Application for Green Sanctuary Candidacy

This is the body of the application the UUFA will submit to the UUA Green Sanctuary Committee as the part of the process of certification as a Green Sanctuary Congregation. This document is the culmination of the UUFA Green Sanctuary Committee's work over the past year. In addition to this narrative part of the application, we submitted three attachments, the report of an energy audit of our facility, a copy of the Present practices of our congregation: UUFA’s environmental footprint survey, and a summary of the survey results; pdf versions of these documents are attached.

Congregation Profile

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Ames (UUFA) is a diverse congregation of just over 300 members and 170 youth, and we employ a full-time minister, a full-time director of youth and children’s ministries, a part-time office administrator (20-hour), a part-time projects coordinator (10-hour), and a part-time music coordinator (10-hour). We occupy a modern steel and concrete building near the campus of Iowa State University (ISU), with large plate glass windows along parts of the east and west arcs of the round, multi-use worship area, known as the Fellowship Hall. On many Sundays we face the west window that looks out upon a hillside of grasses, flowers, and trees, a vivid reminder of our connectedness to the earth.

The UUFA’s History with the Seventh Principle

The Fellowship’s philosophy of shared ministry depends upon the creativity, commitment, caring, vision, discernment, and institutional knowledge of its members, working together. The scientific inquiry and interest in the humanities that takes place at ISU and in central Iowa feeds into the Fellowship. Many members focus professionally and personally on improving land and energy use and water quality in Ames and beyond. For example, one member has developed a presentation that uses undergraduate-level physics and chemistry principles to demonstrate that the currently observed increase in the earth’s average temperature is an inescapable consequence of the current rate of production of CO2 by human combustion of fossil fuels (http://hfranzen.org).

Many have connections to this land’s productivity and many of us—63% of those who responded to our survey of the congregation, Present practices of our congregation: UUFA’s environmental footprint—grow plants for food. The active engagement of such gifts in our community life has drawn the UUFA toward a fuller commitment to and expression of the Seventh Principle.

Green Sanctuary Committee

Interest in becoming a Green Sanctuary congregation dates to October, 2002, when Erv Klaas, then chair of the UUFA Environmental Committee gave a Sunday morning service about the process. Since then, a “Green Corner” column has run in our monthly newsletter. In the summer of 2007, the Fellowship held a four-week series of Sunday morning programs on environmental sustainability, a combination of minister- and lay-led services that produced wide-ranging conversations about what we could do as a congregation.

Early in 2009, Klaas obtained approval for a Green Sanctuary application from the UUFA Board, then addressed a meeting of the UUFA Council of Committees and encouraged each committee representative to imagine out loud about how their work could become “greener.” Many committees began to develop green plans and projects. And, in the decentralized manner in which the UUFA’s shared ministry occurs, these groups have gone ahead and implemented some of these plans—before they could be codified into a Green Sanctuary Action Plan. In short, the UUFA is not standing still in its quest for deeper enactment of the Seventh Principle even as we apply to participate in this program.

The official roster of the UUFA green sanctuary committee consists of 24 UUFA members who have contributed to this application process by proposing action plan projects and activities; surveying our individual environmental practices; and participating in a day-long retreat where “we sought to gain consensus on what we as the UUFA Green Sanctuary Committee are doing, why we are doing it, and how we want to go about it within the context of the values and goals of the UUA Green Sanctuary Program.” A core of about a dozen members collaborated on this document in bi-monthly meetings and sought enthusiastic leaders for our action plan projects.

The following three sections that constitute an assessment of environmental practices are a summary of the professional environmental audit of our facility; a narrative that describes the Fellowship with regard to our present, corporate policies and practices with regard to the environment; and a summary of a survey of our environmental attitudes and practices.

Environmental Audit Report

On July 8, 2009, Mike Willis, with The Energy Group, conducted an energy audit of the 12,000 square foot UUFA building. The Energy Group compiled our energy usage costs from the City of Ames (electricity) and Alliant Energy (natural gas), and reported an average usage of 35,869 KWh @ $0.07 per kWh  (annual total = $2,498) and 4,145 therms @ $1.00 per year, resulting a total annual energy cost of $6,643.

The auditors used eQuest, a building energy analysis tool that uses the DOE2 engine. The UUFA facility is equipped with five Lenox natural gas furnaces with split system air conditioners that include two 92.1 AFUE (annual fuel utilization efficiency) furnaces and two 12.65 SEER (seasonal energy efficiency ratio) air conditioners (installed to serve the 2004 addition); a 78 AFUE furnace and a 13 SEER air conditioner (installed in 1992 to serve the Fellowship Hall); and two 90 AFUE furnaces and two 13 SEER air conditioners (installed in 1996 that serve the rest of the building).

