Environmental Commission - Regular Meeting

It is now 7 o'clock in the Twinsburg Government Center and I will call this meeting to order. Uh remember we have to turn our mics on hitting the button to make it green. Uh we'll do roll call here. We will start down here with Shantanu. Shantanu Pay. John MacArthur present. Jonah Pashette present. Gina Hutter present. Michael Walton present. Helen Mings present. Patrick Jeffers present. And David Post is present. But he's up getting agendas. I was just looking to see if there was any if anyone got um copies of I mean they were sent out and I have mine on my phone. I know. Are they normally hear them? Usually that's okay. It's okay.

And then next we move on to the approval of the minutes. We need to approve both the October and the February minutes. Are there any changes that need to be made to the October minutes? Are there any changes that need to be made to the February minutes? Then I would entertain a motion that we accept both the October and February minutes as submitted. Is there a second? Second. Seconded by Gina. All those in favor of approving the October and February minutes as submitted, please say I. All oppose, please say nay.

Both minutes for October and February are approved as submitted. Uh next there are presentations and I don't think we have anybody u there is nobody in the audience unfortunately for audience participation. So that brings us to commissioner reports. Um we will start want to start with Sean today. Why not go left or right? Does Sean have anything today? Is your microphone on? Just want to make sure everyone's microphone. Yep. It's on. John.

Um I have nothing other than it's nice to be back and nice to see everyone. Wonderful. Um, I will give a a short commission report now because we have new business unfinished and miscellaneous later. Um, just three quick things here. Summit E-waste, I know we've talked about that in the past. Uh, Summit E-Waste offers drop bins at the Metro Parks. Uh, one of them is located at the Liberty Park uh, Metro Park here in our city. And so if you wanted to recycle cables, monitors, batteries, laptops, and more, uh there is a drop off bin at the uh Liberty Park metrop parks along with a whole host of others. More locations have been added recently. It's always there. It's always there.

It is always there. It looks like it's year round. You could learn more at this link. I'm going to kind of try to annunciate as best as possible. It is bit t. SLSMP greener future. So bit.lyward slsMP greener future and you could learn more about it at that link. The next sort of thing on my report, I emailed it to all the commissioners, but it is the wastewater treatment plant tour. Um, after our last meeting, we we asked if I could go reach out to Nate about another tour. Um, working within his schedule, in the confines of his schedule. Uh, Wednesday, July 29th from 2 to 3:00 p.m. is is when he's free. And so, if you're able to make it, that's wonderful. But, as always, it's not required if you've been or or you know, you have other obligations. But Wednesday, July 29th, 2 to 3:00 p.m. at the wastewater treatment plant. We're trying to bring some other people, some community members. I think we set up to 10 people and that's what I told Nate. We'll have a sign up at our Earth Day Arbor Day event, but if you know of community members would like to come, by all means, you could either email me their name and we'll just kind of keep a running list going. That way, we could kind of keep that that going.

You could Did you um you could advertise that on um just Twinsburg Talk? Absolutely, too. That's it's another on the social media pages. It's another avenue. If we don't get enough people by our Aubberday Earth event, I'm sure we'll find Yeah. the 10 by then. But I want to see if we could get the sign up at that Earth Day Arbory event. Are you capping it at 10? Uh that is what I told Nate. But if we have like an Cuz he'll do more. Yeah, we have a crazy amount of people that want to do it. I I'm sure he'd be happy. Yeah, they do. I think tons of kids at one time. We're setting a smart goal here. Smart, you know. No, agree 100%. I'm just saying if you get more, I don't want you to cut people off. No, absolutely. Absolutely.

Um and then this is really not related, but the weather is starting to warm up and I've seen a lot of children out in the parks. um, you know, riding their bikes. With that said, just, you know, if you're out and about, make sure you're kind of watching your surroundings. And none of you would ever speed, so just make sure you're kind of watching that and, uh, cautioning your surroundings because again, more children are going to be out and about and so be cautious of that. Uh, that's all I have for my report. I'll talk later, you know, in miscellaneous, new business, all of that. So, we move on to Gina for her report. Um, I just wanted to say that I would love to have an insert in the mailer and I I started writing up some stuff and maybe we could meet at some point because you had mentioned that you wanted help with it. So, ideas welcome and um I need to get that to whom is it my contact and do we have approval for this to be put in as a as the mailer or added? Uh Jenny would be your

