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Planthropology
Planthropology
122. Green Communities, Urban Conservation, and Just Showing Up w/ Gary Cocke and Carole Fergusson
Gary Cocke and Carole Fergusson share their journeys in sustainability and community conservation, revealing how partnerships between universities, cities, and local organizations create meaningful environmental impact in Waco and beyond.
• Gary's background in biology and ecology led him to sustainability work, first in water conservation during drought conditions
• Carole entered sustainability through nonprofit marketing and event planning, combining her personal passion for gardening with professional skills
• The Baylor "Bearly Used" program diverted 13 large pods of student move-out items to community partners instead of landfills
• Keep Waco Beautiful volunteers generate approximately $200,000 in economic impact annually through their service hours
• The Green Communities Conference brings together academia, government, nonprofits, and citizens to address local sustainability challenges
• Both leaders emphasize that sustainability is fundamentally about people and building community resilience
• Climate impacts are increasingly visible in Texas through longer heat spells, winter storms, and worsening allergy seasons
• Small personal actions like composting and planting native species create "pockets of joy" while contributing to larger solutions
Join us at the Green Communities Conference on September 17-18 in Waco, Texas to connect with sustainability leaders and learn practical approaches to building greener communities.
As always, thanks so much for listening! Subscribe, rate, and review Planthropology on your favorite podcast app. It helps the show keep growing and reaching more people! As a bonus, if you review Planthropology on Apple Podcasts or Podchaser and send me a screenshot of it, I'll send you an awesome sticker pack!
Planthropology is written, hosted, and produced by Vikram Baliga. Our theme song is "If You Want to Love Me, Babe, by the talented and award-winning composer, Nick Scout. Midroll tunes are by Rooey.
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What is up? Plant people. It's time once more for the Plantthropology podcast, the short way to dive into the lives and careers of some very cool plant people, to figure out why they do what they do and what keeps them coming back for more. I'm Vikram Baliga, your host and your humble guide in this journey through the sciences and, as always, my dearest friends. I am so excited to be with you today, especially after a break. So I had a summer break and I hope that was okay for you, it was nice for me and I'm actually coming back because last time I took a summer break it was like six months long and I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry but, to be fair, I live in Texas and the summer is very long here.
Speaker 1:So my guests today for the first episode of the second half of season six of Planthropology are actually two guests, and they are Gary Kaki, the Senior Director of Sustainability at Baylor University, and Carol Ferguson, the Executive Director of Cape Waco Beautiful. I've worked with both Carol and Gary on the Green Communities Conference, which is coming up in a couple of weeks, by the way, and you should come see us in Waco and it is a product of Cape Waco Beautiful and Baylor and the city of Waco, and it's a wonderful collaboration because now Texas Tech gets to help as well, as well as the University of Texas at Austin and a couple of different groups. So, basically, this conference talks about how can you build a stronger green community from recycling to better plantings, to community aid and everything else. It's wonderful, but Gary and Carol are such an interesting pair of people who have done so much in the public space, whether that's in conservation and sustainability, in event planning and community organizing and doing clean, how to be more sustainable in your town and just how to show up how to show up and plug in and be part of something. So this is a wonderful conversation that I think you're really going to enjoy. I know I enjoyed having the conversation and I really enjoyed getting to listen to it again while I was editing as well.
Speaker 1:So grab your recycling bin and a nice hat and some sunscreen and get yourself ready for episode 122 of the Planthropology podcast, green communities, conservation and just showing up with Gary Kaki and Carol Ferguson. We'll give it a couple seconds to think about its life choices and then, all right, well, y'all. Gary, carol, I am so excited to have you with me today. We, I think, started talking about this like in I don't know March or April, and then somehow it's already August, which is very upsetting, but I'm really excited to have y'all on. So why don't you introduce yourselves a little bit, gary, if you want to go first and just tell us about you, where you're from, what you do and all that fun stuff?
Speaker 2:Yeah, my name is Gary Kaki. I am the Senior Director for Sustainability at Baylor University, and so by education I've studied biology as an undergrad and a grad, and then I did my graduate work with a concentration in ecology and conservation kind of just a guy that always liked being outside, and so my studies kind of followed that passion. But I didn't necessarily know that I was headed towards a career preserving nature. But as I progressed with my education I studied the way that mercury moves in the aquatic ecosystems, and so that opened a door for me to have my first job in sustainability with the city of Plano. And although I wasn't doing any hard science, I was doing water conservation. It lit the fire for sustainability for me, because there's no better crash course in effective conservation than doing water conservation during a drought. And so I learned how you can communicate and work with communities to steward a shared resource. I went and got my irrigation license and I went and spoke to every HOA that would listen to me speak and I wrote thousands of tickets for people that were watering irresponsibly, and so that really, you know, turned my passion away from, you know, the science towards community work for sustainability. And then that job got a little boring actually, as we came out of the drought, and so an opportunity at the University of North Texas came up to lead the green fund there, which it generally collects a student fee from from each student and then it organizes a student-run process so that we can get ideas for what students want to see in the sustainability program and solicits those ideas, and so I organized that process.