The auditors report, “The heating and cooling costs are relatively low for a building of this size. Therefore an increase in efficiency will result in a smaller reduction in yearly energy costs than normal.” The audit report included data about replacing the lowest efficiency equipment (serving the Fellowship Hall) with “cost-effective high efficiency upgrades” to a 94 AFUE furnace and a 14 SEER air conditioner as well as two options for air source heat pumps and two geothermal heat pump options.

With estimated installation costs ranging from $3,900 to $154,000 and considering rebates, annual savings ranged from -$101 through $113 to $2,236. Simple payback on these investments ranged from no payback to payback periods ranging from 34.5 years to 68.9 years, and payback after rebates ranged from no payback to payback periods ranging from 21.9 years to 68.9 years. Appendix A is the report from The Energy Group.

Given this information, we will continue to adjust our programmable thermostats weekly to account for events and programs in the building and we will monitor and maintain our current systems to ensure optimal performance and minimal energy use and environmental impact.

Summary of our Congregational Assessment

This section is arranged according to the four Green Sanctuary focus areas, worship and celebration, religious education, environmental justice, and sustainable living.

Worship and Celebration

Worship and celebration are strengths in our Fellowship’s existing enactment of environment principles.

Worship Activities  Over the past three years, 23% of our Sunday morning programs focused on awareness of natural rhythms, the interrelationships among human and biotic communities, our role in sustaining the planet, and the considerable challenges we face in doing so. In fall 2008 our minister, Brian Eslinger, taught a graduate class at ISU on religion and the environment, and developed several sermons from it. Green issues are also paramount for several of our talented lay presenters, who come to these issues from different sensibilities.

Several seasonal rituals serve as the pillars for our celebrations of nature. Like many UU congregations, we have a Flower Communion in the spring, and we celebrate a Salsa Communion in late summer and an Apple Communion in the fall. At our annual early fall ingathering, members bring water from their summer travels or experiences. The Sunday services closest to the equinoxes usually focus on the turning of the seasons, and we celebrate Earth Day annually. One member family hosts a fellowship-wide bonfire at their farm every winter solstice and held a summer solstice celebration and a dedication ceremony for their newly erected 2.3 kW wind turbine.

Incidental services also focus on environmental issues. Recent topics have included global warming, understanding land-as-community, and a youth-powered food revolution. Two musicians who celebrate the earth, Jim Scott and Peter Mayer, have graced our Fellowship Hall in the past year.

Celebrations  The celebration of nature extends to Sunday noon congregational meals held in the Fireside Room and Fellowship Hall about four times a year, a summer picnic at a nearby city park, and holiday potlucks at the Fellowship on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter Day.

In February 2007, we resurrected a tradition of Fellowship meals that involve volunteers signing up in advance to bring food served in buffet style for members, friends, and visitors. The focus is on fine food and camaraderie with no required payment. However, there has been a basket for free will donations that support Fellowship meals, youth travel, local social justice work, and promoting local food. We host one potluck with only local foods.

We use hand-made calico tablecloths and napkins to create a pleasing and inviting atmosphere and we use recycled bottles as vases to demonstrate how to reduce, reuse, and recycle.

In the summer of 2009, the Fellowship’s Social Justice Committee initiated a garden program at the Ames Boys and Girls Club. Others planted and harvested a symbolic, container garden on the UUFA grounds, symbolic because of limitations imposed by shade, poor soil, or the lack of available space. It was refreshing to see the scarlet runner bean vines and tall sunflowers and fun to harvest sweet potatoes grown at the Fellowship.

The Fellowship also supported an informal group, the Iowa Agriculture and Arts Network, that held an Iowa-grown dinner that was attended by about 70 people who enjoyed two locally produced videos about rural Iowa and the importance of locally grown food.

The UUFA is home to the Gallery in the Round. The Art Committee has invited artists who reflect upon Seventh Principle themes to display their work. Recent exhibitions have included drawings and outdoor installations by John Siblik, who works with willow and other natural materials; eggshell and pastel paintings by Ingrid Lilligren, who reflected in her artist’s statement on the environmental dilemmas of her profession of “object making”; and a series of photographs by the Paddlers that celebrated canoeing and kayaking on Iowa rivers and streams.

Religious Education 

The number of children in our religious education program has grown rapidly in recent years. Children attend RE classes at 9 or 11am on Sundays, during the adult services. Every other week, the children start the hour in the Fellowship Hall before being invited to their upstairs classrooms. They are especially included in portions of the seasonal communion or ritual celebrations. Middle-school and high-school students meet at 11am only, and the high-school students also have a well-attended Wednesday-night youth group.

