EUGENE MUTUAL AID SOCIETY

A completely voluntary non-political, non-profit networking organization to connect those interested in being more self-reliant in an urban environment together with others in the Eugene-Springfield area. EMAS seeks to provide the organizational framework for those seeking to pursue the principles of permaculture, genuine perennial sustainability
and voluntary simplicity in mainstream urban neighborhoods.

The Eugene Mutual Aid Society is first and foremost an organizing tool to allow people to help others as close to home as possible; secondly an educational organization to share information and expertise about retrofitting existing homes and buildings into multi-family homes that are 100% self-sufficient for their own energy and waste disposal needs; victory gardens for daily vegetables and networking with local organic farmers for grains, legumes, nuts and fruit; thirdly, a non-profit organization to organized, plan and remodel or retrofitexisting homes and buildings to low-income self-sufficient living communities completely independent of municipal public services and utilities.

If you use Facebook, the page is here:

http://www.facebook.com/groups/297104546974762/

While we are constructing the website and forums.

If you would like to learn more please contact Warren Weisman weiswar@yahoo.com If you would like to attend our next meeting it is Thursday at 5PM and you can email for directions.

Please join Amazon neighbors for the inaugural celebration of a four-family worm bin. We will be celebrating another step toward sustainability and community cooperation. We hope to see you in a throng of neighbors, visiting dignitaries including Nancy Moody, newly-appointed Worm Bin Poet Laureate, and students from Camas Ridge Community School, among others.

At 2 pm, Sunday, October 2, across from 1225 East 25^th Avenue on Eugene Masonic Cemetery property, we will gather to demonstrate our operating worm bin, decorated by children’s art. We will hear from civic and garden leaders, and enjoy fresh apple cider pressed from our community cider press. The program will last thirty minutes, meeting & greeting and refreshments to follow.

This flow-through composter that produces fine garden soil from the kitchen wastes of neighbor households is sponsored by the Amazon Neighbors Sustainability Committee and the Eugene Masonic Cemetery Association and funded in part by a City of Eugene Neighborhood Matching Grant. This demonstration will serve as a model for other such neighborhood worm bins.

To RSVP and for information: Sherry Wellborn at sherry@amazonneighbors.org; Erik Muller at mulpop@efn.org

OSU Extension Service Centennial Open House

1911-2011

September 22, 2011
783 Grant Street
Eugene, OR 97402

Please join us as we celebrate 100 years of OSU Extension Service in Lane County!

2:30 – Remarks and Recognition of Partners
Tour of Facility
Media Q&A
Program Tables:
Farms & Gardens
Master Gardeners
Nutrition Education Program
LCC SBDC/Agricultural Business Management Program
Rainbow Valley Design & Construction

5:30 – Centennial Cake
Light refreshments will be served.

Donate your household items or take anything home for free…

Saturday, June 4th
South Eugene High School parking lot (19th and Patterson)
12-4 PM

More info, or to volunteer: Vanessa Vissar, communiversity@uoregon.edu

Hummingbird Wholesale  and Slow Food Eugene Invite You To The Spring Bean Cleaning Spree–April 2nd

It’s your turn to help build our local food system and enjoy yourself doing it.  There’s a whole hill o’ beans and they need to be sorted! Hummingbird Wholesale is helping out a local farmer who delivered some beans that were not in salable condition.  Slow Food Eugene is helping sort and clean those beans so they can be put up for sale.  This is one of those projects that require a community to help out in the beginning stages of a new agricultural product in the Willamette Valley.    The task is easy, but hugely important in making locally grown legumes a  reality in our area. So come on out after your trip to the Farmers  Market and enjoy the good  company that getting something done together creates.   We need able  hands to commit to at least two hours of bean cleaning, during the rest  of the time you are welcome to munch on some food and make some new  friends. We are also planning a few distractions to mix up the bean  cleaning and keep things rolling.   Kids are welcome at this  event, but please do keep in mind that we have a mission to get these  beans sorted, so it will be a working good time. Of course, this is a Slow Food event, so there will be some tasty things to keep us fueled while we do our sorting.  DATE:  Saturday, April 2, 2011    TIME:  2-5 pm  PLACE:  First United Methodist Church, 1376 Olive Street, Eugene COST:  FREE RSVP: We need to know ahead of time if you will be able to join us! Please let us  know by contacting Erin Walkenshaw: ewalkens@yahoo.com Space  is a bit limited, and we know that there are lots of eager bean  cleaners out there, so please do not wait to get back to us.

