Oklahoma Sustainability Conference
| March 28, 2009 | Posted by Lisa Sharp under Uncategorized |
My mom and I went to the OSN conference this last weekend. It was great to be able to meet some new people and listen to all the great speakers.
The first session I went to was “Sustainable Daily Living” Trathan Heckman Executive Director, Daily Acts. Heckman was really enjoyable! I plan to learn more about Daily Acts. He also likes a lot of interaction with people so he had us talk to the person next to us and I got to meet a really nice lady and gave her my blog address so if she is reading hi! 
After that one I went to “Coal Burning Power Plants” Thomas Smith of Public Citizen, Texas. I learn a LOT from that one. And I was very impressed that OG&E (my power company) had people there listening and they even sponsored the event. I plan to e-mail them a thank you because it had to be hard to listen to us all bash coal power plants haha. Makes me feel better about having them as my power company. I also got to meet a lady I had talked to on youtube.com so that was pretty neat.
After that my mom and I went to Chipotle for lunch. It was very nice and we got there right before it got busy so that was good. While I had talked to Beth Terry (Fake Plastic Fish) about how to make it waste free I never did come up with a good way to not use the paper from the basket but I did take a Sigg bottle with organic sweet tea and cloth napkins for my mom and I so the paper was the only waste. Next time I hope to have come up with a way to not take the paper.
After lunch we hurried back to the conference and looked at some of the booths. I had no idea they would have so many! Next year we want to go both days so we can spend more time at the booths and hear even more great speeches. After looking at some of the booths we went to listen to the keynote speaker, William Greider. I loved a lot of the things he said. He is more to the left than me but economical and environmentally I agreed with most of it.
My mom on Twitter.The next one I went to was “Stories by an Oklahoma Activist” with Earl Hatley. I think this was my favorite! Hatley is a Tribal Consultant, Grand Riverkeeper, and co-founded LEAD Agency, Inc. He is the Grand Riverkeeper in Oklahoma for the nationwide Waterkeeper Alliance, founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. He is also a member of the Long Hair Clan of the Cherokee.
His stories were amazing! He has done so much for Oklahoma. It was also a bit sad because he said the night before the speech was the first time he had ever been recognized for his work! I will never forget him! I wish everyone could listen to his story.
We decided to leave before the last set of speeches because we needed to go to Native Roots Market to get some gifts for bags we are putting together for the local recycling coalition essay contest.
On our way out of the conference someone was smoking and I saw her throw her cigarette on the ground so when I thought she had gone in I went over and picked it up to put it in the trash. She
I guess hadn’t gone in and saw me do it and felt really bad for doing it. It was rather funny and I don’t think she will ever litter again!
I will be writing more about the speeches on Got2BeGreen.com.