Our upstairs classrooms (PS/K–6th grade, space we share with a Waldorf preschool) are well situated to encourage appreciation of nature, with a sliding glass door leading to a patio, a wooded outdoor play area, and a hiking path up the hill. During the summers, the transition between outdoors and indoors is practically seamless. At summer camp this year, the children spent about two hours a day outdoors. Opportunities to observe the changes of the seasons are woven into lessons throughout the year.

Lori Allen, our director of youth and children’s ministries, wrote and implemented “Stories of Our World Family,” an elementary curriculum last year that focuses on the Seventh Principle and includes activities such as observing the conditions that hinder or help plant growth, learning about George Washington Carver and Rachel Carson, and studying stories about other cultures’ spiritual connections to nature (e.g., the importance of the Ganges River to Hindus). This year, Allen wrote a nine-month curriculum organized around the four elements (earth, water, air, and fire). In addition to the classroom curriculum, each element will be celebrated by a multi-age outdoor event. Water, for example, was celebrated by children and their parents on a creek-walk with a professional naturalist.

Preschoolers, middle-schoolers, and teens also participate in the UUFA’s culture of nature awareness. Last year, preschoolers had a 10-week unit on the natural world; middle-school students volunteered to help with recycling and outdoor clean up; and teens chose to go on two camping trips. The youth’s biennial Boston Heritage trip always includes a trip to Walden Pond.

Adult religious education at the UUFA is generated by the minister and the membership committee and arises spontaneously and is organized according to the interests and needs of individuals and groups. Groups such as the Skadberg Science Circle and Women’s Spirituality meet biweekly or monthly to read books about and discuss shared interests, including environmental topics. Prairie Fire, the UUFA young adult group, focuses on earth-centered practices, and the Prairie Sage Circle is an Earth-based spirituality group. UUFA members and friends participate in the reading of Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac, an annual Ames community event. We offered two of Northwest Earth Institute’s discussion courses, “Choices for Sustainable Living” (2007) and “Global Warming: Changing CO2ourse” (2008), and we plan additional courses in the future.

Environmental Justice

Forty-eight members (about 15% of UUFA members) are members of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, which has Environmental Justice as one of its focus areas.

The UUFA donates half of each month’s undesignated offering to local or national social justice organizations. Most of these focus on the immediate (i.e., non-environmental) needs of local homeless people, battered women, disadvantaged youth, and those who face food insecurity or need help with electric bills, as well as those focusing on GLBT and freedom-of-religion advocacy. In an early response to the Green Sanctuary Certification process, the newly formed Social Justice committee designated April as the month to financially support an environmental organization; in April 2009, we sent more than $600 to the local Squaw Creek Watershed Coalition, and the September 2009 amount went to the international organization, Water For People.

Fellowship members who have traveled to visit our sister congregation in Tordátfalva, Romania, have reported receiving an education in sustainable living. The villagers live off the land with few inputs. Our work there has included fixing up an empty pastor’s residence for use as a guest house and low-impact tourism destination point; the larger picture is to help this shrinking rural village retain at least some of the younger generation.

The UUFA is part of the Alternative Gift Market program for the holiday season. The gifts purchased through it—e.g., tree plantings, domesticated animals for third-world families, donations to grassroots groups—are frequently in keeping with environmental justice. The Social Justice Committee planted and tended a vegetable garden at the Boys and Girls Club of Ames this summer to provide inspiration for children who might not otherwise have access to that experience.

Community Involvement  In addition to donating half of our undesignated offerings, the UUFA gives 1% of its annual budget as membership dues to A Mid-Iowa Organizing Strategy (AMOS), a congregation-based community organization serving Ames and Des Moines that advocates for social change. The environment is one of AMOS’s four focus areas. In 2008, UUFA members and friends helped AMOS in Ames lobby city government and ISU for greater consideration of greenhouse gas emissions and conduct “Ames, Be Cool” forum as a project of the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement and Cool Cities Initiative, which included preparation and distribution of an action guide to educate people about environmental practices and options.

The UUFA is a contributing member of Good Neighbor Emergency Assistance, a local non-profit organization that provides individual and family social services to the community, including quality education opportunities for people with disabilities, free care-giver referrals for in-home assisted living services, and mental health counseling. Every Tuesday for more than 21 years, UUFA members and friends have provided the evening meal to residents at the Emergency Residence Project Shelter, which provides temporary lodging, meals, and other support to homeless people.

Members of our Fellowship serve as volunteers on boards and commissions that serve the city, county, and state. For example, members monitor water quality in our local streams as part of a state-wide IOWATER program sponsored by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, and help with prairie restoration on a state prairie preserve managed by The Nature Conservancy.

