March 2019 Meeting Notes

March 2019 Meeting

 

Attended by: Jim Olson, Daniel Livorsi, Eric Johnson, Peter Rolnick, Pam Michaud, Del Holland, Barbara E.,

 

During the CCL video conference welcome time where you can “unmute” and say your chapter name, Eric showed his “Keep Calm and Price Carbon” t-shirt, and the CCL speaker loved it and mentioned 2 or 3 times during her portion of the meeting! Eric shared the link to the shirt:

https://www.redbubble.com/people/ericdjohnson/works/35811409-keep-calm-and-price-carbon

 

The speaker talked about how the business community actually does want climate change addressed (even though they’ve dragged their feet in the past). And how we need to scrutinize any climate change policies or actions offered by fossil fuel companies.

 

Mark Reynolds: “Don’t neglect the power of young people” We need to get them engaged in climate action with us. He mentioned the Sunrise Movement https://www.sunrisemovement.org/

 

Here’s the recording of the CCL video conference:

https://community.citizensclimate.org/events/item/29/222

 

We played an “get-to-know-each-other” game where a few people talked about a game that they currently like and what they like about it, followed by a period of 1 minute for the rest of the group to relate to the game, or what the person said.

 

We learned about a game called “Exploding Kittens” : ) for kids and about Jenga and its cross-generational, cross-cultural apparel, and, from Jim Olson, President of the Johnson County chapter of Iowa United Nations Association, we heard about the climate change simulation game created for the United Nations Association last year, where rich countries and poor countries had to interact and see the direct consequences of their actions.

 

Barbara updated us on the CCL Conference Scholarship Idea and details about how to make the recipient of the scholarship accountable. Due to the tight timeline of the end of March for conference registration, Barbara will work with the Office of Sustainability to select a few students to receive the grant. We also received an anonymous donation of $1000 to send people to the DC conference.

 

Announcements were made at the end

 

• Iowa Solar Bill that’s ruining solar in Iowa with a dishonest ad campaign
  • See attachment
• Tabling subgroup was formed and 6 members volunteered
• Tabling will happen on April 20 in Quad Cities
• Iowa State CCL Conference is April 27 in Mason City
• April meeting, Iowa Utilities Board Chair Huser is speaking about Iowa’s transition to renewables
• Elli Sparks from CCL HQ will be coming to Iowa for 12 days to help us
• Old Brick has offered very low cost office or meeting space to our group (Eric has contact info if you’re interested)
• Presidential Candidate subgroup was formed, and 2 people are members
  • See attached
• State Fair Volunteering
  • Des Moines CCL discussed having a presence at the State Fair this year with other local environmental groups. The idea at the moment is that the individual groups may manage the booth independently over the 9 days of the fair. Details are not finalized, but potentially we would need people from 9am – 9pm on those days.
  • Janelle in Des Moines is reaching out to determine the feasibility of this on behalf of the group, namely to figure out if they can get enough volunteers.
  • If interested, contact janelle.donahue@gmail.com.