in NYC and in sustainable neighborhoods around the world, then discuss how you can get involved and become part of a support network for sustainability within your community (whether this is a physical neighborhood, a community of friends, co-workers or others).

2:15-3:45
-Bicycle Activism with host Aaron Naparstek. Why is the bike so important for the future of New York City and how do we make New York City a better environment for cyclists? With: Noah Budnick, Transportation Alternatives and Matthew Roth, Times Up

-Green Architecture and Design; with host Professor David Bergman; grassroots green building entrepreneur extraordinaire Susan Boyle, and pioneering architects Christopher Garvin and Roberta Washington

-Environmental Justice with one of NYC’s most tireless and effective activists, Samara Swanston; WEACT Program Director Cecil Corbin-Mark; Irene Tung, Coordinator of Organizing at Bushwick’s Make the Road by Walking; and Sustainable South Bronx's Elena Conte

-Open Space/Parks with host Sara Hobel of Urban Park Rangers and: Nancy Barthold, Assistant Commissioner of Capital with the Parks Dept; Lee Ilan, Senior Environmental Planner, NYC Office of Environmental Planning; Mike Feller, Senior Advisor to the Natural Resources Group of the Parks Dept; and a representative from the National Audubon Society's senior staff.

-Writing on the Environment; hosted by J.P. Harpignies, author of Political Ecosystems; with Worldwatch Senior Fellow Mia MacDonald; Nancy Jack Todd, co-founder of the legendary New Alchemy Institute and the author and co-author of many works, including the classic From Eco-Cities to Living Machines: Principles of Ecological Design; and the brand new: A Safe and Sustainable World: The Promise of Ecological Design; others tba.

-Alternative Energy for the Metro Area; hosted by Samuel Krevor, coordinator for SustainUS in New York City; with Wilson Rickerson from the Center for Sustainable Energy at Bronx Community College; Matt Williamson, Director of Renewable Energy at Natsource LLC; and Gordian Raacke from Renewable Energy Long Island

4:00-5:30
-Green Entrepreneurship; hosted by Mark Caserta of 3R Living; with Leslie McEachern of Angelica Kitchen; Brent Baker of Tri-State Bio-diesel; and Atom Cianfarani of Gaelyn and Cinfarani socially responsible fashion (and green consultant to Habana Outpost)

-Neighborhood Activism with Park Slope's Aaron Naparstek, Stuyvesant Cove organizer Joy Garland, Jesse Goldman of Make the Road by Walking; others tba

-Jobs and the Environment with host Joanne Derwin, Project Director, Urban agenda; Green Worker Cooperatives founder Omar Freilla; Elizabeth Yeampierre of UPROSE, and Harlem builder Carlton Brown

-Eco-Arts; hosted by Ecoartspace’s Amy Lipton; with artists Jackie Brookner, Brandon Ballengee and Christy Rupp

-Wild NYC; hosted by Wild Metro's founder and Director David Burg; with Wild Metro research coordinator Stefan Ekernas; Yigal Gelb, NYC Audubon's Program Director; and Teresa Crimmens, Environmental Coordinator of the Bronx River Alliance

-Green Progressive Media; hosted by WBAI's Deena Kolbert; with Ken Gale of WBAI’s Eco-Logic show; Joel Landy, host/producer of the cable TV show, Songs of Freedom; Mark Spellun, the founder of PLENTY, an eco-lifestyle magazine which focuses on new paradigms in “green” culture and technology; others tba

-The Battle for Clean Air-hosted by Bob Muldoon, Associate Regional Representative, Sierra Club; with Thomas Congdon, Policy Analyst with the New York State Attorney General's Office, Environmental Protection Bureau; and others tba

There will also be exhibits by:
Green Maps; OASIS/NYPIRG; Rocking the Boat; Photographer Amanda Means; and others tba

Special thanks to our media co-sponsor, The Nation magazine

Note: Some sponsors' tables may be available for a few legitimate green businesses and non-profits. Please contact carrie@ecometropolis.org for more information.