Sacramento environmental groups gathered Thursday night to recognize local leaders in sustainability and to raise funds for local environmental projects. Sustainable Sacramento was hosted by Pesticide Watch and Slow Food Sacramento. The event was held at Hot Italian Pizza and Panini Bar in midtown Sacramento.

As attendees escaped the damp streets and persistent rain, they were greeted warmly by Paul S. Towers, state director of Pesticide Watch Education Fund, and Slow Food Sacramento’s Kathy Les. Hot Italian co-owner Fabrizio Cercatore poured glasses of red wine and brought out a variety of pizzas for guests to enjoy.

Pesticide Watch, a statewide organization based in Sacramento, seeks to empower citizens to use sustainable solutions to deal with pests and to keep their community healthy. Towers addressed the crowd of approximately 75 people by thanking them for supporting local environmental champions.

“There is a long history of people in our area willing to stand up to injustices when they see them. These people are champions,” he said.

Sustainability Leadership Awards were presented to Harvest Sacramento, the GEO Environmental Science and Design Academy and Hot Italian.

Harvest Sacramento’s award was presented by Blake Young of the Sacramento Food Bank and accepted by Randy Stannard, Food Access Coordinator for Sacramento’s Soil Born Farms.

Harvest Sacramento’s mission is to collect fruits and vegetables which might otherwise go to waste from neighborhoods and small orchards and distribute it to local hunger assistance agencies. It is a collaborative effort of Sacramento area residents, non-profits and businesses. Since the effort got underway in 2009, Harvest Sacramento has collected more than 20,000 pounds of produce.

Soil Born Farms has taken a leadership role in organizing the group’s efforts and in connecting those efforts with local food banks.

In his acceptance remarks, Stannard talked about the origins of Harvest Sacramento. “People saw a problem. They saw trees full of fruit going to waste and fruit rotting on the ground. They said, ‘This just makes us sick! What can we do about it?’ ”

The Sustainability Award for GEO Academy was presented by David Herbert of Kaiser Permanente and accepted by Fatima Malik, GEO’s Cooking and Nutrition Educator.

GEO Academy, located at Grant Union High School, is pioneering efforts to teach Sacramento youth how to create and foster healthy, sustainable communities. GEO provides high school students with a unique combination of rigorous academics and real world based projects that prepare students for careers that will shape our communities and our environment.

Students and community members grow vegetables, fruit and flowers at GEO’s community garden. Students use the garden for hands-on learning about ecology, plant biology, health and nutrition.

Hot Italian owners Andrea Lepore and Fabrizio Cercatore accepted their Sustainability Award. The award was presented by Sacramento City Councilmember Steve Cohn.

Hot Italian is the first restaurant in the Sacramento region to achieve LEED certification. LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) is a rating system of the U.S. Green Building Council in order to provide standards for environmentally sustainable construction.

The midtown Sacramento restaurant was a major restoration from the retail space which previously existed there. The building now has a solar thermal system for hot water, low energy LED and CFL lighting, low flow faucets and toilets, and uses recycled materials in chairs, tables and other fixtures. Hot Italian strives to serve food made from local and organic ingredients with a menu that changes seasonally. They also compost their kitchen waste, provide compostable pizza boxes and there is parking for 32 bicycles on site.

Brenda Ruiz attended Sustainable Sacramento on behalf of Slow Food USA’s “Time for Lunch” campaign and is heading up the effort here. Time for Lunch is an effort to get Congress to reform the U.S. Child Nutrition Act and the National School Lunch Program in a way that provides more funding for school lunch and farm to school programs.

Ruiz, a chef at Sacramento’s Biba restaurant, reminds people that they have the power to address problems in their community.

“People sometimes say, ‘The school lunch issue, it’s messed up,’ and they don't think there is anything they can do. Well, people need to know there are always things they can do to help,” Ruiz said.

For more information:

Pesticide Watch

Slow Food Sacramento

Harvest Sacramento

GEO Academy

Hot Italian

Time For Lunch