Private and Public Coordinate for Corporate Recycling

This is not another fluff story about corporations trying to make themselves appear to be good citizens by doing less than they should and bragging about it way too much. It's about corporate responsibility from the inside out and the grassroots up. In most cases, conscientious employees are going out of their way to extend to their workplace what they already do at home.

Take Carolyn Mitchell at the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce for example. A self-described tree hugger, she sends out office-wide emails to remind fellow employees to recycle. "It's not that they don't want to recycle," she observes. "People simply get busy and forget." She thinks she sees a temporary increase in the recycle bins when she sends the emails.

"There is no one telling employees that they must recycle. It's strictly voluntary. Yet I would say that about 90 percent of the employees participate," Mitchell muses. "I think that the Chamber should set a positive example for other businesses."

After a pause, she laughs, "It's nice that even visitors seem to get into the spirit. Of course the bins are right there for everyone to see, but they're pretty good about putting their containers and all in the correct bins." The bins are beside desks and in the copy room for paper, and in the kitchen for plastic, cans and paper. "When I came in 2002, they already had the paper recycling bins. Then they added bins for other recyclables like plastics and cans in 2003," she recalls.

Mayor Ron Littlefield held a press conference at the Waterhouse Pavilion at Miller Plaza in January. The Mayor introduced Rocky the Recycling Raccoon to promote Chattanooga's monthly curbside recycling program. Rocky is the mascot for Team Recycle, a joint effort between the City of Chattanooga and Orange Grove Center. As the Recycle Right website explains, there are three steps in the recycling process. The joint venture completes the first two steps to help direct some 330 tons of waste into recycling for reuse instead of being dumped into landfills. It also provides jobs for Orange Grove Center clients.

But according to John Chamberlain, Recycling Coordinator, Orange Grove Center has additional recycling services targeted specifically at businesses. "Recycle Express provides weekly pickup of cardboard, mixed paper, glass, plastic and aluminum for $20 per month. Well over 100 businesses are currently participating."
He points out that the waste to be recycled varies by type of business. Real estate offices generate large volumes of paper to be recycled. Liquor stores generate cardboard boxes. Small bars and restaurants generate cardboard and beverage containers. By paying a small amount for the service, the businesses enjoy weekly frequency of pickups rather than just the monthly curbside pickup.

Recycle Express has been operating for about three years. "BlueCross BlueShield (of Tennessee) has been recycling for a long time. They even recycle computer stuff like printer cartridges," Chamberlain recalls. "They plan to incorporate recycling into their new (headquarters office) complex on Cameron Hill."

He also noted that businesses like BCBS, doctors offices and others that process security sensitive documents first shred the paper before recycling it. "The tiny pieces of paper make our job harder, but we still handle it. (They refuse shredded paper in the curbside program and at the convenience centers.)

"Another department of Orange Grove Center provides document destruction services and we recycle their paper too," says Chamberlain.

The cooperative arrangement between Orange Grove Center and the City of Chattanooga extends to four recycling drop-off convenience centers as well. The convenience centers accept glass bottles (brown, green and clear), computers and small electronics (no TVs or microwaves), wet cell batteries, motor oil, shredded paper, as well as all paper except shredded, cardboard, plastic #1 and #2 (bottles with a neck), aluminum cans, and steel cans that are recyclable through the curbside program.

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The portable recycling trailer sits on the City of Chattanooga's future second permanent collection site located on Access Rd. at DuPont Pkwy., beside the Refuse Collection Center. The facility is accepting recyclables even as a permanent office is under construction in the background.
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A permanent facility is located at Warner Park Recycle Center, 1250 East Third St. A second permanent facility will be complete in about 30 days at Access Road at DuPont Parkway, with the Refuse Collection Center. That facility is already accepting recyclables with a portable facility, as are two additional locations at John A. Patten Recreation Center, 3202 Kelly’s Ferry Rd., and East Brainerd Baseball Complex, at the end of Batter’s Place Road. All four will eventually be permanent facilities, but Chamberlain wouldn't speculate on a completion date. "Orange Grove Center operates them, but the City owns them and is handling construction."

City convenience center hours are Monday, Tuesday and Friday, 7:30 a.m. - 5 p.m.; closed Wednesday and Thursday; open Saturday, 8 a.m. - 5 p.m., and Sunday, 1 p.m. - 5 p.m.

