Recycling Initiative

Our commitment to a Greener Metro-St. Louis:

History of Pagan Picnic Recycling:

As Chairman of the Division of Operations of the St. Louis Pagan Picnic 2005, and as part of the critical thinking process of this job, I called about St. Louis to see if I could get an idea of the resources in St. Louis when it came to setting up recycling at the event. I contacted the St. Louis County's Environmental Protection team, and they lent St. Louis Pagan Picnic 75 wire recycling baskets and bags for our Green Initiative. This was a fantastic group led by Mr. Bill Seffens whom also gave St. Louis Pagan Picnic committee additional information on contacts in the City.

Beginning with last year picnic, those wire baskets were donated solely for the St. Louis Earth Day organization, as part of a grant initiative received from St. Louis County. Cassidy Dellorto-Blackwell of the St. Louis Earth Day organization was excited to hear that we had borrowed those racks the year before and gladly checked them out to us again for the next two year. Her group has been very kind and helping us find resources to further the Greener Metro-St. Louis Initiative.

I called Ms. Jill Hamilton of the St. Louis City Refuse Department whom was very excited about manning a booth to be available to the St. Louis City (and County and rural areas in the Metro area) whom had questions about recycling, the benefits of purchasing recycled/refurbished products. Ms. Hamilton and her team are very warm and welcoming folks, and as I passed by their booth, (quite often) she would be in constant dialogue with adults and children at the picnic. Jill expressed excitement at rejoining the folks that come to picnic as in the picnics of years past.

Because we actively recycle at this event we not only help interested parties, pagan and non-pagan alike, bringing valuable resources to help save our beloved Gaia. We also walk our talk, and project to the non-pagan community a positive image through a problematic concept that affects ALL people walks on this earth. Also because we recycle and don't have to have that huge and ugly construction bin, we save dollars to be used in other initiatives, such as purchasing autographed books from authors and performers to raffle and help further defray our picnic costs. With Tower Grove Park raising the park fees by $2,000.00 in 2007, every dollar saved is worthwhile.

I would like to encourage you to volunteer at picnic to help in this recycling initiative. Help us more efficiently process the recycling (gathering bags of recycling for storage, moving true trash to the trash bins, and replacing all bags) so that we can continue to use the saved dollars to make your event more pleasant. Please contact Ms. Juanita Barrett by e-mailing her at volunteers@paganpicnic.org or by contacting a picnic coordinator by calling 314-477-2063.

Namaste'
Cretta Wilson, Chairman of Operations - Retired