Held on the “2nd Saturdays” of each month, they will enjoy a delicious vegan potluck and meeting, along with a discussion, film screening, food demo or speaker presentation on intersectional issues of veganism, animal rights, environmentalism, nonviolence, health and more. Each month will be something new! Their new venue is at the HCC Conference Center.

They are asking for a donation of $5 per person to help cover our facility rental expenses. All attendees must bring a vegan entree to share at the potluck (serving size to feed 10 people)!

Please remember to bring a vegan dish to share with the group! Their events are always vegan, so please only vegan or raw vegan foods (no animal-derived ingredients). Also bring reusable dinnerware and plates to keep the event earth-friendly. If you have questions on ingredients, feel free to contact them.

They will also feature a new discussion topic on inter sectional issues each month, such as: animal rights, ethical vegan living, vegan health & nutrition, cooking, world hunger solutions, eco-friendly living, nonviolence and more! Some months will also include film screenings and/or guest speakers and food demos.

Houston Community College Conference Center is located at 3100 Main St, 3rd Floor, Houston, TX 77002. See below for map. Free Parking is available on level 7 & 8 of the HCC Administration parking garage at Main & Elgin. Use elevator from parking garage to 3rd floor breezeway, which leads to the Conference suites. You must enter the building through the parking garage and not street-level.

All attendees must sign in at the Security Desk.

RSVP is appreciated for seating!

What’s new with solar?  Time for an update.  A solar farm is in development for Houston, and Tesla will tell us what their solar offering is these days. In addition, we’ll have a bit of permit data about solar installations in Houston.

Dori Wolfe, founder of Wolfe Energy, will discuss her C-40 proposal to the City of Houston to convert a brownfield landfill to a solar farm including systems thinking and recent progress in the community solar movement.  Mark Mason, market manager of Houston Metro/Mexico of TESLA, will fill you in on the various solar products offered by Tesla, such as those solar roof tiles you’ve heard about, and how those are different from the other products on the market.

The City of Houston—Public Works & Engineering Code Enforcement Green Building Resource Center presents this Education Seminar in partnership with the Texas Chapter of the US Green Building Council.  This 2019 series is generously underwritten by Rockwool.

CEUs available.  Please RSVP to steve.stelzer@houstontx.gov. Free parking.  Bus stop: Preston@Elder.

The Texas Environmental Excellence Awards is an annual awards program that honors achievements in environmental preservation and protection. There are ten diverse award categories that provide citizens, communities, businesses, and organizations an opportunity to obtain the state’s highest environmental honor and be recognized for their environmental projects. The deadline for submission is September 27th.

Since 1993, they have honored more than 250 successful environmental projects and efforts. By honoring these winners, the TCEQ hopes to encourage others to initiate like-minded projects and reinforce a spirit of environmental stewardship. These are the categories:

• Agriculture
• Civic/Community
• Education
• Environmental Educator of the Year
• Individual
• Innovative Operations/Management
• Pollution Prevention
• Technical/Technology
• Water Conservation
• Youth

Please join the Houston Chapter of Native Prairies Association of Texas for their Fall Wildflower Day to enjoy the fall blooms and wildlife at the Lawther-Deer Park Prairie Preserve.

See prairie plants that you can use in your garden to attract pollinators, learn seed collecting techniques and take some Deer Park Prairie seeds home. Experience the beauty of insects through Chuck Duplant’s photos at tinyurl.com/CDuplant; then come and learn about them from him in person.  Bring your camera or smartphone to take photos of plants and animals that you see and post on the Deer Park Prairie Project on Naturalist.org.  Activities include:

● Bird Survey (tentative)
● Insect Net Sweeping – by Chuck DuPlant at the Insect Popup Tent
● Wildflower Walk – learn plant identification techniques, including taking photos
● Seed Collecting / Prairie History walk
● Complimentary lunch

Since lunch will be provided, RSVP IS REQUIRED, at https://tinyurl.com/DPP190928, so they can have a food count.

The 2019 annual symposium will focus on conserving native plants in the upper Texas coastal prairies, also known as the Northern Humid Gulf Coastal Prairies in the EPA Level IV ecoregion map.

Quaternary-age deltaic sands, silts, and clays underlie much of this gently sloping coastal plain. The original vegetation was mostly grasslands with a few clusters of oaks, known as oak mottes or maritime woodlands. Little bluestem, yellow Indiangrass, brownseed paspalum, gulf muhly, and switchgrass were the dominant grassland species, with some similarities to the grasslands of the Blackland Prairies. Almost all of the coastal prairies have been converted to cropland, rangeland, pasture, or urban land uses. The exotic Chinese tallow tree and Chinese privet have invaded large areas in this region. Some loblolly pine occurs in the northern part of the region in the transition to the South Central Plains. Soils are mostly fine-textured: clay, clay loam, or sandy clay loam. Within the region, there are some differences from the higher Lissie Formation to the lower Beaumont Formation, both of Pleistocene age. The Lissie Formation has lighter colored soils, mostly Alfisols with sandy clay loam surface texture, while darker, clayey soils associated with Vertisols are more typical of the Beaumont Formation. Annual precipitation varies from 37 inches in the southwest portion to 58 inches in the northeast, with a summer maximum.

