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Sustainable Bellingham is proud to congratulate one of our own for winning the "Environmental Hero" award for 2009. For the seventh year, local environmental education and advocacy organization, RE Sources for Sustainable Communities, celebrates local people working for the environment by naming their 2009 Environmental Heroes. On April 25th, David MacLeod will be among the six community heroes being honored this year at the Award Banquet held at the Leopold Crystal Ballroom. As the award announcement states, "David MacLeod is a quiet force for change," and we have been pleased to have him on board as a committed Sustainable Bellingham volunteer since the founding of our organization in 2005.
When asked to comment on winning this award David said, I was shocked. I really wasn't expecting this. It's quite an honor to win an award for something that is so important to me, and I'd like to thank James Loucky for making the nomination. However, it also feels a bit strange to be singled out like this. There are so many people in our community who are working very hard on sustainability and environmental issues. Nothing is accomplished in isolation, and I really have to share this award with all of the Sustaianble Bellingham team, especially the most recent Vision Team, consisting of Lynnette Allen, Craig Mayberry, Jeff Westcott, Rich Taylor, Dan Martin, and Marilyn Flint. I would also like to acknowledge Allison and Dave Ewoldt, David x, Calvin Priest, Sandy Hoelterhoff, Lynnette Allen and Tiffany Schoessler, who served on the original team that launched SB."
Originally coming on board to our web team, David has consistently kept our website updated with new content. His special interest early on was the "Sustainability Documentation Project" on our wiki site, with numerous pages devoted to recording the best internet articles coming out on the various topics related to sustainability. Our mailing list was originally being used just for the occasional updates on the goings on of Sustainable Bellingham, but David offered to edit a weekly newsletter that informed readers of as many sustainability related events as possible going on in our community, regardless of whether they were sponsored by SB. The idea was readily accepted, as it fit the part of our mission that called for us to collaborate with and support all sustainability efforts happening locally.
"It made sense to send the information out to people, rather than wait for them to come to us, in hopes that they would find and use our online calendar," David said. "However, part of my motivation was that this newsletter would allow me to pass along the many great articles I was finding on the internet that relate to our mission and the issues we at Sustainable Bellingham are concerned about."
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"Many have told us of how highly they value this community resource, and we now have 700+ (and growing) subscribers. We really need to thank our web developer, Rich Taylor" David says. "For the first couple of years I was creating the newsletter by hand, from scratch...by hand I mean by my hands on the computer keyboard. Rich has done a fantastic job putting together a workable online calendar where people can submit their events. I can now download events from the calendar to easily complete the newsletter!!"
In late 2006, David joined the core Vision Team for Sustainable Bellingham. According to Vision Team member Lynnette Allen, "As David joined in, the SB Vision Team noticed and appreciated David's approach, his taking time to really listen and absorb what we were doing and scoping out ways he could enhance our offerings to the community and then doing that so effectively."
Participating as part of a team that brought David Korten to town in 2007, part of MacLeod's focus was to engage local clergy in public conversation with the spiritual issues raised in Korten's book, "The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community." Later that year, David MacLeod organized the showing of the film "What a Way to Go: Life at the End of Empire," with the filmmakers in attendance, as part of a west coast tour. Enlisting co-sponsorship from other local organizations, such as RE Sources, Village Books, the Pickford Cinema, and Whatcom Community College, the film showing had the highest attendance (300+) of the entire tour.
Since 2008, David's focus has been first working on a city and county Resolution to create a local peak oil task force, and then serving on that task force, with the goal of assisting our community to face the long term challenges associated with energy uncertainty, and coming up with recommendations on how best to address these challenges on the local level. David has recently decided to step back from the SB Vision Team in order to have time for other projects and interests, but he continues to serve on our Web Team, and continues to edit our weekly email newsletter.
Please join us in congratulating David MacLeod on this award! We thank him for his service to our community!
The Environmental Heroes Award Banquet occurs on April 25th at 7pm at the Leopold Crystal Ballroom in Bellingham. Tickets are $25, and can be purchased at in advance at Kulshan Cycles, The RE Store, Village Books, or by calling RE Sources at 733-8307. The event is a fund-raiser for RE Sources for Sustainable Communities, and will also feature live music by the Scot Ranney Jazz Trio and have elegant appetizers by Market Street Catering. There will be a cash bar with beers from Chuckanut Brewery as well as wine and non-alcoholic drinks for guests.
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Official Award Bio:
"David is a quiet force for change. He has been a key organizer behind the community education organization, Sustainable Bellingham, helping to organize numerous excellent films and discussions about sustainability topics. David was an early leader pushing for a community conversation about Peak Oil and energy descent, and has brought well-known speakers to Bellingham to meet with ecumenical and academic audiences, as well as the general public. He compiles and widely disseminates summaries of local events and endeavors, and puts these out as the "Sustainable Bellingham Community Newsletter". David also finds time to help produce workshops for Cascadia Training & Mediation, which provides leading edge sustainable living, personal empowerment, and organizational effectiveness tools. He was instrumental in the creation of the City of Bellingham/Whatcom County Energy Resource Scarcity/Peak Oil Task Force, and is currently involved in birthing Transition Whatcom, an initiative to help our community plan for a post-carbon future. David strongly values collaboration and always works to bring diverse organizations into cooperative efforts. He shuns the limelight, instead putting his energies into collaborative education and activism, opening his heart to others who also seek a better world."
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