Sustainable Living

Almost all of the UUFA’s sustainable living measures are best described as practices rather than policies. Nonetheless, over the past several years, a great deal of effort has been focused on greening the UUFA physical plant. One policy, however, is explicit: all UUFA events and classes are directed to use the Fellowship’s dinnerware, cups and silverware rather than disposable products. This policy extends to renters of the building.

Paper Products and Plastic Recycling  Paper conservation began in earnest several years ago. Postcard meeting reminders were replaced with emails. Two-thirds of those on the general mailing list receive the monthly newsletter (usually 12 pages) in digital form. The paper purchased for the office is generally post-consumer recycled paper. The newsletter—which is printed off-site—is not post-consumer recycled. Beginning July 1, 2010, the newsletter will be distributed by email, with paper distribution being available only by opt-out.

A bin is installed outside the Fellowship Hall for people who attend the 11am service to conveniently recycle their programs (people who attend the 9am service usually leave programs on their seats). Programs are generally kept to one double-sided 8½ x 11 sheet.

Energy Use  With the introduction of programmable thermostats, the Fellowship’s utility bills were $2000 under budget last year. The thermostats can program as many as four different temperatures per day; each week, the volunteer building and grounds manager studies the upcoming schedule of events and programs the thermostats accordingly. Last year, gaskets were replaced on the Fellowship’s metal doors to eliminate drafts.

We are gradually replacing our 200W incandescent bulbs with 40W fluorescent bulbs, and we use halogen bulbs for spotlighting in the Gallery in the Round. We open or close the curtains on the large windows in the Fellowship Hall to allow natural light and heat or shield the room to minimize our need for air conditioning; we rely on light from a large skylight in the room.

Water Use and Management  The Fellowship’s water comes from our municipal utility in Ames, Iowa.  The city obtains its water from 22 wells drilled in to a large shallow aquifer contained in ancient glacial riverbeds. The aquifer is recharged from surface water that infiltrates through streams and rivers that overlay the aquifer.

The Fellowship uses water to furnish the needs of six toilets (two with low-flow commodes), two drinking water fountains, and two kitchens, a satellite kitchen with a microwave and a catering kitchen. The catering kitchen has two double sinks and a commercial dishwasher that cleans and sanitizes in one operation; a separate hot water heater serves the dishwasher. We do not irrigate our grounds.

Chemical Products  We switched to non-toxic cleaning products several years ago. We use vinegar and water for glass and Dr. Bronner’s products for other surfaces. However, our dishwasher uses standard, toxic, corrosive chemicals. The wooden dance floor in Fellowship Hall is sealed with a non-VOC coating. No chemicals are used in the landscape upkeep, and we use sodium chloride (mild freeze) or calcium chloride (deep freeze) on the sidewalks.

Transportation, Parking, and Landscaping  Although most of the people who come to the Fellowship drive, biking is on the increase, at least on fair-weather days, and we provide a secure bike rack. Bike paths and a city bus route pass directly in front of our building. Buses run on a 20-minute schedule during the week and 40-minutes on weekends. We do not have a formal car-pool program in place at the present time, but we hope to respond to interest in this as a possibility.

Parking is a critical issue at the UUFA and has restricted our growth to some extent. On most Sundays, our two small parking lots are quickly filled, and others must park on a residential street 300 yards up a steep hill. Some people have the opportunity—or challenge, depending on your perspective—to walk as much as a third of a mile from their car to the Fellowship. In 2008, we bought a residential property adjacent to our current site to increase our parking capacity. Although this meant removal of a large cottonwood tree and a house and garage, we recycled the house by finding a new home for it. We investigated permeable pavement for the new parking area, but the high water table precluded this option. To offset the removal of the tree, a Fellowship youth led volunteers in planting six evergreens on the west hillside.

Landscaping has been planned carefully in relation to the site. Ginkgo trees, which handle air pollution, line the adjacent street. Ground cover holds the soil on the south hill, with a small lawn on the east. The west hill behind the Fellowship is landscaped naturally, with un-mown grasses, native prairie flowers, and trees line the perimeter. Paths and the play area in the back are paved with woodchips. At least one gutter drain is equipped with a chain that slows the fall of water so that the soils beneath it are not eroded.

Building addition  In 2003, we added a wing with office space, a library, and a large youth room. At that time, we imagined many green designs (e.g., ground source heating and a green roof) that had to be abandoned due to cost. However, a recent bequest provides funds specifically for roof solar panels that will be installed on a different portion of our roof.

Other  The UUFA has no policy regarding the social or environmental responsibility of the funds or companies in which it invests its endowment—now valued at about $160,000. A highly functional user-based website was created this year to allow virtual conversations among members of the UUFA’s various committees, and we hope that this new communication venue may decrease the frequency of meetings, and hence, our environmental footprint.

