12-09-20 MIN1
Chanhassen Environmental Commission (EC)
Regular Meeting – Fountain Conference Room and Zoom Online Meeting
6:00 pm
December 9, 2020
Members Present: Bill Chappell (zoom), Kristin Fulkerson (zoom), Jeff Harken (zoom), Greg Hawks
(zoom), Don Vasatka (zoom), Lucy Rehm (zoom) and Markus Fischer (zoom)
Members Absent: None
Staff Present: Jill Sinclair, Environmental Resources Specialist
Minutes: November minutes were approved.
City updates:
• The Parks dept. will be promoting a program in January that encourages residents to come hang
bird feeder pine cones in the trees in City Center Park.
• The city has registered with the Adopt-A-Drain program. Promotion of the program will begin
next year hopefully.
• The issue of garbage hauler districts has been postponed until Jan or Feb. Jill will bring it back
to the commission for any input prior to the council discussion.
• The 2021 newsletter will be issued twice – spring/summer and fall/winter. Spring/summer
covers Mar. 1-Aug. 31 and fall/winter covers Sept 1- Feb 28.
• Lucy’s open position on the commission will wait to be filled with the rest of the positions in
April. Interviews for new commissioners will mostly likely only be held with the City Council.
2021 Recycling education event brainstorming: The commission considered hosting a virtual event
in February. Maybe partner with the Blue Couch team. Or maybe participating in Feb Fest somehow. It
might be hard to plan for any in person events and wanting to make contact with people during the
event. Feb Fest may be changing to a weeklong event. The commission was still interested in booking
the DemCon trailer for July 4 if it’s possible. Greg offered to contact them. Another idea was to invite
Don Shelby to do a virtual presentation on green living. Stan Tekiela could also be an option and could
talk about micro plastics in birds/environment. The commission thought Feb might come too soon to
plan an event. Maybe use Feb meeting for planning an upcoming event. A green film festival was
suggested. Pick 3 movies to show over a period of time. Or pick 1 and have a city-wide discussion
afterwards. Could also have a recommended book list and push relevant content. Kristin offered to
compile a list of resources commissioners send to her and create a post. Commissioners thought a
steady stream of news, content, etc. for ongoing communication is important to keep public attention on
environmental issues and commission. Maybe start with 1 or 2 posts. The commission could also
promote a city wide book club.
2
Work Plan 2021: The commission reviewed the draft plan.
• Virtual event planning was added to February
• Further development of the communications plan was added to January
• Interviews in February are tentative
• Suggestion was made to try for a virtual tour of the Environmental Center or other possible tours.
The commission discussed how to incorporate the communications calendar and the work plan. The
calendar could be used just to promote events but it would be beneficial for increasing communications
throughout the year. The commission could also re-publish interesting articles, such a RAM (Recycling
Assoc. of MN) articles. An agenda bullet could be added to each month asking for articles to share. It
was suggested that a paper shredding event be added to the fall.
General Discussion:
• No news from the watershed district. Meeting is tonight after Env. Comm.
• Jill shared that commission meetings will be held by Zoom indefinitely.
• Good luck to Lucy on her move to City Council!
• Northern lights are forecasted for good viewing tonight.
Meeting adjourned at 7:35 pm
Minutes prepared by Jill Sinclair