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Six honored with Sustainable Racine awards
By Journal Times staff
Sustainable Racine has announced winners of its sixth annual Recognition Awards.
Winners are recognized for projects that benefit the greater Racine area's environment, economy and social equity. They were honored Wednesday at the Racine Theatre Guild.
Nominations were grouped into six award categories. Five judges reviewed each nomination independently and selected those that most closely met a 32-point checklist focusing on the three components of sustainability.
The winners
Modine Manufacturing Co.
Modine challenged its facilities across the globe to reduce the company's use of electricity and fuel. The Racine facility and other manufacturing locations were able to reduce consumption by 12 percent over a year.
Modine's declining energy dependence lessens the amount of coal combustion by-products released in this area, improving our air and water quality.
Money formerly spent on energy will now be reinvested in operations and growth, further strengthening the employee base and the local economy.
Nonprofit category:
Families In Transition Families In Transition provides educational services to children experiencing homelessness here, while helping to stabilize and sustain their families. It is state-funded and housed within the Racine Unified School District.
In an effort to find constructive outdoor summer activities for the children, Families In Transition implemented a University of Wisconsin-Extension gardening curriculum. The children and their mothers formulated a plan to beautify Bethany Apartments with a vegetable garden, flowers, bird feeders and a decoratively painted fence.
The garden has received numerous compliments and inspired others in the area to better care for their own yards.
Educational institution
category:
Racine Montessori School Since moving to its current location at 2317 Howe St. in 1996, Racine Montessori School has been acquiring adjacent property for the benefit of the school and its neighbors. It has developed a nature center, community garden and outdoor classroom.
On land donated by Case-New Holland, the school has been working with renowned landscape architect Steve Stimson. The plans call for less asphalt, better control of runoff and more continuous green space.
The green space will include the Nature Center, Science Exploration Center, a natural Wisconsin prairie maze, an outdoor classroom, larger ball fields, playground equipment and a solar greenhouse built almost exclusively with recycled materials.
Food grown on the property will be donated to the John Bryant Center Senior Food Program and to neighborhood families during National Night Out. Some of the plants will be sold by students to show that environmental ideals can be economically profitable.
Neighborhood category:
Racine Housing and Neighborhood Partnership In 2002 Racine Housing and Neighborhood Partnership received a Sustainable Racine Recognition Award for its work in the West Sixth Street Neighborhood. This year it is recognized for its work in the Lincoln-King Neighborhood bounded by Douglas Avenue, Hamilton Street and State Street.
The organization provides home-buyer education, down-payment assistance, home improvement loans, and new construction and rehabilitation programs. In one year, the organization passed more than $1 million in home-improvement and down-payment help to homeowners in the area.
The Partnership has also been instrumental in starting development projects such as the four-home Gideon Court-LaSalle Housing Development, which should be occupied by December. Ten development projects have been identified to be started under the program.
Individual Category: Larry Jozwik Larry Jozwik, a teacher with 33 years of experience at McKinley Middle School, has been working with the Keystone Science School in Colorado for 15 years to hold a summer program for educators, based on the concept of sustainability. He founded the McKinley Middle Charter School which incorporated sustainability into the model.
Jozwik also started a week-long professional development institute for middle and high school educators. After completing the course, teachers can experiment with and learn about the relationships between the three pillars of sustainability.
Jozwik has worked with the institute staff to combine the best in middle and high school education kits, teacher-designed activities and proven assessment tools to produce innovative and dynamic learning progression. He prepares educators to teach students about sustainability and how their decisions have an effect on the community.
Youth Category: Melvin Bridges Jr.
At Park High School, Bridges is a strong student and a lead member of the Africans, Hispanics, Asians and Native Americans Club. He consistently urges his fellow classmates and club members to seize every opportunity and never accept anything that is not just or equitable.
Bridges is a member of the Youth In Government and the youthAlive programs and was offered a job at the YMCA Welcome Center. He continues to dedicate himself to the Teen Achievers, Youth In Government and Teen Action Council.
Now he is working with peers to organize a Stop the Violence Youth Summit to be held in November. The group has set a goal of having at least 100 teen-agers attend an overnight event at the YMCA.
During his free time Bridges has been working to start his own disc-jockey business. He hopes to use his earnings to pay for college.
All-America City Civic Pride Award: The Nehemiah Project The Nehemiah Project is an outstanding example of forming community partnerships to creatively address a situation. It targets the city's near-north and near-south neighborhoods and has reached out to almost 200 participants, creating gardens, birdhouses and a sense of community.
These once-flourishing neighborhoods are targeted as they now face the city's highest rates of crime, poverty and unemployment. The Nehemiah Project has been a thoughtful and deliberate return to quiet yet invigorating and old-fashioned neighborhoods where neighbors support and help one another.
Gardens have been created in West Park, at the Martin Luther King Center. Entire blocks of neighbors have shared their time and resources to create gardens for residents along Park Avenue, Villa Street and Marquette Street. Project volunteers taught families how to plant and care for their gardens, and how to split and share plants.
Birdhouses were built, painted and distributed to neighbors. The project has included renters, homeowners and landlords.
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