Summary of the Present Practices of our Congregation Survey

To determine the present practices of individuals and households in our congregation, the Green Sanctuary Committee (GSC) prepared and administered Present practices of our congregation: UUFA’s environmental footprint, a SurveyMonkey survey in fall 2009.

The GSC conducted this survey primarily to determine our present practices, but we also intend to administer the survey after we have completed our GSC projects to assess the impact of those projects on our understanding of environmental issues and our practices. To assess changes in our attitudes and actions, we collected demographic data for eight indicators so we can compare cohorts over time, including the two-year benchmark of our Green Sanctuary certification process and at regular intervals thereafter.

In addition to the demographic questions, the survey presented 20 questions in 9 content categories.

• Environmental Issue Awareness
• Major Changes that Help Reduce Environmental Impact
• Solid Waste Issues
• Day-to-Day Energy Conservation Practices
• Water Conservation
• Toxic Substances
• Food Purchase Choices
• Growing Your Own Food
• Earth Justice

Methods and response

We administered the survey in three ways, electronically as a link from our website that was open for 14 days; on eight computers that were available before, between, and after services a the UUFA on September 29, 2009; and as printed pdfs of the survey that were available on the 29th and by request. Over the two weeks that the survey was open, we received 65 responses (21.6% of our approximately 300 active members and friends). We requested one response per household (approximately 150 households), and we believe that fewer than five households were represented by two responses.

The complete survey is included in Appendix B. Appendix C presents tables and charts of all of the data, including representative responses to the open-ended Other (please specify) option for most questions.

Summary of results

Even before the GSC administered the survey, we believed that UUFA members and friends were generally aware of environmental issues and had already modified their practices accordingly. Therefore we were not surprised that nearly 60% of respondents felt they were well informed about environmental issues while only 3% (2 respondents) considered themselves not well informed. Thirty five percent of respondents identified climate change as most important environmental issue. Water quality and availability was the most important issue for 22% of respondents.

The respondents reported conservation practices that are consistent with this trend, with 77% reporting that they had already purchased a more fuel efficient or hybrid vehicle; 50% had completed a home energy audit; 58% had improved the insulation in their home; 44% had installed a more efficient HVAC system; 51% had installed low-flow showers and faucet aerators; 42% had installed low-flow or dual-flush toilets; and 35% had planted drought-tolerant landscaping.

In response to Question 9, In my household, to recycle and/or reuse things that would become solid waste, I/we . . ., 40% reported that they compost yard waste; 65% recycle/reuse glass bottles and jars; and 40% recycle newspapers. This question generated the most (15) written comments; this response was among the longest and reflects the gist of most of the comments.

When will Ames get serious about recycling? I mean, I can recycle soup cans, but that's a pound or two every month. How about old appliances? Scrap metal? Plate glass? I still throw out more than I want to, because I don't have good alternatives.

When asked about their transportation practices, 34% of respondents walk or bike often in lieu of using their cars; 95% consciously plan trips to include multiple errands, and 41% have reduced discretionary air travel.

In terms of energy use in their homes, 63% don’t use A/C or set their thermostats to 75º or higher degrees in the summer; 74% wash only full dishwasher loads; 45% wash laundry in cold water; and 56% turn off lights when not in use.

For questions about water conservation, 86% reported that they wash full laundry loads or adjust the water setting to conserve; 58% turn off the water while brushing their teeth; 66% now take briefer showers; 40% reduce or eliminate outdoor watering; 43% don’t wash their cars as often; and 27% select plants that require less water.

When asked about practices related to potentially damaging substances, 88% reported that they dispose of car batteries and motor oil properly; 65% use minimal amounts of chemical fertilizers; 67% use water based paint; 60% use no lawn chemicals; and 62% dispose of excess medications properly.

In terms of shopping for and purchasing food, 44% reported that they use reusable shopping bags; 33% have reduced their consumption of meat and poultry; 29% avoid over fished or endangered species of fish; and 47% patronize farmers markets. Many UUFA households (63%) produce at least some of their own food, and 45% produce their food organically; 21% produce food to share; and 17% preserve some of what they grow.

We received 57 responses to the multi-part question about earth justice, and 65% reported that they purchase fair-trade goods often or sometimes while 21% reported that they purchase these goods whenever possible. This question solicited only two comments:

As a single mom on an extremely small budget, I often have to make the choice to either purchase socially irresponsible food items or go without.

I lack reliable, up-to-date knowledge on what businesses I can trust, which to avoid.

