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05-11-2022 EC Agenda AGENDA CHANHASSEN ENVIRONMENTAL COMMISSION WEDNESDAY, MAY 11, 2022 FOUNTAIN CONFERENCE ROOM, 7700 MARKET BOULEVARD 6:00 P.M. CALL TO ORDER APPROVAL OF MINUTES April Meeting Minutes VISITOR PRESENTATIONS DISCUSSION ITEMS Arbor Day summary Regional Environmental Commission Conference summary July 3rd Trade Fair booth display planning Social Media Calendar review and updates City Updates: WaterWise Rebates, Tree Rebates, Emerald Ash Borer Update COMMISSION PRESENTATIONS ADJOURNMENT UPCOMING ITEMS AND EVENTS Upcoming items and events from 2022 Work Plan 1 1 Chanhassen Environmental Commission (EC) Chanhassen City Hall, Fountain Conference Room 6:00 pm April 13, 2022 Members Present: Kristin Fulkerson, Leslie Elhadi, Scot Lacek, Julia Adams, Greg Hawks, Markus Fischer, Scott Grefe, and Kaisa Buckholz Members Absent: Staff Present: Jill Sinclair, Environmental Resources Specialist Visitors: Keith Butcher Elect Chair/Vice-Chair:Kristin was nominated for Chair. All were in favor. Greg was nominated for Vice-Chair. All were in favor. Review and Approve By-laws: The commission added the term length for the youth commissioner. Approved amended by-laws. All in favor. Minutes: March minutes were approved. Arbor Day poster contest selection: The commission spent time reviewing poster submissions from Bluff Creek Elementary. The commission selected 10 posters as the top entries. From those, the commission selected the grand prize winner. The school and winners will be notified and the kids and their families will be invited to the April 25 City Council meeting to receive their awards. Jill asked for a couple of commissions to attend to help pass out the awards. Scot and Markus volunteered to attend. Arbor Day event planning: The Chanhassen Arbor Day event will be on Saturday, May 7 at Curry Farms Park. There will be 19 trees planted in the park. The event starts at 9a. Commissioners who can attend are asked to show up around 8:15/8:30a to help set up. The commission discussed supplementary activies for attendees. Lawn checkers, seed bombs, Frisbee toss, and a scavenger hunt were suggested. More options were a tree-themed corn whole toss, kite flying, chalk for drawing on trails. Jill said the city has a Tree ID guessing game that could be brought to the park. The commission would like to have signs made for the activities explaining the activity. July 3 Trade Fair planning: The theme will be water. Where does it come from? Answer to that could be the focus. The commission could have a diagram showing where drinking water comes from. Why Save Water? This could also be a focus. Activity ideas included a wheel spin for questions or prizes; squirting water at something; duck pond with water facts on the bottom of ducks. Jill suggested looking at Project Wet activities for educational activities related to water. Kaisa will research that. The commission will finalize plans in May and June. Perhaps the watershed could give away a rain barrel? 2 2 Environmental Commission Conference: The state commission conference is happening at the end of the month. Greg has signed up to attend. He has attended in the past and shared his past experiences at previous conferences with the commission. The commission requested to add a review of the conference to the May agenda. City updates: Sump pump and lakeshore buffer social media posts are running during the month of April. Pollinators are the topic for May. Kristin will be preparing those posts. In May, the commission agenda packets will be switching to a new format consistent with other commissions. The Gnomadic Gnome Eco Adventurer begins on Earth Day (4/22). After picking up a gnome at the Garden by the Woods, participants visit up to 20 Chanhassen parks and take pictures at way station signs to qualify for rewards at The Garden. Jill encouraged the commission to participate. The event runs through the Summer Solstice (6/21) Jill reported that visible damage in ash trees from emerald ash borer (EAB) is on a noticeable uptick in the city. She reminded commissioners to start managing ash trees in their yards now. Options include treatment or removal. General Discussion: Keith Butcher, resident and former commissioner addressed the Environmental Commission (EC) to thank them for their time and efforts on the commission. He shared that he was on the commission when GreenStep Cities was initiated and would like to make sure that the EC champions the program to the Council and that it’s important to keep it at the forefront. Professionally, he’s involved with wellhead protection and sees a role for the EC to make sure residents are educated on keeping driving water/groundwater safe. The commission asked if he had a shortlist of things to do to promote wellhead protection. Keith said to check the city’s wellhead protection plan, encourage mapping wells, minimize aquifer penetration, and make sure companies aren’t polluting groundwater. Cities need to work with neighboring cities to make sure protection plans are in place for all municipalities. The commission wondered if this topic should be added to the social media calendar. July and August are the same topics, maybe it could fit in there. Jill will switch the topic to July – groundwater protection – for Julia. Scot will do irrigation in August. The May agenda will update the media calendar. Greg shared watershed updates with the commission. The board approved some permits and payments. There was a discussion on the regulation of payments. They didn’t get through the whole agenda. Kristin gave an update on the fall event planning. She contacted the Chan Brewery about scheduling a trivia night in October. She hasn’t heard back yet so will reach out again. Julia shared that the Chanhassen Environmental Club is doing a park clean-up on April 23 at Lake Susan park. The club is also doing a compost sale on May 8 and May 15 at Chanhassen high school, noon-4p. 3 3 Meeting adjourned at 7:45 pm Minutes prepared by Jill Sinclair 4 Upcoming Events: May – Arbor Month May 7 – Chanhassen Arbor Day, Curry Farms Park May 21 – Paper shredding event, Public Works building June July August Connection article on focus topic July 3rd Trade Fair Progress Plan promotions for Plastic Free July Review GreenSteps – progress towards Step 3 Advertise for youth commissioner Plan Fall Community Service Event Promote Plastic Free July Trade Fair Event Summary July 3 – EC at Trade Fair Event July - Newsletter article due for fall/winter edition Youth commissioner interviews Month off 5