Why do we waste anything?  It is a question I ask myself a lot these days.  Why did it become normal to waste something?  Our neighbors at the Cedar Mountain Community Center have decided to stop wasting and have had huge success quickly!  Wow, I mean wow!  I wanted to share this story of their last potluck dinner held in April.  What amazing neighbors!  This story was taken (with permission) from Linda Packer Young’s community newsletter.  Thanks for sharing Linda and thanks to the volunteers of our neighborhood community center for being so wonderful.  We love you!

CEDAR MOUNTAIN COMMUNITY CENTER
The Cedar Mountain Community Center hosted its first potluck dinner and program of the season
on Monday evening. There was plenty of delicious food, and friendship. A wonderful
informative program was presented by Sarah Landry, Executive Director of Friends of DuPont.
She spoke at length about the DuPont Recreational Forest.

The only thing missing from the meeting was the abundance of trash. The potluck normally
generates three full 55 gallon bags of trash. This time the Center implemented their Zero Waste
program and the amount of trash was reduced to a total of ¼ of a 13gal trash bag. (Pix) CMCC
has joined with other Cedar Mountain businesses to reduce the amount of waste produced during
their events.

CMCC has also invested in a commercial dishwasher. Reusable dishes and silverware are
quickly cleaned and sanitized in just a few minutes. Cloth napkins and towels are also washed
and reused. The Center has agreed to work with other area businesses in cleaning and sanitizing
their event utensils. CMCC is proud of the huge reduction in waste, but plan to do even better at
the next event. The Cedar Mountain Canteen has agreed to take all food scraps to use for
composting. This should result in almost no waste.

Potluck diners all cooperated to make the Zero Waste program a success. Area landfills and our
beautiful mountain lifestyle can benefit from our efforts. Please support Zero Waste programs and
business promoting it.

Teresa Girolamo, Board President.