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Lombard, IL —
Today is Earth Day, and while some will remember to take the time to appreciate the environment, others honor it year-round.
Lombard Elementary School District 44 has various activities planned throughout its schools, including reading books about tree importance, passing out seedling, tree plantings and Earth Day stations.
One of Manor Hill's second-grade teachers tries to enforce the Earth Day mentality all year through her curriculum.
"I believe it's important for children to learn about ways to go green and how we can better preserve our community and reduce our carbon footprint," teacher Lori Hacker said.
Throughout the school year, Manor Hill promotes recycling in all of its offices and classrooms. Other efforts include turning lights off when not in classrooms, use of technology like SMART boards and using both sides of paper. Hacker said she hopes more efforts will be implemented year-round.
In honor of Earth Day, DuPage School District 45, which has four schools in Lombard and four schools in Villa Park, had first graders at Westmore School making globes out of recycled bags and newspaper on Wednesday.
The village uses about $12,000 in recycling education grants to raise awareness at local schools.
The village of Lombard holds itself accountable to the environment with its Sustainability Framework report. It was originally adopted in May 2010 with the purpose of comprehensively viewing the environmental goals and programs of the village.
The framework is broken down into seven main components:
Air
On Tuesday, Assistant Director of Public Works Dave Gorman accepted another Clean Air award on behalf of the village.
"We're very proud of this award," Gorman said. "We were one of three recipients in all of Illinois."
Lombard won this award because of its no-idling initiative, which began three years ago and serves as an example for other towns.
"We placed no-idling signs in school pick-up areas and by railroad crossings," he said. "There's signs saying to please turn off your engine to save money and air pollution."
One of the reasons, in addition to keeping air clean, are health concerns such as higher numbers of asthma cases in these areas.
"As a result of the initiative, other towns have put up similar signs," Gorman said.
The village won a Clean Air Counts bronze-level award in 2007 for monthly clean air information dispersed to residents, a gas can replacement program, using no- or low-VOC paints and implementing an anti-idling policy for village vehicles.
Today is Earth Day, and while some will remember to take the time to appreciate the environment, others honor it year-round.
Lombard Elementary School District 44 has various activities planned throughout its schools, including reading books about tree importance, passing out seedling, tree plantings and Earth Day stations.
One of Manor Hill's second-grade teachers tries to enforce the Earth Day mentality all year through her curriculum.
"I believe it's important for children to learn about ways to go green and how we can better preserve our community and reduce our carbon footprint," teacher Lori Hacker said.
Throughout the school year, Manor Hill promotes recycling in all of its offices and classrooms. Other efforts include turning lights off when not in classrooms, use of technology like SMART boards and using both sides of paper. Hacker said she hopes more efforts will be implemented year-round.
In honor of Earth Day, DuPage School District 45, which has four schools in Lombard and four schools in Villa Park, had first graders at Westmore School making globes out of recycled bags and newspaper on Wednesday.
The village uses about $12,000 in recycling education grants to raise awareness at local schools.
The village of Lombard holds itself accountable to the environment with its Sustainability Framework report. It was originally adopted in May 2010 with the purpose of comprehensively viewing the environmental goals and programs of the village.
The framework is broken down into seven main components:
Air
On Tuesday, Assistant Director of Public Works Dave Gorman accepted another Clean Air award on behalf of the village.
"We're very proud of this award," Gorman said. "We were one of three recipients in all of Illinois."
Lombard won this award because of its no-idling initiative, which began three years ago and serves as an example for other towns.
"We placed no-idling signs in school pick-up areas and by railroad crossings," he said. "There's signs saying to please turn off your engine to save money and air pollution."
One of the reasons, in addition to keeping air clean, are health concerns such as higher numbers of asthma cases in these areas.
"As a result of the initiative, other towns have put up similar signs," Gorman said.
The village won a Clean Air Counts bronze-level award in 2007 for monthly clean air information dispersed to residents, a gas can replacement program, using no- or low-VOC paints and implementing an anti-idling policy for village vehicles.
Eve Pytel, assistant director from Clean Air Counts, said the village won the award for its “eat-your-vegetable” style projects which yield significant environmental impact per the investment. She mentioned the no-idling zones at schools, parks and train stations as one of their best initiatives.
“Through their procurement process, they have implemented a green cleaning program,” she said.
Greenhouse gases
The village attempts to reduce greenhouse gases by utilizing the Cool Cities program. It’s also added three hybrid cars to its fleet.
The Sierra Club sponsors the Cool Cities program — a national collaboration of more than 1,000 city and county leaders with community members, organizations and businesses.
The village purchased the hybrids in the last four years.
The first purchase in 2007 was for $23,316 and the last two in 2008 for $21,295 and $22,395.
“We analyzed several similar-sized vehicles and found that the hybrids would save us $6,000 to $8,000 over the life of the vehicle based on fuel savings,” Gorman said.
Water conservation
In order to conserve water, the village of Lombard started its own rain barrel reimbursement program in 2008. More than 200 homes currently participate in this program.
Transportation
To get more people out of their cars, the village has and continues to promote the use of bicycles by providing new routes and paths around town. The village has also been working with residents to develop pedestrian bridges over railroad crossings to promote safer transportation for pedestrians and cyclists in addition to a circulator bus system serving the train station and major employment places.
Land use
To effectively use village land, Lombard is a Tree City USA member with nearly 18,000 parkway trees. The village has won this award for 22 consecutive years because it has met the following four standards:
- must have a tree board or department
- must have a tree-care ordinance
- must have a community forestry program with annual expenditures of at least $2 per capita
- must have an Arbor Day observance and proclamation
Waste diversion
With the goal of decreasing the volume of waste from properties, the village's recycling rate has been 30 percent of the curbside weight for the past five years, according to the Sustainability Framework report.
Additionally, the village's annual Recycling Extravaganza collects 60 tons of electronics, 3.5 tons of metal, 100 bicycles, 500 pairs of shoes, 170 car batteries and flags, hearing aids, glasses, garden pots, crutches and wheelchairs.
Energy use
To reduce electricity and natural-gas consumption at all the village facilities, the lighting has been replaced with more energy-efficient bulbs and the village hopes to install motion-detector lighting in all faculties.