The symposium headquarters will be in League City, between Houston and Galveston. at the South Shore Harbour Resort and Conference Center, which is on the south side of Clear Lake across the lake from the Johnson Space Center. The event begins with a reception on Thursday evening for those arriving early, speakers on Friday morning with a choice of field trips in the afternoon, more speakers and breakout sessions on Saturday, and an awards banquet on Saturday night. A social event is planned for Friday night on the Kemah Boardwalk. In addition they have prepared a list of suggested side stops and field trips for those traveling on Thursday and Sunday.

Registration prices vary depending on your level of participation.

Shell Educators’ Preview: Start your evening at 4 p.m. and earn one hour of CPE credit while viewing our newly renovated George W. Strake Hall of Malacology.

HMNS’ Educator Members will have an opportunity to speak to Tina Petway, the
Museum’s Associate Curator of Malacology, during the Shell Educators’ Preview.
As a special treat, all guests will also be able to visit our newest special exhibition,
Art of the Brick until 6:00 p.m.!

The Educator Event @HMNS: Continue your evening with us starting at 5 p.m.
and earn up to three additional hours of CPE credit depending on which
programming you attend. HMNS is featuring several ways to earn CPE credit from
attending workshops to taking a guided tour to seeing a show in our Planetarium.
Educators are able to earn a total of up to 4 hours of CPE credit while attending
HMNS’, An Evening for Educators!

Registration Information
Educators: Free
Non-Educators: $10.00

(Pricing includes entry to the George W. Strake Hall of Malacology and Art of the Brick)
Registration begins Tuesday, July 30th and ends Wednesday, October 2nd.
Please complete the online form at hmns.org/eveningforeducators to reserve your spot. For questions, contact educatorevent@hmns.org.

Held on the “2nd Saturdays” of each month, they will enjoy a delicious vegan potluck and meeting, along with a discussion, film screening, food demo or speaker presentation on intersectional issues of veganism, animal rights, environmentalism, nonviolence, health and more. Each month will be something new! Their new venue is at the HCC Conference Center.

They are asking for a donation of $5 per person to help cover our facility rental expenses. All attendees must bring a vegan entree to share at the potluck (serving size to feed 10 people)!

Please remember to bring a vegan dish to share with the group! Their events are always vegan, so please only vegan or raw vegan foods (no animal-derived ingredients). Also bring reusable dinnerware and plates to keep the event earth-friendly. If you have questions on ingredients, feel free to contact them.

They will also feature a new discussion topic on inter sectional issues each month, such as: animal rights, ethical vegan living, vegan health & nutrition, cooking, world hunger solutions, eco-friendly living, nonviolence and more! Some months will also include film screenings and/or guest speakers and food demos.

Houston Community College Conference Center is located at 3100 Main St, 3rd Floor, Houston, TX 77002. See below for map. Free Parking is available on level 7 & 8 of the HCC Administration parking garage at Main & Elgin. Use elevator from parking garage to 3rd floor breezeway, which leads to the Conference suites. You must enter the building through the parking garage and not street-level.

All attendees must sign in at the Security Desk.

RSVP is appreciated for seating!

This year’s luncheon will serve as the kickoff event for a year-long, city-wide celebration as they near completion of the Bayou Greenways project at the end of 2020. It will also showcase the project’s latest milestones, the exciting impact it is having on individuals and communities, and offer a preview of the phenomenal events in store for 2020.

Houston’s parks connect us to each other across communities. Parks also serve as spaces of joy and celebration where we are united by the common space under our feet. In 2020, these green spaces will bring us closer to our families and our neighbors, to the city we love and the things that matter most.

Registration and Networking: 11:00 am – 12:00 pm

Luncheon: 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Make your plans now to attend the Keep Pearland Beautiful Plant Thyme Fall Luncheon on October 18^th and hear RETREET Founder/Executive Director Grady McGahan as he shares his stories of how he created RETREET a 501(c)(3) public charity that provides disaster relief to communities on a local, national, and international level by leading volunteers in restoring decimated urban forests. Learn how RETREET redefines disaster relief by engaging communities to replant lost trees. Visit their website to learn about this years speaker! Keep Pearland Beautiful will also be featuring a native and adaptive plant sale as part of the luncheon, runs 10:30 AM – 1:00PM along the same timeline as the luncheon. On Saturday, October 19th, the plant sale moves to the Stella Roberts Recycling Center- 5800 Magnolia Parkway, Pearland, TX 77584, from 9am to 1pm.

For information on becoming a sponsor for the Plant Thyme Fall Luncheon, contact Lenora Tollefson at 281-489-2795. Contact KPB by September 6^th to take advantage of all the sponsor benefits. Tickets for the luncheon we be on sale September 20th.

KPB currently serves over 10,000 households, with 250 members, through litter prevention, waste reduction, and beautification programs. From organizing and running the first recycling program, to the development of hike and bike trails, initiating the Adopt-A-Spot program, to collecting Household Hazardous Waste and developing KIPPERS (Kids in Pearland Preserving the Environment through Responsible Service) in local middle schools, KPB continues to make a difference in the community in which we live, work, and play.

The Woodlands G.R.E.E.N. is sponsoring a FREE Going Green Sustainability lecture: “Mycophile or Mycophobe–we all need mushrooms” with guest speaker, Teri MacArthur, Certified Texas Master Naturalist. This event is free and open to the public.