Jenny is the person your marketing contact and is this something we need to get permission from council to pay for or anything like that budgeting wise our budget comes from Rebecc Rebecca Ziegler. Yeah. So I you could add her on the email or ask Rebecca Zagler. I could send you her contact. But our budget comes from the cost is so minimal that I don't think you're going to get uh nobody's going to say no to an insert to do good for the community just to be sure. be sure to post. No, I understand that. But I'm saying, but it's it sounds like it um feels good down there. Okay. Yeah, absolutely. I wrote um something up. I'll share it. I'll email it to you and tell me what you think. Yeah. Perfect. Okay. Anything else?

No, that's all I'm working on. All right, Michael. Nothing to report. Absolutely. And then Helen, nothing to report. All righty. And so with that, we now move on to uh council report. We'll start with you, Councilman Post. I I got nothing. All right. I have nothing. I think uh you cover all the bases. I I appreciate that. That's a compliment. So then we move on to our engineering report. Nothing to add right now. Excited to see your guys' trail maintenance project uh on the agenda. Think that sounds interesting. Well, that you could thank parks and rack for that. And your our conversations the last meeting reminded me that is something that helps with the you called it points I think for the

Yeah. Yeah. Or storm water annual report that we put in. So, I thought thought we could help out parks and wreck and combine the commission's efforts and work. Um, so with that, we now move on to unfinished business, new business, miscellaneous. I ask that we we talked about kind of three things. First being the award selection subcommittee. Uh, so we just solicited nominations for our good neighbor award. We had four or five nominees um this year come in and and we need to now have select three individuals to serve on that sort of subcommittee to narrow that four down to top two where then ultimately we as a commission would pick the top two at the next meeting if that's still the route we want to proceed as we had done last year. Uh, I know Virginia is not here, but she did want to be and serve on that little subcommittee like we did last year. And we could only have three of those members on a subcommittee because you do more than three. It becomes an open public meeting at that point in time.

Well, I'd be willing. I'd like to serve on it as well like I did last year. So, we have Virginia, we have Helen. Would anybody else want to serve? John. All right. So, we have Virginia, Helen, and John. I'm okay with that. Is everybody else okay with that? Shant new seconds that all in favor please say I. I. I.

All opposed. All right. So, Virginia, Helen, and John. Uh, what I will do, I will blank out the names like I had done last year. And so, it just simply says name redacted, but you could then read the entire rest of the nominee form. I'll get the rubrics that we created last year out to the three of you. Um, and the three of you will coordinate Virginia, John, and Helen time to meet between now and before our next meeting to go through. Okay. Score them, look at all that, and you'll present kind of the top two scoring people back with us at our next meeting.

That's awesome. All right. Um, are there any other questions or topics on that award award selection? Anything there from the commission? All right. So, then Earth Day, Arbor Day. Uh, I just had a couple updates. I wanted to see if the commission had any questions, if you guys had any ideas. Um, but I did end up ordering a couple of prizes and a small activity for us to to do at the commission. Um, they are in. I just asked Pat if he could hold on to them here in the office instead of, you know, us holding on to them until then. Um, but I am going to follow up with all the participants either this week or next and say, "Hey, we're a little over a month and a half out. Just want to confirm you're still attending. How many tables will you need? Here's the setup time. It's 9:00 a.m. to 11. Event runs 11 to 1 at the community center. Any questions? Uh it does seem there's a lot of eager participation. Um we've had Journey Church reached out to me and Director Bettinson asking if they could somehow find a way to get involved. They wanted to grill hot dogs and burgers and add add a sense of community and director Benton and I said that sounds wonderful. Um you just need to get a permit from the county to grill at an event like this. So it seems like they're moving forward with that and the Girl Scouts just reached out to me to talk about, you know, possibly tableabling to talk about their environmental badges and stuff like that. And I said we we would welcome any community partner and I did speak on behalf of our commission for that.

