Sustainability Subcommittee of Campus Planning
California State University, Fresno
November 20, 2008
8:30am-930am
Police Briefing Room-Police Department
Members Present: David Moll, Amy Allen, Ron Durham, Andrew Jones, Lisa Kao,
Lanny Larson, Ron Leach, Thomas McClanahan, Mike Mosinski,
Gary Nelson, Joseph Oldham, Christopher Pluhar, Nate Wills, Jeri
Willis
Absent: Caryl Jacobs, Briana McDonald, James Tyner,
The meeting was called to order by Dave Moll at approximately 8:35am.
Approval of last meetings minutes: Motion to approve placed by Andrew Jones, seconded by Mike Mosinski and all accepted.
Dave reported that the Listserv is up and running. All information for the committee will be reported on Listserv.
No new people so no introductions needed.
Matt Harmin Sustainability Coordinator report:
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Working on getting new lids for recycling containers.
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Greenhouse Gas Emissions Audit will give us a baseline for the last fiscal year. This project could function as a collective graduate or upper division seminar project involving some students in the Earth and Environmental
Sciences Department.
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Meeting later with Elizabeth Potter in Procurement and Lisa Kao to review the
E-Waste recycling contract.
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Residence Dining composting program is coming together. A planned route to get composting material to the farm area has been worked out. Andrew Jones offered to assist Matt with forklift training.
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Will bring a draft copy of the University Statement on Sustainability Principles to the next meeting. Will also send out on the Listserv in a few weeks.
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Will try and meet with the Student Senate at the December meeting.
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Library brochure is coming together which will also be incorporated on the
Library’s website. Will work with Lanny to use some of the graphics that appeared in the Fresno State magazine. Lisa recommended having pictures of the Library’s own Green Team for the brochure also.
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Planning to meet with Dean of the Library Peter McDonald.

Dave encouraged the committee that if there are any issues or suggestions they would like
Matt to work on feel free to contact him. Matt will discuss suggestions and program ideas with Dave so they can be prioritized and worked into Matt’s schedule as appropriate.
Joseph Oldham Fresno Green Team:
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Fresno Green Team reports one of the most important issues within the City of
Fresno is water conservation.
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City of Fresno approved an Urban Water Management Plan in August 2008 which will have significant impact on their planning processes and efforts of their own Green Team. They will be working very closely with the Water
Technology Incubator at Fresno State. It would be valuable to reference Fresno
States water consumption and goals. It would also be helpful to collaborate and work together to communicate on Fresno States efforts and approach to reduce water consumption in order to answer any questions that may come up from the
City Council, the City Manager or the new mayor.
Dave mentioned he watched a webcast on Wednesday, November 19, 2008 from Cal/EPA on Prop 84 Water Conservation measure that was pasted. There was a lot of money that was appropriated to fund this proposition. We need to partner with the city to apply for a grant under Prop 84. We will need some of the Prop 84 money to start developing our own waste water treatment program on campus so we can irrigate with gray water first on the farm and then later for landscaping. By partnering on the grant proposal we can include units for the campus and the city.
Joseph also indicated:
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Sarah Pomare, our Grant Writer in DPU, is very interested in projects that the city will be looking at and identifying to be included in the FY10 budget that the city is currently working on. The City Managers office indicated that water conservation is going to take the same level of importance within the city as air quality. Water conservation could become more important in the publics mind in 5 years and perhaps eclipse air quality in 10 years as being the number one issue for the valley. So if we get in early, we get the grant monies, get the projects going and then we will get the good reputation for being proactive.
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Some statics that were given at the last Fresno Green meeting: o Within the City of Fresno-water usage is 296 gallons per person per day of which 50-60% of that being used for landscaping. In the 1940’s
California had a large population influx from the middle part of the country. Those who moved here had lush landscaping ideas and with the pumping technology and building of dams at that time they were able to provide adequate water for them. We now have people using water at a rate that is totally unsustainable. o Rainfall on average is 10” per year. Last two years rainfall has been significantly below average due to the climate changes. Fresno State has worked closely with the city to develop the climate report. We are

going to see longer periods of drought and more intense droughts.
When it does rain it rains very hard for very short periods of time which will cause high levels of runoff and low levels of snow pack for residual water to feed the reservoirs. As a result, if our views are not changed as to where we live we could face ecological disaster. The goal within the city based on the Urban Water Management Plan that was approved by
Council is to reduce water consumption by 20%. If the council is going to require the general public to reduce their water conservation then the city needs to take the lead. The city used over 915 million gallons of water last year for city facilities. The parks were the number 1 usage for landscaping. To meet the goal the city needs to cut back approximately two million gallons of water per year which will be a big task. o We need 40-50” of rain per year to meet the current 296 gallons per person per year. o 10” of rainfall per year is the borderline for a desert area which is basically what we are. We need to rethink what we plant in our area to plants that will survive in a drought area like those who were here in the late 1880’s. Some examples are the oleanders and palm trees that were planted on Kearny Boulevard and are still surviving.
Dave indicated that it would be great if Fresno State could take more leadership in appropriate landscaping. The new University High School landscaping plan that was approved will be using over 3700 plants most of which are in the mid range, close to the building, and many are water intensive plants. Alternatively, this area ideally could have been a gravel landscaping area. We need to keep the trees that provide shade for cooling and help with improving the air quality, but to prevent running out of water we all should strive to start cutting back on landscaping and plants just for “show.” Very often these types of plants, if poorly chosen, do nothing to decrease the heat island but increase water usage significantly.
Question placed for when is the grant deadline for Prop 84. The grant criteria is currently being developed and to be completed by March 2009. The grant application period will start in July 2009 which will go into the next calendar year.
Question was placed as to the amount of water used by Clovis. Joseph indicated the amount is less than Fresno but still over 200, approximately 240-250 per person per day.
Question placed to what is the sustainability number for water use per day? Joseph estimated 120-150 gallons per person per day.
Question placed as to what educational campaigns is the city looking into doing. The average person either does not know the proper landscaping or they haven’t really thought about it. In Fresno we are surrounded by Coastal Redwoods so it is believed it is normal.
And the local nurseries don’t really have the proper plants for our area.
Dave Moll Wastewater treatment & dual plumbing:

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Wastewater treatment as mentioned before we want to partner with the city to take a look at a grant to get do some wastewater treatment here on campus for our irrigation for the farm then later for the rest of the campus.
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University High School is the first building on campus designed with dual plumbing. Initially the building will run off domestic supply water then when the
Wastewater Treatment Plant is online we will be able to split graywater from the solids and use it for irrigation, thereby saving a tremendous amount of money and reducing the amount of water pumped from the ground. For the rest of the campus we probably will develop some type of parallel plumbing which will have a lot of benefits. One of the greatest benefits will be that we will no longer need the backflow preventers that you see all over campus. These are vey expensive to purchase and maintain.
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Campus Pointe developers are also interested in this issue .
Dave Moll Budget update & effects on our projects:
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Budget update-we have had $50,000 in planning funds pulled back by the president to help with offsetting our one-time cuts back in July. This money was to be used to move the recycling center and the build-out of the recycling center over by the new organic garden center near Willow and Barstow. We still have $100,000 left in VPA funding for that project so we can still move forward but maybe at a slower pace.
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Because of the cutbacks we’re going to loose flexibility. We will need to be more creatieve with funding. This is why Matt is working on grant funding to offset the money we won’t be able to get due to the budget cuts.
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If there are any ideas from committee members please include some creative funding ideas to look at.
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Everyone should have received a copy of the”green issue” of Fresno State
Magazine except for Joseph Oldham. Dave has enough for everyone on the Fresno
Green team and he will get them to Joseph.
Lanny Larson reported there has been generally positive feedback on the Fresno State
Magazine. Couple of concerns:
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One regarding using soy ink but we are not out of bounds with using it.
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This budget cuts may force us to not use recyclable material for future issues.
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Next issue will be on the library which will be the centerpiece to demonstrate what is “green” in the library along with showcasing the different types of gardens that will be a significant part of the exterior “look” of the new library.
Dave congratulated Lanny and his team on a magazine well written and focus was in the right place.
Lanny mentioned they are going try to keep “Green” in each issue to keep it in the minds of the people.

Question was asked if the magazine will be interested in any editorials or columns to print.
Lanny said yes and the broader based the articles are from people who the readers can identify with the better. We also need to talk more about the partnerships with the city to encourage people to care.
Dave suggested maybe Joseph can do an article on water conservation. He also suggested, a “Green Scene” column that can be coordinated by Matt.
Andrew suggested we watch how we use the “green” because people are already rejecting the term.
Joseph suggested we need to start framing discussion less in terms of green perspective and more into a survivability perspective. Everything is green in some way.
Lisa Kao Report on E-Waste program changes:
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For a couple of years we have had our community electronic waste events where the community could bring their electronic waste. As time has gone by the need has become less. Our last event was in October 2008 and we only had 115 customers take advantage of the event. Our event before that was in April 2008.
At our previous October events there were 350 and 375 people.
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Electronic Recyclers of America informed us that they will begin charging us $.15 per pound for electronic waste. We would have to tell the public that we will start charging them for something that was free. We didn’t feel that was going to work to well so we decided not to do discontinue the program.
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Lisa and Matt will work together to post on the campus Sustainability and
Recycling website where the public can take their ewaste for free.
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We did the events in the first place because we were looked at as the center point to the city and also the public thought they were helping us by bringing their ewaste to us. It did help for a little while but not anymore.
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We also used to take light bulbs and batteries along with other things that were waste stream problems which unfortunately we can’t do anymore either. There is a
“take it back” program, where retailers can take back items that they sell, in the works.
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Will send out on Listserv information about EStewards to make sure electronic recyclers people use have signed up with the Basel Action Network.
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Meeting today, November 20, 2008 at 10:00am with Elizabeth Potter in
Procurement because our current Electronic Recyclers contract has expired.
Joseph Oldham additional Fresno Green Team report:
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Scheduled meeting for December 5, 2008 that combines November and December due to the holidays.

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Planning to go to City Council on December 2, 2008 with our Climate Impact
Report presentation. Was delayed due to needing to include a Solar RFP report which took some time.
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Developing our FY10 budget projects as mentioned before.
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Looking into developing a local supply source for liquid natural gas (LNG) as a fuel for our refuse trucks and truck fleet. Encourage evaluating use of LNG as a potential fuel for some of our equipment. LNG is cheaper and continues to be cheaper than diesel fuel.
Roundtable:
Andrew Jones- The University in conjunction with the city in a joint partnership are going to apply for a EPA grant, The Sustainable Skyline Initiative asking for $125,000 to look at ways of implementing sustainability. There are multiple research projects in conjunction with the city on how to get more people in the suburbs to use mass transits, how to use eco-friendly architecture in downtown for low income housing, and landscaping water and energy conservation. Hopefully the letter of intent will be done by November 21, 2008 because the grant application deadline is December 17, 2008. This will be done through the Institute on Climate Change Ocean & Atmosphere through the College of Science and
Mathematics.
Motion to adjourn at 9:30am made by Joseph
Seconded by Andrew.
All approved.
NEXT MEETING: December 18, 2008 – place TBA