The Institute of Contemporary Ethnobotany and the
Seed Ambassadors Project present:

The 11th ANNUAL: FOOD NOT LAWNS SEED SWAP

Sunday, Dec. 5
1:00 – 3:00 pm
(come at noon to help set up!)
FREE

The Community Room at the East Blair Housing Coop,
940 W. 4th st.
(Btwn. Adams & Jackson also accessible from W. 4th alley)

Build community by sharing surplus harvest bounty with
your friends and neighbors at this annual event.

Bring your seeds, plants, canned goods, brews,
tinctures, food, instruments, friends, or just
yourself! (piano on site…)

http://www.foodnotlawns.net/
www.seedambassadors.org
http://plants-people.blogspot.com

When: Tomorrow – Wednesday August 4th from 12 – 1

Who: Anyone looking to get outside and lift some stuff

Where: Camas Ridge Community School – 1150 E. 29th

Please bring work gloves, and wear closed toe shoes if you can help.

The largest pieces of steel are about 150 pounds and 20 ft. long. The plan is to move them one-by-one from the truck to the yard. We need some muscle. If you feel like you can help out for an hour, please join us!

Mike McCann

(541-579-4288)

Barnraising in the Crest Neighborhood: the Laurel Hedge Party

Members of the NLCCS decided that doing “barnraising” projects for each other would serve a couple of good, green purposes. First of all, increasing connections between people is one of the basic tenets of sustainability, because you are more likely to survive and thrive if you know your neighbor (and which neighbor has water, which one has beans, which one has a chainsaw). Secondly, our committee works hard and has an ambitious work plan. You get a lot more done in a committee if the people in it genuinely care about each other and cooperate well as a team.

The second barnraising project was done at my home here in the Crest neighborhood. The weather wasn’t the best, but even so, eight people braved the rain and chill to help cut back my enormous mountain laurel hedge.

I’m a “newbie-permie” with a lot of plans but little money and time. I didn’t get a very good yield of vegetables last year, and I thought it was because I didn’t put enough work into the garden. But then I realized that over the years, the neighbor’s hedge has slowly taken over about six horizontal feet (and even more vertical feet) of my yard and has been casting a nice, thick shadow on my raised bed. Time to create more light! However, the estimate I got from a professional landscaper was $450. This project seemed like a likely candidate for a barnraising.

It is utterly amazing how much got done in just a few hours. Not only is my hedge tamed, but I also have a weeded garden as well as the knowledge that I have a few nice native plants that have been hiding in the dark (an Indian plum for one) as well as some poison oak.

We ate white bean chili and sampled some biscuits I made from some locally-grown wheat. Katherine’s daughter Lucy helped cut them out, so all ages participated in this event.

We’re hoping to put together some kind of instructional guide on how to do a successful barnraising after we’ve held a few of them. One thing that would be good is a tool inventory beforehand to avoid duplication as well as a site evaluation. Not all jobs are equal. There was a lot of work on the hedge for people with ladders and long loppers, but not a lot for the “ground-bound”. If we had evaluated other things to do, people could have brought other tools.

But all in all, it was an inspiring event that was so inspiring, I keep going out onto my deck to assure myself that it actually happened. It may not have been a “real” barnraising, but there is probably enough mountain laurel wood here to build something, if not a barn.

– Kathy Saranpa

Co-Convener and Crest rep