So is it 9 to 11 or is it 11 to 1? The event is 11 to 1. Okay. But we're we're running setup. So setup is 9 to 11. Really setup is just putting up the the tables and making sure all that's set up there. What did we run last year? We just had our table and the parks and recck department set all the tables up. They set everything up for us. We were just responsible for our table. What time did it run? Oh, last year it ran was it 10 to noon? 10 to noon. 10 to noon, I think. Okay. That's why we went We went We pushed it an hour back. Yes. Because of people were came in late. Yes. Yeah. That was that was Yeah. I just wanted to make sure it was later than last year.

Yes. Yeah. Because last year all the people came in like the last hour and we thought maybe it was just too early. So, we pushed it from that 11 to one. If it's super busy and it works wonderful this year, next year we could talk about expanding the time because it doesn't have to be two hours. But we figure let's start with two and see how it works. But are there any questions, any concerns? Anything else Arbor Day Earth Day related?

No. All right. And then the last thing um is the trail cleanup with parks and wreck. Uh I got a message from director Benson and Andy. He is a member of the parks and recck commission. He wanted to he had an idea in their commission meeting about uh doing a trail cleanup and I believe Councilman Post attended this so if I miss anything or or you know misquote him Post can correct me but they'd like to do a trail cleanup around the city of Twinsburg. They talked about combining it with Arbor Day. Personally I think that might be too much in one day um to try and combine a trail cleanup with Arbor Day and I think it might be better to do it after the fact so we could get more community members involved. That's my personal opinion, but he's thinking about cleaning up downed branches, picking up trash, dealing with overgrown brush, and then ultimately repainting and blazing the trail. He his idea is either a oneanddone scenario where you do like, I don't know, a park or all of the trails at once or a single trail at a time. And this becomes a sort of repeating recurrent event. Um, TNHA Virginia had said she'd be happy to help and TNHA could have would be happy to volunteer. Um, but that's all I sort of have here and I told Andy and Director Benton said I'd bring it to us as a commission to hear your thoughts.

Well, my husband's on the rec board, the commission. So, he also was telling me about it and um I'm like, "Yeah, if if we don't do it, I'll help you." So, sounds good to us. It's fine with us. Yeah. Do we? But I thought they picked a different day. I I don't remember. I thought I he they had a different day picked. Yeah. My my email with him, he said it was originally about Arbor Day, Earth Day. Um and possibly combining it. And I I simply responded, I'll talk with the commission, but it might be too much to combine it with that one day.

I think about a different day. Um because we're doing that Arbor Day in April. Yes, April 25th. Why couldn't we pick some May, June? May, June. That was my thought as well. Especially if you want to get the community involved. It's a lot to ask the community to come to our event and then later to come back out to also clean up the trail. And if we're doing one thing, that doesn't mean we can do two things simultaneously, right? Um, and who knows what the weather is a lot more sketchy in April in Cleveland than if we postponed it a couple weeks. We can advertise it at Arbor Day. Absolutely. Um I I think get the word out there because you have similar people.

I think they just have to decide what they want though. I mean there's multiple trails. Are you going to pick a group and assign them a trail? Are you going to focus on one trail? Right. They just have to decide what they want. It sounds like they're going to take the lead on this and they just they we are and I always brag about us council councilman postass. We're a very active commission and so I believe they asked us because they can rely on us to help and show up and if we're able to and willing, they know we'd be there. Um, which is why I I wanted to see what our thoughts are. We wanted to do an allin one and done or if we want to make this maybe a recurring thing with the parks recurring. I think it should be recurring. Okay.

I think it should be like we did our Arbor Day last year. Like maybe if they're starting this this year, pick one trail. Pick the trail that goes from Dodge over to Glenwood. That's a pretty long trail. There's stuff whatever they could do. Pick that. How well how does that work? And then decide, okay, we're going to maybe branch out. Maybe do two next year or something like that. Okay. So, or even make it once a month in the summer. Yeah. Or like the first Saturday of every month. Here's the trail, you know, that we're going to meet at. Come if you can. Oh, I do like that. like a once a month trail cleanup doesn't sound terrible either because that way it's a come if you can. Yeah. Also keeps it fresh in people's minds.

