Eco-Bulletin ~ January 10th, 2007

Join us for the City of San Luis Obispo Community Forum tonight from 6:30-9:30pm at the Ludwick Community Center, 864 Santa Rosa Street. This forum is an opportunity to present your priorities to the City Council as they begin the budget process for 2007-2009. The City has already identified community priorities including preservation of open space and repair and maintenance of parks. We need to make sure that these priorities are recognized in the new budget cycle. Firstly, renewing ECOSLO’s contract with the City, with a focus on the following areas:

· Publishing SLO Stewards quarterly instead of three times annually as under the current contract. We would like to increase this contract to allow us to publish SLO Stewards more often, organize creek clean ups, and lead more frequent hikes on city open spaces.

· Publishing a wildflower guide for the City in cooperation with the Natural Resources staff.

· Reestablishing the City of SLO Green Business Awards in recognition of commitment to environmental resource conservation.

· Reviving the tree-planting program with donated trees and volunteers.

· Publishing a guide to City open space lands with information on trails, history, geology, vegetation and wildlife.

· Organizing Community Service Workers to perform trail maintenance, cleaning up parks, and planting trees.

· Increasing the number of hikes and stewardship work on City open space lands.

· Continuing our role as an environmental information center for the community.

Additionally, we will address restoration of funding for the acquisition of open space and the creation of an open space committee as described in the Open Space Element.