You know the Transition Movement is catching on big time when it comes to Rochester. I found through the Fingerlakes Permaculture Network that my friend Kit is bringing official Transition Training here, taught by Alastair Lough and Tina Clarke. This is very exciting!

Details on the Rochester training are available on the TransitionUS site.

Kit is also having a Transition Rochester kickoff meeting this Thursday, March 5. If you’re in town and interested in attending, give me a shout at dave@greenerminds.com.

Meanwhile, I’m working on setting up a Transition kickoff meeting in Honeoye Falls, and starting to pass the word among my neighbors here. I’m hoping to kick off before the Rochester training so I can get some of us to attend with me and go official.

Today’s Op Ed piece on human waste treatment may be a harbinger of better times. I hope so, because according to one of my Village Trustees, about 75% of Village taxes go to our sewage treatment system.

A few months ago, a notice came around saying the Village would be sending a code enforcement officer to every house to ensure that we weren’t overloading the system with storm and sump pump excess water. Apparently, when the system runs over capacity, untreated sewage goes directly into Honeoye Creek! The nice officer came by, looked in the basement, looked at the gutters and gave us a pass.

As we were chatting, I asked if he knew of anyone doing greywater treatment in the Village. He said it was the first time he’d ever been asked the question- what did I mean excactly? I said, well, say I drain my washing machine hose out the window instead of down the drain, and into a reed bed or some other treatment in the back yard. That would lessen the load on the sewage system, and help to keep raw sewage out of the creek, right?

Oh no, you can’t do that- it’s greywater. Unless of course there’s some precedent elsewhere in the state where the DEC allows it.

Irony seems to be lost on government officials of all sorts.

Sunday was a little bit of a bust- I only had til about 10:15, and the whole show was over at noon. I was starting to come down with the flu, but I dragged myself out of bed early to be there at 8:00 for Phil Botwinick’s talk on The Two Faces of Money. Unfortunately, Phil was in a car accident a week before and wasn’t able to make it.

When I walked in the hall first thing I saw Kelly Keck and his partner David. They were excited about Kristin Gillibrand’s appointment to the U.S. Senate, as she was the Congresswoman from their district. Kelly had previously run for State Assembly or Senate and they said Kristin was like their friend and it was weird that she was now a Senator.

Since Phil’s talk was cancelled I instead went to Carol McNeil’s talk on Soil Testing and Soil Survey maps. Brian Boucheron and I sat together, and he updated me on the work he is doing now as an intern in Scottsville. I’m hoping he’ll do some guest posts here this year. Carol’s talk covered simple soil pH tests you can get from Cornell Cooperative Extension, and an awesome online soil survey mapping tool.

Carol also pointed us to Cornell’s online IPM Field Crop guide.
Finally, I attended Mike Kimball (Essex Farm) and the Thorpes (East Aurora) presenting on their experience with their CSA operations. Mike charges $2800 for the first family member, $2400 for the next, $2000 for the third and all kids under 13 fly free. This seems exhorbitant, but keeps the margins up and the no-money liberals away. Although most of the membership are wealthy liberals, they subsidize many other members, about 115 total, who can’t afford the CSA. It’s all you can eat, with some limits on things like baby zucchini and pork chops.

My impression is that these folks work exceptionally hard for no money. Someone said that they felt they were performing community service by being a farmer, and that was the take-away for me.