In addition, Hamilton County operates collection facilities at East Ridge Recycling Center, 1001 Yale Street (behind East Ridge Hospital), Tuesday and Thursday, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m., Saturday, 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Highway 58 Recycling Center, 5414 Hwy. 58 (corner of Hwy. 58 & Hickory Valley Rd), Monday and Wednesday, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m., Saturday, 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Middle Valley Recycling Center, 1600 Crabtree Road (Hixson), Monday and Wednesday, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m., Saturday, 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Red Bank Recycling Center, 4851-B Dayton Blvd. (Next to Fire hall #2), Tuesday and Thursday, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m., Saturday, 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Standifer Gap Recycling Center, 7625 Standifer Gap Road, Tuesday - Friday, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.; Saturday, 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Sequoyah Recycling Center, 9525 Lovell Road (Soddy Daisy) Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.

To participate in Recycle Express by Orange Grove Center call 493-2925. For additional information on City recycling programs and centers call 311. Information on Hamilton County recycling is available at 209-6480.

How Clean Is Green Chattanooga?

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Clean blue skies prevail over Enterprise South today, where the U.S. Army once belched, spilled and dredged pollutants into the environment at the largest TNT manufacturing facility in the world.
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"Deer!" is a common cheer uttered by passengers of cars passing through Enterprise South, along with less frequent cheers of "wild turkey!" "coyote!" and "fox!" Such wildlife sightings underscore a remarkable resiliency of the former Volunteer Army Ammunition Plant and its inhabitants. In spring and summer many sins of the past are completely overgrown by kudzu. Only with the onset of cold weather and resulting loss of foliage are automobile passengers reminded of the area's mysterious industrial past.

Starting in the 1940s, the VAAP became the world's largest manufacturer of TNT explosives. Production declined after World War II and the Korean War until it was finally decommissioned in 1977. It sat like a derelict in its own waste until a decade ago.

Chattanooga has been trying to market the massive acreage since then, first the Army contractor ICI Americas as the Volunteer Site and now Hamilton County and the City of Chattanooga as Enterprise South. The efforts have been largely unsuccessful, but some of that faltering has been deliberate. Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce Director of Marketing J.Ed. Marston has noted, "This is the last large undeveloped piece of land in Hamilton County. We only get one shot at developing it right."

Before the Army could sell the reservation to local governments, the Environmental Protection Agency required significant remediation of the chemical waste that had been carelessly mishandled during production of TNT. As a result, the transfer of ownership was incremental and the Army is still on the hook for remediation until around 2020 according to a 2004 Public Health Assessment.

Chattanooga's Cinderella story from "dirtiest city in America," a dubious honor bestowed by the Environmental Protection Agency in 1969, to one of America's ten greenest according to travel and environmental journalist Brian Goodspeed has been a model of public and private cooperation. Numerous other environmental and travel writers have also noted the remarkable transformation that has taken place in Chattanooga. Governments from American and overseas cities have sent delegations of observers to study progress of the new environmental emerald of the South.

Yet the recent loss of the Toyota assembly plant incited speculation that environmental issues were at least partially responsible. One of the earliest U.S. reports about Toyota's decision to locate in Tupelo, Mississippi, appeared in the Memphis Commercial Appeal. Writer Amos Maki asserted that "Air quality problems in and around Marion (AR) and Chattanooga opened the door for Tupelo."

State and local authorities then scrambled to deny that environmental issues factored into the decision to pass over Chattanooga. Bob Colby, Director of the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Air Pollution Control Bureau, addressed air concerns by insisting that "Chattanooga would not have even been considered as a site without a 2003 Early Action Compact that worked to achieve cleaner air by this year."

As a part of its preemptive efforts to meet EPA ground level ozone requirements for 2008, the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Air Pollution Control Bureau enacted a program labeled the Early Action Compact that included mandatory vehicle emissions testing and seasonal burning bans to reduce air pollution. The efforts reportedly put Chattanooga two years ahead of schedule and might forestall mandated draconian measures like industrial development limitations and use of specially blended fuels in cars and trucks.

Hamilton County Commissioner Bill Hullander addressed ground contamination or brown field concerns by stating, "An EPA study gave the site a clean bill of health and only a couple of places needed cleaning up. It wouldn't qualify it as a brown field."

Presumably Hullander's information is from an update of the aforementioned 2004 Public Health Assessment which listed 26 sites of potential locations of contamination ranging from debris, pesticides and acids to far more lethal toxins like vanadium pentoxide, asbestos and "a minor mustard gas release." Though he didn't claim that the cleanup had been completed, the significant progress from 26 sites to "a couple" apparently represents a significant acceleration ahead of the 2020 conclusion projected by that same report.

