By Barbara Morris
The date is March 27 from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. The place will be the big, beautiful Al Oerter Recreational Center at 121−40 Fowler Ave. in Flushing, right off College Point Boulevard. It is easily accessible by the No. 7 train Willets Point station, the Q8 at the corner of College Point Boulevard and Fowler Avenue or car with free parking near the center. Admission, workshops, giveaways, food and fun will be free. Please pre−register by e−mailing herr281761@aol.com or ggiq2010@yahoo.com.
While you are with us at the Al Oerter Recreational Center, you may want to take a tour of the new Olympic−sized pool building. You will surely want to visit all 50 tables and exhibits and at least some of the 10 workshops. Every one will be interesting. Queens Botanical Garden’s Daniel Tainow, compost project coordinator for the city Compost Project in Queens, will present a workshop: “Composting in the City & Indoor Worm Composting.”
All vegetative scraps can become “garden gold’ outdoors or in your home with the help of friendly little worms. Indoors they are housed in neat little bins that hardly take up any space at all and they are hard workers who do their jobs in absolute silence.
There will be a second workshop on composting, because it is such a hot topic, called the Western Queens Composting Initiative. This one is totally different from the first one mentioned. Tony from U.S. Natural Energy will present a program on solar energy. This will be a chance to learn more about harnessing and maximizing all those free rays of the sun.
If you have constructive ideas about our parks or just want to meet the commissioner to chat, you will have an opportunity to do so. She is a nice and talented and happy to hear new ideas.
If you are working on a community project, you probably know how important money is. Ioby.org and Citizens’ Committee for NYC will be there to teach tips on fund−raising, writing workshop grant proposals and hear about funding opportunities. We will help you get started on raising the money you need.
Recent harsh winds and weather have made us conscious about problems with trees. Sam Bishop of TreesNY teaches tree pruning to prospective volunteers and also teaches other aspects of tree care in courses. You will be able to learn some of this free at the Going Green in Queens event.
Many of us have seen bodies of water that are in dire need of help. Willow Lake is one of the lucky ones that is in the process of being restored. Come learn about how this it being done.
Add to the above, we have received permission to show the movie, “Dirt.” It has a fine reputation and I am anxious to see it. The care of our earth is important to all of us so we feel certain everyone will want to see it. As a way to help with recycling, we will be collecting used cell phones for our 911−only program as well as used eyeglasses and ink toner cartridges, so bring yours along that day and drop then off.
We are sponsored by Citizens Committee for NYC, Partnership for Parks and Thrivent Financial for Lutherans Queens Chapter 31026 with our media partner: TimesLedger Newspapers.
Look for us on Facebook and Twitter and come be with us. We are hoping for perfect weather, but if necessary, listen for weather advisories.