That's true. Yeah. It's a once a month advertise well in advance, but it's it's not too much where it's it's overburdening. I I like that. Um, I because I told Andy, obviously I can't volunteer the commission to to do everything and uh I I feel like I volunteer us for a lot of stuff in the community already, but I I told him I'd be happy to have this conversation and send back what we talk about. But it sounds like we're happy to to help out a little bit if we can and they just need to decide when it would be, but we would prefer May or June a recurring maybe once a month event. Am I Am I hearing that right? That's good. Starting in May, we'll advertise in the um Earth Day activity

or even beginning, mid and end of summer, right? Both like even just three times for the whole season. Three time whole season versus like five or six once a month. I think you know three time middle and end is more than enough. I don't think you need absolutely five for the whole I don't know. I'm just thinking alone. Yeah. And certainly if 35 people come, you can say, "Hey, our second choice, anybody who has a car, if you're interested, go to this path or whatever. It's not that big of a deal." Yeah, we'll figure it out.

So, okay, I will let Andy and Director Benton know that. Um, that brings us to the the remainder of kind of miscellaneous. Is there any other uh miscellaneous conversation items for new business? Alan, anything other miscellaneous? Nothing. Nothing that I can think of. Michael, anything other miscellaneous? Nothing for me. Gina, do we have a shredding day date? We do. Can you tell me? Remind me so I can put it up. Is June 27th from 9:00 a.m. to noon at the public works department. There are two trucks. Yes, two trucks on that same day. Nice. So, last year want to make sure I get it right.

And uh I did hear they are going to be planning on checking resident IDs uh at it this year. So make sure Twinsburg residents only. So yes, we don't have uh people from neighboring communities filling up the trucks before Twinsburg residents are able to. But June 27th, 9 to noon, public works, two trucks, resident IDs, no more than six bags or boxes if we're keeping standard from last year. Um It was raining. We were just getting out of there. Anything else miscellaneous? I don't think so. Councilman Post.

So, I I still think that uh it's a really good idea to advertise the schools. I'm not saying necessarily, Jonah, that you need to do it. Uh, but I really think that if we advertise in the schools for the Arbor Day event, you know, with just that flyer, my opinion, I think that that is a huge marketing grab to get the kids and their families. It's an easy way to get it out there. It's something for the mom to do with the kid in the morning. Um, the kid shows interest, then, you know, mom's going to bring the kid and really it's us educating the kids really, right? So, I I still think that that in my opinion is a is a score. Um, if you guys disagree, that's fine. But, if you were going to do that, you would need I don't know if we talked about last meeting. I don't know if there was anything from last meeting to this meeting.

I'm just throwing out my two cents with that that I I I think that's easy because it's just someone passes them out in schools. Does the commission Did you guys receive the flyer that was created for this event or was it just me and you on it? No, just me. I didn't get a flyer. I will forward it to all of you. Director Bettinson of parks and wreck. She created the flyer for this event. And so it basically it's last year's recycle just logos changed, but it says, you know, environmental commission, parks and rack, watershed partners. It shows all the different partners for this event on the flyer. And so I'll forward that to you. I thought I sent it. I apologize. So did you add the new attendees like Girl Scouts and Journey Church?

No, it just has like I think the big four. So, like us, parks and rack, watershed, um, and I think Metro I think are the big four. But it doesn't have all the tables listed of who's it doesn't have every single one now. And I could easily go in if we wanted to and like add those in the top. No, it's not. Don't we have the gardening club? Club. They're I think they're a big poll and they might be the fourth. They might be the fourth. Yeah, I know there's four for sure, but I will forward that to you and so forward to commission writing a note to myself. But that could be the flyer we just send right away to the schools. Start pre-made. Save some work. And you guys don't have to do it. Again, that was just my suggestion. Well, even if we just email it to the principles and the PTAs and we say, "Hey,

event, can you get this out?" The word out, many of us on here work at schools. We know that that's a great way to get word out, right, through PTA and the the principles. Oh, I think yeah, that they can put it out. They could PTA could put it on their Facebook page. The principal at least a Will Cox she that he he sent she sends out um like once a week something a little thing or they could put it on parent square or whatever. Right. So that's Thank you. That was that was a welltimed reminder. So

and and I have one more thing. Um I think when it comes to that trail cleanup I I think it is a great idea. Um you know I I know that you guys um you know not that there's a right or wrong. I I think that it would be okay to let parks and le wreck run that you guys are so involved in so many things and have your hands in so many things that you know I almost think like it's great that to invite you as it is related but you know maybe let them take the lead on it you know so that way they got their hands on something you guys got the good neighbors award you guys got this you got that you got all these things going on you've got all these events you've got I don't know I think that you know Absolutely. I