The most reassuring statement denying the significance of environmental issues, however, came from Toyota itself. Jim Press, President of Toyota North America, Inc., stated that air quality issues did not affect the Tennessee and Arkansas sites. "We were able to clear all of the goals in terms of environmental impact," Press said, as reported by the Associated Press. "The site in Tennessee, environmentally, was fine."

Enjoy the Chattanooga Traditional Jazz Festival May 5-7

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This story will be published in the past tense because the publication date is near the event date. I am going ahead and posting it here with apologies and the hope that it will do the event some good.

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The Chattanooga Traditional Jazz Festival is a love story that spans 17 years for promoters Mike and Astrid Griffin shown here in front of the new addition to the Hunter Museum of American Art, site of "Hot Jazz in Stone and Steel."
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May 5 is your opportunity to get something special for nothing. The Buck Creek Jazz Band will perform Dixieland Jazz at the Hunter Museum of American Art at 12:30 p.m. on the first Saturday of May this year. And it's free.


Billed as "Hot Jazz in Stone and Steel," the event combines American visual art and uniquely American early jazz music under the new "wing" of the Hunter Museum. "The expansive views and soaring architecture of our newly expanded Museum will provide a terrific backdrop for the marriage of these two American artforms," director of the Hunter Museum Rob Kret observes. The event is a bonus of the annual Chattanooga Traditional Jazz Festival being held May 5-7 at the Chattanooga Choo Choo.

This event follows on the heels of a Carrie Mae Weems photographic exhibition at the Hunter Museum focusing on the New Orleans area and American social issues. Early jazz is often identified with its origins in New Orleans during the early 1900's.

Jim Ritter, cornetist and co-leader of Buck Creek Jazz Band, will narrate a history of jazz as the band plays and various works of art reminiscent of that period are displayed from the Hunter Museum's private collection. Seven musicians, including two drummers, who have been playing together for 19 years generate a rich, highly refined sound that is sought after by traditional jazz aficionados. They reportedly have served up their unique brand of New Orleans style jazz to every major traditional jazz festival in the United States, and some elsewhere as well.

The Buck Creek Jazz Band aspires to represent the playing of the early jazz pioneers without copying them. Music by Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, Buddy Bolden, Sidney Bechet, King Oliver and cornetist Bix Beiderbecke often are associated with the genesis of jazz. With their talent, jazz fever spread from New Orleans to Chicago, New York and Los Angeles, and then to Europe and the rest of the world during World War I. Ritter will interpret Beiderbecke's arrangements along with that of other memorable jazz artists.

In commenting about this extension of the larger 3-day event, promoters Mike and Astrid Griffin noted, "We have always had wonderful cooperation from Allied Arts, the Hunter Museum and Bluff View Art District publicizing our Festival. Until now the Museum hadn't had the facility to host this type of event. We think 'Hot Jazz in Stone and Steel' marks the beginning of a new level of cooperation. We would like to see the Chattanooga Traditional Jazz Festival become more of a community event like Riverbend rather than simply focusing on visitors," and he sees the Bluff View Art District as an ideal venue. Griffin confirmed that some of the most memorable jazz shows at Riverbend are held on the stage near the Hunter Museum.

The Chattanooga Traditional Jazz Festival has successfully enhanced traditional jazz appreciation and awareness of Chattanooga for 17 years, and payed its own way in doing so. Formerly known as the Bessie Smith Traditional Jazz Festival, it brings enthusiasts from around the world to patronize Chattanooga lodging, restaurants and tourist attractions. "There is a huge number of people who will travel across the country to attend a festival of this caliber," Mike Griffin notes. "Americans recognize the value, but the Europeans and Japanese recognize it even more." Approximately 450 people willingly ante up $125 to $175 for a weekend of quality traditional jazz. "Many of the reservations are made a year in advance," according to Griffin. The rest trickle in throughout the year. "We are very fortunate. Often events in Chattanooga don't sell out until the day of the event."

"Bessie Smith and Louis Armstrong recorded together," Griffin remarks, so the Chattanooga jazz and blues native's name was an obvious choice to be associated with the Festival. However, the Festival was often confused with the popular Riverbend night known as the Bessie Smith Strut so the Festival's name was changed. Though the Festival originally helped raise money for the Bessie Smith Hall, there is no current relationship. "Unfortunately, the Bessie Smith Hall is not recognized in the industry as a jazz venue," says Griffin sadly, "and I don't know why that is."