Survey conclusion

In general, the survey responses confirmed our beliefs about the present practices of our congregation and reflected support for pursuing certification as a Green Sanctuary Congregation. Slightly more than 73% (of 60 respondents) indicated that they are excited about the program, and this question generated 13 comments. 10% responded that they don’t care either way or think the UUFA focuses on the environment enough already.

On the other hand, one respondent completed the I am excited about the program choice this way: “but, I don't want it to become a creed that alienates people who come to the UUFA for other reasons.” This trend was reflected in other comments, such as

• I think it is a worthwhile cause, but I wonder if we are preaching to the choir.  Perhaps these efforts could be better used in direct action against those who are ruining the environment;
• It is good to see a congregation attempting to live up to its mission—the 7th principle; and
• Yes, I am interested in the program, but the certification is just a step—and hopefully a catalyst. I am concerned about how fellowship folk build the trust to work in solidarity to actually make changes.

In general, responses to this and other questions indicate support for the Green Sanctuary process to complement and confirm the UUFA’s ongoing commitment to, for example, our Welcoming Congregation status, our outstanding youth and children’s ministry, our vibrant Sunday morning programs, and our social justice programs.

Proposed Action Plan Projects

Based on this kind of support from UUFA members and friends and from the GSC and the UUFA board and other committees, we put forward these 12 projects for consideration as meeting the requirements for certification as a UUA Green Sanctuary Congregation.

Worship and Celebration Projects

Sustaining Intentional Earth-Oriented Worship and Celebration

Project Description:Continue to be deliberate in incorporating environmental, earth justice, sustainable living, and other green practices into our regular and special worship and celebration events. Continue to recognize and draw upon the resources of the many groups within the Fellowship (e.g., the meditation group, women’s spirituality, the drumming group, planners of our memorial garden/columbarium) that already focus on the Seventh Principle as we develop opportunities for spiritual practice and celebration.

Timeline for Completion: Ongoing

Lead: Sam Wormley

Raising Community Awareness of Environmental Issues through a Symposium and Concert

Project Description:Plan, publicize, and implement an artist(s)-in-residence educational program culminating in a concert with artists/teachers such as Libby Roderick and/or Joanne Shenandoah and her husband, Douglas George Kanentiio, for UUFA members and friends as well as members of the larger Iowa State University, Central Iowa, and Ames communities.

At this time, we have not decided which artists/teachers would be best for our purposes, but both Roderick and Shenandoah and Kanentiio are well-known educators and entertainers whose works raise consciousness about critical issues and inspire people to work for social change.

Timeline for Completion: Spring 2012

Lead: Christianna White

Religious Education Projects

The Elements: Connecting Body, Mind and Spirit to Planet Earth

Project Description:Continue to be deliberate in incorporating environmental, earth justice, sustainable living, and other green practices into our religious education programs for children and youth. Our curriculum focuses on the four elements—water, fire, air and earth—and our interaction and dependence on these elements.  Each week the students hear a story with an element theme.  They then reinforce the message of the story with art, music, nature, movement, and special projects.  Our middle and high school students facilitate these activities for the younger children on occasion, giving them an opportunity to develop leadership skills and share their advanced knowledge of environmental subjects. Activities have included informal noise and energy audits, recycling, and outdoor activities like nature walks and adopting a class tree.

Our high school students spend one weekend camping each year, where they learn more about the environment and engage in a project designed and facilitated by the campsite organization, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.  For several years the entire RE program focused on green practices by always using reusable dishes and napkins for snacks in the classroom and exchanging tap water for processed and bottled juices for weekly snacks.  This year we have cut down on resource use through a year-long art project rather than weekly craft projects.

Timeline for Completion: On-going

Lead: Lori Allen and Doug Jones

Life-long Learning and the Environment

Build and expand a series of small group discussions to promote environmental awareness and encourage people to take actions toward preserving the planet. We will use study guides such as those from the Northwest Earth Institute, such as Sustainable Systems at Work, Choices for Sustainable Living (2009 edition), Voluntary Simplicity, Menu for the Future, and Healthy Children-Healthy Planet. We also plan to use a series of documentary films on current environmental issues, such as Annie Leonard’s videos, The Story of Stuff, Thinking Outside the Bottle, and Cap and Trade.

Timeline for Completion: Fall and spring beginning in fall 2010

Lead: Erv Klaas

Environmental Justice Projects

Be an Active Institutional Member of AMOS

Project Description: AMOS—A Mid-Iowa Organizing Strategy—is a local IAF (Industrial Areas Foundation) broad-based, non-partisan, community organization comprised of 27 congregations and community institutions, including the UUFA. AMOS is based on the idea that ordinary people, working together, can accomplish great things in a democracy and have a say in the destiny of their own community.