I would let them take the lead on it personally and then you guys can say, "Hey, when is it?" We'll be happy to show up because we just want to do it because we individually think it's a good idea. You know, that's that's why I ask for feedback. I'll I'm giving you that's my feedback. I'll let I'll let Andy know our our feedback, but like I said, it's I think Parks and Rack is taking the lead on this. We I I volunteer for a lot as is in the fall, all the years, but this was their event. They they brought it forward. So, we'd be happy, I think, to help. We can, but I don't know that we need to run the trail cleanup. So, yeah, just supporting it is different than running it.

And if they can take our feedback, they don't have to, but I will provide it to invite you and if you're able, you show up. Yes. So again, happy I always happy to try to tell, but I will give them the feedback the commission that recurring event once a month and you know, probably not starting on a a Arbor Day because it's probably not the best day to start and if they take it, they take it. If they don't, they don't. So that's that's what I could do. Anything else, Councilman? That's it. I thank you. Gina, did you have anything else miscellaneous? No, I don't.

I have nothing else miscellaneous, Sean. Anything else? Johnson. Nothing else. All right. So then we move on to excusing absent members. Uh I move that we excuse Virginia Schmidt. Is there a second? John seconds. All those in favor, please say I. I. All oppose, please say nay.

Virginia is excused. Our next meeting date is April 7th, 2026 at 7 p.m. And we as a commission will decide the good neighbor award out of the top two nominees. Um and before we adjourn, councilman post. Uh, I think for this commission, I wrote it down here. I I don't recall if everyone is returning um for I think some people's applications were up. Um, and so I just want to address that here just to bring it up real quick. I think that we're going to be starting interviews uh soon. The deadline was we extended the deadline already once. Whose terms are up? All right. And I don't I I think two of the three of you are returning. And was it Are all three of you planning on returning? I had turned it off.

I I applied three times I put it in. Okay. Cuz I thought I saw that. I just wanted to bring it up cuz I thought I saw Sean knew that it said that I'm going to have to double check, but I thought I saw that it said that you were not reapplying unless I read that wrong. No, that's why I brought it. I couldn't apply for it. So, I sent an email and I they there was somebody I think either Shanner or somebody said they received my application because I tried submitting it then I tried signing in would let me. So, I sent an email.

Okay. Then I'm going to have to go because I wrote notes on all the committees and who's coming back and I just want to bring it up to make sure that if you did want to return that you did reply. I thought it was I I thought I saw you guys. I really was addressing that really to to you cuz I thought and I might have miss seen or maybe it was two weeks ago and maybe you did it in the last two weeks and maybe that was the difference. I just want to make sure he had sent me an application about he had sent me an a text and I'm like look I tried applying and I sent an email through the website look how do I get you know because I tried signing in I couldn't so

yeah so may maybe it's been within the past two weeks or I don't know yeah maybe I'm I'm trying to find the email but it doesn't matter as long as you you replied to Shannon and she knows and she confirmed that you're good, then you're on. Well, then you have reapplied. Yes. I I just like I said, I just wanted to make sure. Okay. Cuz I thought I saw that not everybody responded. I know those that deadline was extended till March 7th, something around there. I actually thought it was last Friday, but it might be but it might be this Friday, but I thought it was last Friday. Just two weeks from week. Oh, might might have been. Okay. But we could always extend it. Huh? It was Shannon Collins.

Yeah, Shannon Collins is who you would reach out to. When did you reach out to her? Was it just recently? Yeah, it was

trying to figure out. Okay. Well, if it was just this week, for example, that's probably February 7th or something. Okay. We're We're all good then. Okay. All right. We're all good. That's great. And any other miscellaneous? No. All right. So, our next meeting date will be April 7th, 2026, 7 p.m. here in Twinsburg Government Center. We'll decide on the Good Neighbor Award there. Um, and then presented at council in the May uh meeting. I have to double check with council president Bellin, but I've spoken once with him. He seems, you know, okay with that again. Um, and so with that, we will adjourn the meeting at 7:26.