This year the Festival is hosting four noted traditional jazz bands, all of which are sought after throughout the world of traditional jazz. In addition to the Buck Creek Jazz Band, the Cakewalkin' Jass (sic) Band, Grand Dominion Jazz Band and High Sierra Jazz Band will take turns cabaret style in the Chattanooga Choo Choo's Imperial Ballroom. "There are over 100 jazz festivals throughout the United States," Griffin noted. "Some festivals bus guests to multiple venues. Ours is a boutique jazz festival where the jazz comes to you. When our guests leave they are happy."

"Three of these bands played in the Bessie Smith Jazz Festival," according to Griffin. "In fact, trumpeter Duke Heitger played with his sister, Nicole Heitger, for jazz great Banu Gibson here in a swing feature as a part of the Chattanooga Symphony Orchestra's pops series five years ago. He is returning from touring in Europe just for his performance at the Chattanooga Traditional Jazz Festival with the Cakewalkin' Jass Band led by his father, clarinetist Ray Heitger." Cakewalkin' Jass Band is eight musicians from Toledo, Ohio, playing banjo, string bass, piano, cornet, clarinet, drums, trombone and vocals. Duke, when not traveling in Europe and elsewhere, now hails from New Orleans where he leads his own Steamboat Stompers aboard the Natchez paddlewheeler daily, makes a weekly appearance at the Palm Court Jazz Cafe and recorded with the Squirrel Nut Zippers on their million-selling disc "Hot."

Grand Dominion Jazz Band is from Vancouver, British Columbia, and Seattle, Washington. Bandmember Jim Marsh recalled in an article he wrote for Just Jazz magazine, October 2006, and reproduced on the band's website: "My own 'personal best' recollection was in Chattanooga in 1996, when Adolphus 'Doc' Cheatham joined us onstage for a few tunes. What an experience it was to share the stage with a legend. At the age of ninety-one, he required a stool to support him, but his trumpet still rang out sweetly, and he sang 'Sweethearts On Parade,' with no hesitation whatsoever. At one point, Bob Jackson was looking closely at the rusty and battered old tin mute that Doc was using, so Doc handed it to him, saying as he did so, 'King Oliver gave me that mute.' Bob snatched his hand back as though he was being offered the crown jewels, which, in a sense I suppose, he was." Marsh goes on to add, "The Chattanooga Festival has become an annual event for us, and we are referred to as 'the house band' by organizers Mike and Astrid Griffin."

The High Sierra Jazz Band is seven musicians from Central California and the tiny town of Three Rivers located at the entrance to Sequoia National Park. According to their website, an American Rag readers poll pronounced the High Sierra Jazz Band the second most popular traditional jazz band ever, just behind the Turk Murphy Band and ahead of the Duke Ellington Orchestra. Instrumentation for High Sierra includes reeds, trombone, cornet, sousaphone, piano, banjo, drums and vocals.

Promoting jazz events started early for Mike Griffin. His first were jam sessions in high school in Grand Rapids, Michigan, during the 1940's. He then graduated to promoting shows featuring local bands and icons such as Sidney Bechet and Louis Armstrong to the general public. In fact, Griffin promoted two concerts of Louis Armstrong and his band, the Allstars, to crowds of 4500 each. After relocating to Chattanooga years later, his love of jazz and familiarity with events promotion led he and wife Astrid to begin this endeavor that has spanned nearly two decades. "I couldn't do it without Astrid," Griffin says of his wife. "We think the Chattanooga Traditional Jazz Festival helps to present a good image for the community, and we hope to encourage more local people to appreciate music."

Visitors to "Hot Jazz in Stone and Steel" may elect to continue their afternoon at the Hunter Museum with a tour of the permanent art collection for $8. Admission to the rest of the Jazz Festival performances are available by phone at 423-266-0944.

Is the Risk of Radon Real?

If you have ever known of a non-smoker who died of lung cancer, you probably pondered how that could have happened. Considerable media coverage has pointed an accusing finger at second hand smoke, but there may be another culprit. According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, "Radon is the leading cause of lung cancer in America among non-smokers and claims more than 20,000 lives annually."

"Radon is a naturally occurring environmental carcinogen," according to Amy Fields, spokesperson for the American Cancer Society. "Most radon-induced cases of lung cancer occur in smokers, reflecting synergy between smoking and radon exposure. Quitting smoking is an essential part of prevention, but the estimates of radon-caused lung cancer are also substantial. Radon-induced lung cancer can be prevented by reducing radon levels in homes and other buildings."