UUFA members will work specifically with the AMOS Environmental Research Team to educate member institutions and other community organizations on the benefits of sustainability planning. The ultimate goal of this team is to help formulate and adopt a comprehensive plan for sustainability for the city of Ames.

Members will also work with an AMOS team whose goal is to develop a workforce intermediary program for mid-Iowa. This AMOS economic development project is modeled on Project QUEST in San Antonio, TX, and will bring together business leaders, workers who are unemployed or underemployed with the aptitude and attitude needed to succeed, and institutions of higher education to help people move into good jobs that offer fair wages and full benefits. This AMOS team is gathering information. By talking with people in each of the concerned groups about opportunities and road blocks, we’ll develop a plan to make our state a place where people who want to work can get the training they need and where companies know they can find a trained, motivated work force.

Timeline for Completion: Fall 2010 through early 2012

Lead: Jim Murdock and Cathy Scott

Environmental Restoration Service-Learning Project in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico

Project Description:This project will help us understand our role in the global community and the social and agro-environmental problems that globalization is causing for our neighbors in rural Mexico and to examine our own worldviews though one-on-one interactions with Mexicans, while contributing our labor in an environmental restoration project that is yet to be determined. Since Iowa and the Yucatan are both rural, corn-growing areas and have had an official Sister-State relationship since the 1960s, this is an excellent place to study the interplay of modernization and agro-environmental destruction.

This ongoing service project will help our congregation understand and work on environmental and social justice issues, cooperating with the agroecology school called by its Maya name, U Yits Ka’an (dew from the heavens) that is located just outside of the town of Maní, Yucatán. This school, started in 1996 and directed by liberal Catholic priests, educates peasants and youth in sustainable agriculture and empowerment, along with teaching the local Maya language, culture, and traditions that are disappearing. The school has dormitories, classrooms, a dining hall, gardens, agricultural fields, livestock, and a Mayan bee project on site.

Our coordinator in the Yucatan is a retired Central College (Pella, IA) Spanish professor, Dr. George Ann Huck, who lives there. Huck, who agrees with UU principles and attended a UU fellowship in college, has arranged and led many educational trips for Central College students in the Yucatan and in Chiapas and has a particular interest in gender and social justice/inequality issues.

We plan to offset our travel footprint by planting and/or caringfor young trees on deforested land and we may buy carbon offsets for the air travel.

Timeline for Completion: The first nine-day service-learning trip will be in March of 2011, during spring break, with pre-trip educational sessions beginning in Fall 2010. We anticipate an ongoing, two-way environmental education exchange so that we can improve both the physical environment and understanding on both sides of our shared border.

Lead: Sue Jarnagin

Take Back the Tap

Project Description:Water is a basic human right and not a commodity to be bought and sold for profit. When it is treated as a commodity, our democracy, health, and environment suffers. Drinking water in the city of Ames, IA, is pumped from a large underground aquifer, examined for contaminants, treated, and distributed to our household taps. The drinking water utility is publicly owned and regulated under state laws. As in most communities in the U.S., the quality of our drinking water is excellent and inexpensive. However, bottled water corporations have convinced American consumers that the only place to get clean, safe water is from a single-use PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottle—when in fact commercially bottled water is minimally regulated and has negative social and environmental impacts.

This project will begin an education and advocacy campaign in our community to change behavior and beliefs regarding drinking water. We will educate our members and community groups, and ask local institutions to Take Back the Tap; make a commitment to opt for tap over bottled water; use safe, refillable water bottles; promote drinking fountains; and support public water systems.

Timeline for Completion: Fall 2011 and beyond

Lead: Roger Jacobson

Sustainable Living Projects

Solar Panel Project

Project Description:Solar electric or photovoltaic (PV) systems use solar radiation during daylight hours to generate electricity. Renewable energy should be viewed as a long-term investment, a way to help reduce the usage of fossil fuels, and thus our carbon footprint.

In 2007, the UUFA Board allocated and a congregational vote approved the use of $15,000 of a bequest to fund a solar panel project. These actions led to almost three years of study, site analysis, and meetings with the City of Ames that culminated with passage of an ordinance containing covenants governing solar panel installation on residential and commercial properties. The creation of this body of legislation supporting the production of electricity by private citizens and businesses is a groundbreaking contribution to the citizens of Ames, Iowa.

The UUFA is moving closer to achieving pioneer status as having the first electricity producing solar panel installation permitted by the City of Ames that allows for net metering. In 2008 the Ames City Council, at the urging of UUFA members, passed a Net Metering Interconnect Agreement that allows installation of an electric meter that can run backwards on a PV system. If a facility produces more electricity than it uses, the excess is returned to the electric company to be utilized at a later time by the owners of the PV system.

