For those of you unable to attend last nights sustainability event downtown, you missed out on a panel of exceptional experts, conversation, and ideas to benefit our city.

The George Washington Carver Museum and Cultural Center was filled with almost 400 community members. The forum was filled with heated debate but after all was said an done, the panelists encourages more community and individual involvement to reach solutions.

So What can you do? Well here are a few ideas:

• Install Solar panels – A great way to take advantage of the Arizona Sun and cut down on energy usage. This can be a pricey investment, but with incentive programs and leasing options, it is worth it in the end and may add value to your home.
• Green Remodeling and Demolition – looking to fix that fixer upper? A local green demo and remodeling service for residential homes can be a great way to make a green friendly decision.
• Green Landscaping – You don’t need to be a botanist to know your lawn needs water to survive in Arizona. Choose plants that thrive in our climate or find an ecofriendly landscaper to find them for you.
• Use a Paperless system at your business – If every U.S. home received and paid its bills online, annual greenhouse gas emissions would drop by 2.1 tons. Seriously
• Unplug electronics, battery chargers and other equipment when not in use – Taken together, these small items can use as much power as your refrigerator.
• Bring reusable bags to do your grocery shopping. – Or bring your old plastic bags to the store, they’re not helping anyone under your sink. Some stores even give you 10 cents off your groceries for every bag you bring.

So get started today! And check out the Environmental Sustainability Programs Phoenix had developed to help us become one of the country’s leaders in sustainability!

Derek Slife at the Downtown Public Market

So, I’ve been a member of a food co-op for about 4 years now. Great idea, you know. You skip the grocery store and just pick up an order of fruits and veggies.

Interestingly enough, the biggest drawback was also the biggest opportunity. Each order consists of just what the co-op organizers happen to get in bulk that week. That’s a pain if you don’t know what to do with 50 Russian Babushka Radishes. But I found that getting an order of food that was unfamiliar pushed me to cook with things that I thought I would never use.

As a result, I’m a master chef….. just ask my dog.

But another drawback I’ve noticed is that the food I get with Bountiful Baskets is not grown locally. Although, you can order organic options, much of food comes from California.

Enter Chow Locally, stage left.

Founders Christopher Wharton and Derek Slife believe that we do just as much for our country by sourcing food locally, reducing carbon emissions and keeping money in our community.

To that end, they have a business model that is really quite unique. Using their website you can choose what you want during the week and pick it up on Saturday or Sunday from any one of several farmers’ markets. Check out this link to see how it works.

Warton and Slife actually won the Arizona’s Next Great Business award by National Bank of Arizona for this model. Ordering ahead of time certainly does solve the problem of getting little food surprises in your order, like Scandanavian Dwarf Bananas.

Each box comes with useful recipes, etc.

Now, if you are worried about cost, I would not be. I compared both food co-ops. While Chow Locally is a couple dollars ($19) more than Bountiful Baskets ($16.50) and you get only about 80% of what comes in a Bountiful Baskets order, it is still much more than you could buy at Safeway for the same amount of money. Either way, you still get enough food to last for two weeks.

I enjoyed trying this and I enjoy having the excuse to visit the public market every other Saturday (twist my arm).

Give it a shot and let me know what you think.