After a one-year hiatus, the Scarlet, Gray and Green Fair returns to the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center on Tuesday April 22nd – also known as Earth Day.
Serving as chair of the planning committee, Gwen Covert encourages the community to come to the free educational fair. She explained, (The) event provides an opportunity to visit with local businesses and organizations who are active in green industries. Our mission is to educate the public about the latest green technologies and simple ways individuals can incorporate green lifestyle changes at home and work.
Visitors can learn how to save money, eat sustainably, reduce home and transportation energy use, decrease dependence on imported oil, address global warming, and improve their recycling effort.
According to the Stark-Tuscarawas-Wayne Recycling Districts statistics, the three counties divert over 20,000 tons of recyclables from local landfills each year. While this number is impressive, with additional effort consumers can recycle considerably more household waste. Throughout the year, it might mean saving items like fluorescent bulbs and batteries to bring to a designated drop-off site, or finding a local organization that collects cell phones and printer cartridges, but during the Scarlet, Gray and Green Fair, a Recycling Station is set up to collect some of the items that are not accepted in traditional drop-off or curbside recycling programs.
The drive-thru station will accept computers, keyboards, printers, household and rechargeable batteries, CFLs and fluorescent tubes, DVD players, video games, small appliances, sensitive documents for shredding (limit to two boxes), and prescription and OTC drugs. TVs will be recycled for a small cost. For a complete list of accepted items, go to www.wcsen.org/WCSGGF/Recycling.
The Wayne County Sustainable Energy Network (WCSEN) serves as a coordinating sponsor of the fair because according to Barry Romich, vice-president of the organization, Our values are aligned, and the mission of the SEN is education. Romich noted that they have been involved in planning the Scarlet, Gray and Green Fair since its inception, but said, This is an exciting time for sustainable energy with so many kinds of initiatives. More and more people are making earth friendly choices for their homes, vehicles, and businesses. But Romich stated, Theres still more work to be done.
The schedule of events for the fair includes:
11:00am-11:45am Opening Ceremony, Keynote Speaker:
Brandon Miller, Carbon Vision
11:30am-6:30pm Exhibits, Recycling, Food Vendors
1:00pm-4:00pm Akron Zoomobile
1:30pm-2:30pm Cooking Demonstration, featuring local foods
3:00pm-3:30pm Arbor Day Tree Planting Ceremony
4:00pm-5:30pm Compressed Natural Gas Presentation w/ Q&A
Covert noted that visitors will find a great mix of new exhibitors, including Backyard Herbs & Flowers, Energize Ohio, Habitat for Humanity ReStore, Hyperion Energy Solutions, Ohio Wetlands Association, Threads of Hope and Valley College Grange, among others.
A student competition was held for the first time with categories aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards, according to Covert. K-12 students from the tri-county area completed projects such as Maps & Apps: Lets Talk Trash and Whats Your Footprint? Winning entries receive trees and other green prizes for the classroom. Student entries will be on display throughout the day in the Fisher Conference Room.
Fair-goers who enjoy food will not be disappointed. Covert said, We will be featuring four new food vendors: Get Stuffed Solar Powered Mobile Eatery, Pig Lickin Good BBQ Food Truck, The Orange Trük, and Street Mobile Bistro.
With food, give-a-ways, raffles, demonstrations, and more, the Scarlet, Gray and Green Fair can be both a fun and green way to celebrate earth day.
The OARDC is the research arm of Ohio State Universitys College of Food, Agriculture and Environmental Sciences and is located at 1680 Madison Avenue in Wooster. The event takes place from 11 am – 6:30 pm.