The UUFA solar panel system has been designed to expand, as additional money is available to install more PV panels, thereby increasing the amount of energy produced.

Timeline for Completion: We will install a 3 kW system in the summer of 2010

Lead: Janet McKee

Promote Home Energy Audits and Educate Toward Conservation

Project Description:Raise the funds to purchase several Kill-A-Watt-type devices and build a program that will help people understand their consumption of electricity by using one of the devices on all of the electrical appliances and equipment in our homes and businesses. We plan to begin the program in our congregation, and then take it into the community.

Timeline for Completion: Fall 2011 through spring 2012

Lead: Ralph Gandy

The UUFA Green Policy and Guidelines Project

Project Description:Establish a written, comprehensive Green Policy for the UUFA with a plan for ongoing review and revision. We anticipate that the Fellowship’s corporate green policy would address issues such as, for example, how we invest and spend our money.

In addition, the policy would cover things like how we implement energy conservation measures, such as converting Fellowship Hall recessed incandescent lighting to florescent or LED fixtures, installing motion sensing light switches inside, and replacing one water heater with on demand heater(s).

Under the umbrella of this project, we plan to form a committee that will maintain a list of Green Guidelines and make them available to UUFA members and friends who will be encouraged to submit ideas for decreasing our ecological footprint and establishing sustainable practices. The committee members’ contact information will be included regularly in the Fellowship’s Green Corner in our newsletter. The committee will meet regularly to discuss the submissions, and then discuss them with the appropriate Fellowship committee or the UUFA Board before adding them to the Green Guidelines.

Timeline for Completion: Spring 2011 and beyond

Lead: Jamie Gurganus

Promoting and Celebrating the Use of Local Foods

Project Description:In many ways, the Fellowship is progressive in understanding and promoting the use of locally grown food. However, we plan to become more organized and intentional by developing a local foods task force that will take the lead in promoting food grown in central Iowa and informing Fellowship members and friends about food as well as the ethics related to food production and consumption.

Our activities will be gently informative such as occasional, informal discussion topics at our Sunday morning produce sharing table and asking the Sunday Morning Program Committee to relate the program on the fourth Sunday of January to that day’s annual Iowa-grown meal.

We will offer informal challenges such as inviting people to make personal commitments on special occasions, such as pledging on Earth Day to purchase one local food item per, and we will offer ways for people of all ages to connect and collaborate on growing, harvesting and/or purchasing and preparing local foods including hands-on classes about using local foods.

The Meals Planning Group will continue to purchase locally grown foods, and the coordinator of the in-home potluck dinners will discern ways to encourage the use of local foods at those meals. We will collaborate with the Environmental Committee when it offers the Northwest Institute’s “Menu for the Future” curriculum at least once every other year and presents food-related documentary films.

Timeline for Completion: Beginning in Fall 2010, the task force will meet twice a year, in May to plan our summer efforts and August to plan our efforts for the academic year.

Lead: Helen Gunderson and Linda Barnes

Going Native: Revising the UUFA Landscape

Project Description:The UUFA property is populated by invasive species including buckthorn and honeysuckle. We propose removing invasive plants and planting native woodland species that are appropriate to the site.

Timeline for Completion: Summer 2010 and beyond

Lead: Mimi Wagner

Communications Plan

We will use the following strategies to share information about environmental issues and sustainable living with the congregation.

• Expand the Green Sanctuary section on the UUFA website (www.uufames.org) so members can read about what is being done, communicate with each other, access the UUFA Green Sanctuary Action Plan, and receive green tips.
• Communicate about Green Sanctuary activities in the weekly congregational email, our  website, announcements section in the order of service, and the monthly newsletter.
• Wear a big green hat while making announcements on Sunday mornings and inviting UUFA members and friends to get involved in Green Sanctuary activities.
• Place sign-up sheets for current activities in the Fireside room during social hour.
• Engage in conversations and invite participation through personal contacts.
• Provide visual information through postings on a Green Sanctuary bulletin board, posted in the Fireside room.
• Establish a Green Resource Center in the UUFA Library with information about environmental issues and sustainable living strategies. We will call attention to this resource center in the UUFA newsletter and on the website.

We will use the following strategies to collaborate with the other groups, organizations, and committees within and beyond our congregation.

• When appropriate, Green Sanctuary Committee members will attend meetings of other Fellowship committees and the UUFA Board to coordinate efforts.
• Keep the UUFA staff and the Board informed of our activities through e-mail, telephone, and personal contact.
• Use and build upon committee members’ contacts with other environmental organizations in Ames, Central Iowa, and Iowa State University.
• Communicate with outside organizations through e-mail, phone, and personal contacts.
• Send press releases of major speakers, events, and accomplishments to local and regional media.