By Huck Fairman
Just as the nations of the world have seen the necessity of coming together to sign, and hopefully implement, the Paris Climate Accord, so members of our local communities have also seen the necessity of working together to save our environment by promoting sustainability.
In this mostly, but not exclusively, Princeton story, the impetus and commitment to learn about the environment and sustainability, and then act on it came from three different sources.
The originating idea was envisioned by Gery Juleff of Hopewell. Born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, he attended the University of Dublin, served in the British Army, played semi-pro rugby in France, joined the U.K. Foreign Office, was a diplomat in Uganda and Burundi, married a Jersey girl, together owned a ranch in Brazil, and while with the Foreign Office was the leader of a team dealing with climate change.
In Mercer County he has been a host of the Green Hour Radio show, a participant in the D&R Greenway Land Trust talks and discussions, and a trustee at the Sourlands Conservancy.
Most recently he volunteered to teach a class on environment and sustainability at the local private school, The Princeton Learning Cooperative. There, drawing on his experience, he recognized that he did not want the students to simply become knowledgeable in these subjects, but saw that wider and necessary benefits would result from the students becoming multipliers — that is, spreading their knowledge and sense of urgency to family, friends and communities.
In discussing these ideas with his PLC class, Mr. Juleff suggested that they formulate plans to address environmental and sustainability issues. And this they did. The students looked at what could be done by them to address issues of: energy, transportation, food and water, waste management, ground maintenance, and education. While many PLC students supported these ideas, four among them took the lead: Sara Webber, Penelope Smith, Nathaniel Kruger and Sophia Emmet.
And naturally they approached the host of their school, The All Saints Episcopal Church in Princeton. In the church’s administrator, Jocelyn Colao, they found an enthusiastic supporter who brought them to the church’s vestry, or governing board. Together they formed a Green Team of students, vestry members, and church members.
This response by the local church coincided with a 2011 teaching by the Episcopal House of Bishops on climate change and its threats to the planet’s environments and mankind. The bishops called for action together for the common good.
And so this local cooperation between teacher, students, church, and church members was an enacting of this call. Here, as foreseen by Mr. Juleff and his students, their efforts were intended, and designed, to not only address local issues of sustainability but serve as an ever-expanding role model for other students and churches. And toward this end, All Saints Church has reached out to the interdenominational organization, GreenFaith, which is working and guiding churches of all faiths to realize a sustainable world.
With the local Green Team in place, the PLC students drafted an environmental proposal and action plan for the church which recommended such cost and energy-saving steps as more efficient light bulbs and appliances, reducing CO2 emissions by using more efficient heating and cooling, and maybe eventually solar, and by car pooling.
It also proposed reducing landfill waste, and preserving local water and land, while urging congregation members to become involved, spread the word to friends and neighbors, and take similar steps at home. It was calculated that cost-saving measures at the church and in homes would not only acknowledge budget limitations at all levels but would enable future spending for further cost and energy-saving steps.
Thus these overlapping triangles of cooperation — first Mr. Juleff, the students, and the church, and then the students, the vestry, and church members — are not only important environmentally, as means to get essential changes made, but as examples of how individuals and communities can, and must, come together to save our environment as we have known it.
Huck Fairman is a Princeton author who writes SOLUTIONS on environmental issues.