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Testing is important to determine if your location is at risk. Sometimes radon gateways are easy to spot. Remediation can be as simple and economical as caulking cracks in floors and walls.
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You probably briefly studied about radon in high school or college chemistry as an element on the periodic table. It also "is a cancer-causing natural radioactive gas that you can’t see, smell or taste," according to the EPA. Radon is produced by the radioactive decay of uranium, which is present to some degree in all rocks and soils. Concentrated by the movement of ground water, gases like radon release into homes and workplaces through cracks in floors and walls often too small for solids or liquids to penetrate.

In fact, the danger of radon was discovered in 1984 in the case of Stanley Waltras, an employee at the Limerick Nuclear Power Plant in Pennsylvania. In routine employee testing, alarming levels of radiation were discovered in Waltras. Surprisingly, the source was eventually tracked--not to the power plant--but to radon contaminated air in the basement of the Waltras home. Carcinogenic radiation exposure there was estimated to be equivalent to smoking 135 packs of cigarettes per day!

I asked a random dozen Chattanoogans about what they knew of the risk of radon. Other than some general awareness that radon is not good for you, they did not associate radon with lung cancer. The problem may be the lack of top of mind awareness. Unlike cigarettes, labels about radon are difficult to affix. And unlike smoke detectors, radon detectors are not sold on end caps at local Wal-Marts. Information is readily available if you search on the Internet. But first you must be aware and concerned enough to perform the search.

Calls to regional offices of the EPA in Atlanta and the Tennessee Department of Envrionment and Conservation's Radiological Health unit in Nashville to inquire about specific efforts to promote radon awareness in the Chattanooga area went unreturned.

The EPA has created a public service announcement that compares the Surgeon General's Warning on cigarette packages with a similar Surgeon General's Warning about radon. You can view the ad at http://www.epa.gov/radon/rnpsa.html.

Unfortunately local television stations cannot confirm that they have ever aired the ad. Though she thinks WRCB-TV12 might have aired a radon ad in the past, Doris Ellis, programming director, explained, "We receive hundreds of public service announcements, especially during election time."

According to Ellis, "The way to warn Chattanoogans about the risk of radon is for an authority to be interviewed on one of the news broadcasts." It turns out, however, that there is no local authority promoting radon awareness.

Iowa ranks as the state that leads the nation in naturally occuring radon, so it logically follows that the state has done the most to study the health risks posed by the element. But what about Tennessee and Georgia? How prevalent is it here?

The EPA provides national and state maps showing three levels of radon incidence. However, it warns that the maps are "not intended to be used to determine if a home in a given zone should be tested for radon. Homes with elevated levels of radon have been found in all three zones. All homes should be tested regardless of geographic location."

A study at Oak Ridge National Laboratories revealed that the United States Department of Energy has conducted quarterly ambient air monitoring in the environment surrounding ORNL facilities including in nearby Scarboro since 1986. "The level of radiation received by Scarboro residents is not a health hazard." Note, however, that this is surface "ambient" exposure.

A "Tennessee Agricultural Research and Extension System Report from the University of Tennessee and Tennessee State University to the United States Department of Agriculture" stated that of "463 home radon tests conducted in 2003, 145 (31%) were at or above the level recommended for treatment by the Environmental Protection Agency."

Air Check, a leading radon test kit lab located in Fletcher, North Carolina, reports that average test results for Tennessee are above the 4 pCi/l threshold at which the EPA recommends remediation, while the average for Georgia is well below. However, keep in mind that the EPA insists that all homes should be tested regardless of geographic location.

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Solids and liquids may not be able to pass through, but gases like radon can. Radon is the leading cause of lung cancer among non-smokers, equivalent to smoking up to 135 packs of cigarettes per day in some cases.
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Though Wal-Mart doesn't carry radon detectors, Lowe's and Home Depot do sell passive test kits for less than $20 and they are even more affordable online starting at around $10 from sites such as radon.com, testproducts.com and ebay.com.

Passive testing involves hanging the self-mailer envelope at the normal breathing level in a room. After two to three days it is sealed air tight while in the testing room. Then it is mailed to the lab for measurement. The results are provided by return mail or email.

Extensive radon information can be found at http://www.epa.gov/radon/ and at http://www.cancer.org/docroot/PED/content/PED_1_3x_Radon.asp?sitearea=PED as well as other Internet sites.