New Hours of Operation at the Newly Staffed Homeland Recycling Center!

A Message from our President, Cody Deem:

There are many questions about recycling, now that Central Disposal is Shawnee’s waste hauler. While many details remain to be clarified, I had the opportunity to speak with Chris, who will be staffing the drop site on the Homeland parking lot on Independence (same site we are all used to). His job is to answer questions and assist us all by placing our recyclables in the proper bins. This is a tremendous step forward in Shawnee’s recycling efforts! The site’s operating hours are Mon-Thurs, 8 AM to 12 Noon and 1 PM to 5 PM; Fri and Sat, 8 AM to Noon. The gate will be locked during other hours. This restriction will take a bit of getting used to, but by having the staffed site will discourage the dumping of trash and prevent the contamination of recyclable materials. The attendant can also assist senior citizens and others who may need extra help.

More information will be forthcoming and thank you for persistently recycling!

Have feedback? Contact Us will your thoughts on the new recycling plans and we'll pass the information on to the City of Shawnee

Shawnee's Native Plants Park is Looking Good!

Sustainable Shawnee's own Tom Terry and Shawna Turner have been working hard to promote the use of low-water use plants and drip irrigation in Shawnee. Direct Colors Inc., a local decorative concrete company, acid stained the concrete pathway in the park and later Tom Terry with the Garden Clubs of Shawnee followed with additional plantings.


The park was created by the City of Shawnee and the Garden Clubs of Shawnee in 2009. Sustainable Shawnee with the assistance of the Oklahoma Water Conservation Grant program purchased the drip irrigation equipment in 2010.

The Native Plants Park is located on the corner of Main and Broadway. Come on by!

Top 10 U.S. Air Polluters: Do They Live Near You?

The Toxic 100 Air Polluters index identifies the top U.S. air polluters among the world's largest corporations. The index relies on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Risk Screening Environmental Indicators (RSEI), which assesses the chronic human health risk from industrial toxic releases. The underlying data for RSEI is the EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), in which facilities across the U.S. report their releases of toxic chemicals. In addition to the amount of toxic chemicals released, RSEI also includes the degree of toxicity and population exposure. For the complete Top 100 air pollution emitters, visit http://www.peri.umass.edu/toxic100/

Top 10 U.S. Air Polluters:

Bayer Group
ExxonMobil
Sunoco
E.I. du Pont de Nemours
ArcelorMittal
Steel Dynamics Inc.
Archer Daniels Midland Co. (ADM)
Ford Motor Co.
Eastman Kodak Co.
Koch Industries

It's Local Food Week in Oklahoma!

June 13-20th

Local food is a valuable economic asset for the state of Oklahoma.

Any Oklahoman can celebrate Local Food Week in some simple way – by shopping at a farmers’ market or including locally grown food in the family’s meals during the week. A menu of many other ideas forcelebrating local foods is also available at http://www.buyfreshbuylocalok.com/.

A full schedule of Local Food Week events. is available at http://www.localfoodweek.org/.

Lasagna Gardening

Pesticides linked to ADHD in Children

What you bringing into your house?

Pesticides in foods are only part of the story. Soaps, dishwashing and laundry detergent, shampoos, toothpaste and many other household items also have chemicals in them that your family shouldn't be exposed to either. Consult the Whole Green Catalog for tested chemical-free alternatives for every imaginable product. Please consider making these changes. You'll be glad you did!

Study: A Link Between ADHD and Pesticides

Studies linking environmental substances to disease are coming fast and furious. Chemicals in plastics and common household goods have been associated with serious developmental problems, while a long inventory of other hazards are contributing to rising rates of modern ills: heart disease, obesity, diabetes, autism.

Add attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) to the list. A new study in the journal Pediatrics associates exposure to pesticides with cases of ADHD in the U.S. and Canada. In the U.S. alone, an estimated 4.5 million children ages 5 to 17 have been diagnosed with ADHD, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and rates of diagnosis have risen 3% a year between 1997 and 2006. Increasingly, research suggests that chemical influences, perhaps in combination with other environmental factors — like video games, hyperkinetically edited TV shows and flashing images in educational DVDs aimed at infants — may be contributing to the increase in attention problems.

"I am very confident in the correlation in this study, because we controlled for quite a few things that we thought could play a role," says Bouchard. "Adjusting for those things did not change the results very much. Which indicates that there is very little potential for confounding in this association between pesticides and ADHD."

Read more at http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1989564,00.html

Whole Foods is Coming to OKC!

I always enjoy shopping at the Whole Foods Grocery in Tulsa and finally after much waiting, Whole Foods has announced a new location in the OKC area. A location has not yet been disclosed but read more about this exciting development in the Daily Oklahoman and stay tuned for more details!

Water Use It Wisely Conservation Week

Econundrum: 12 Most Pesticide-Laden Fruits and Veggies

The Environmental Working Group recently analyzed samples of 47 common produce items in the state that they're usually eaten (i.e., avocados were peeled, apples washed with water, etc.) then ranked them according to the amount and variety of pesticides the researchers found.

In descending order, the EWG's 12 most contaminated fruits and vegetables:

1. Peaches
2. Apples
3. Sweet bell peppers
4. Celery
5. Nectarines
6. Strawberries
7. Cherries
8. Kale
9. Lettuce
10. Grapes (imported)
11. Carrots
12. Pears

For the full list of all 47 fruits and veggies, go here.

Community Vision: Sustainable Tahlequah is continuing to move forward with an eye on a greener and greater future for all residents.
By BETTY RIDGE Press Special Writer

Tahlequah’s future may not be exactly a Norman Rockwell illustration, but members of Sustainable Tahlequah have visions that could return many old-time values to a contemporary world.

During the first official gathering Saturday of Sustainable Tahlequah, which recently became an affiliate of the Oklahoma Sustainability Network, participants discussed these ideas:

• Expanding the Farmers’ Market and community garden that already exist.

• Developing a network where producers are listed and consumers can find a place to buy the locally-produced items they need. Although much of the meeting focused on foods, members said this could also include other products.

• Establishing a community kitchen where people could get together to can and preserve foods that are grown locally.

• Educational efforts, including gardening classes.

• Old ideas such as barter (trading what you have for something you need that someone else has) and neighbors getting together to share the labor of planting, harvesting, building fence, etc.

For the complete article, visit tahlequahdailypress.com/features/x1004929433/Community-vision