Speaker 2:But the more fun part was working with students to help them.
Speaker 2:You know, go from having a passion and wanting to do some good to putting together a full plan with a budget and an implementation process and the stakeholders aligned so that we could do some good work, and so that was really fulfilling.
Speaker 2:We launched community gardens, we got more sustainable shirts to give away at student events, we first purchased renewable energy, and so that was where I learned that my home was higher ed, and then I had an opportunity from there at the University of Texas at Dallas, where I spent about seven years and was able to lead a fully scoped sustainability program that was working with faculty and staff and impacting operations and continuing to work with the students. That I really found fulfilling. And at Baylor we're doing that same work. We have a new strategic plan that has really prioritized stewardship of the environment, and so it's been really rewarding to jump in to this work with the lessons that I've learned in my career and to have strong support from leadership to kind of paint a picture on a blank canvas and really, you know, figure out what sustainability at Baylor is going to be as we fulfill the strategic plan no-transcript.
Speaker 1:Like all that, you know, we've been in our college working through a strategic plan for a year and a half and I get all twitchy when anyone says that anymore because it's like I don't know post-traumatic stress from it. But it is important to know where we're going and how we get there. I mean it's super cool.
Speaker 2:Yes, absolutely. And then having that at the highest level to really make sure that the sustainability of work is not just the lip service that you referenced, that it is substantive. It's really important to have as we go out and engage our community with the work. For sure, for sure.
Speaker 1:Well, Carol, your turn. You're up.
Speaker 3:Man, that's a hard one to follow. I am not professionally or educationally trained as either of you, but my background is actually in nonprofit marketing and communications and I also have a really strong background in events. And this position opened up October of 21 and was ready to make a leap into a leadership role. I had some experience in it and wanted to do it at a higher level, and so when this opportunity opened up, I was like this is great. This aligns with some of my personal morals.
Speaker 3:I am a gardener. I grow and kill plants nonstop year round, actively killing an entire garden at the moment Thanks Texas heat and I personally just love caring for my environment. As just a human, I feel like it's important. I find a lot of spiritual connection in nature, always have had those moments, just whether it's going for a walk or hiking. I just really feel super connected to the earth, and so this was kind of a fun like oh, this kind of hits on some personal joys of mine and I had no idea I'd be doing what I'm doing now and it is honestly just incredible work. And so, yeah, we kind of weird.
Speaker 3:I'm coming up on four years. My actual education is a bachelor's of science or a BS degree in psychology, so that BS could be whatever you want it to think it to be. We all know what it is. I had debated on doing my master's and, you know, the more and more as time went on, I have a very strong affinity for human behavior and neuroscience. I am quite a nerd at heart, but I actually just love working with humans in the capacity that I do now, and so it was more of a mantra of community and working with my community and making my community better and stronger and healthier and more beautiful, and so this role actually allows me to do that and it's really awesome.
Speaker 1:So I just use that BS degree to judge people on the side, which you know, know, everyone needs a little judgment in their life, you know that's the way to go yeah so just just out of curiosity, like as an executive director for an organization like keep waco beautiful right that that feels like there's a lot of moving parts, like herding cats is that what you spend most of your time? Is it like?
Speaker 3:yeah just coordinate thousand moving parts all the time yes, you know that meme from it's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, with the guy with all the sheets and the strings. I joke, I'm like that is my mind. That is literally what is happening and, yeah, it is kind of like turning the chaos into order and I also really enjoy that. I think that's actually a very deep childhood wound of mine. I've worked on over the last several years and it actually has worked out well in my adult life to utilize that skill and so, yeah, I it is very much a herding cats, herding all of the people. You know, internally we're a really small organization, really only two people, but then we work with so many people across the community and now across the state, and I've worked with people across the country overseas. We have grown in some of the work that we have done in collaboration with people beyond the city of Waco jurisdiction, and so it's really honestly a pleasure to be doing what I'm doing and just the timing of where I'm at.
Speaker 1:So that's, I think, an interesting kind of thing to think about, because you know there are organizations across the country that's like Keep Insert City Beautiful. But then, like we talked about a little bit earlier, you know Gary sort of is doing sustainability on a city inside your city. So can y'all talk, both either of you, about the partnership a little bit between the city of Waco Keep Waco Beautiful and Baylor, because you know, living in a college town or a college-ish town like Lubbock, like the university and the world around the university are very like. They're so intertwined, like how do y'all make that work? How do you work together? What kinds of things do you partner on?
Speaker 3:it's a good question, gary.
Speaker 2:I'll let you take the lead on this from a bailer perspective yeah, and I might, I'm gonna step back a little bit and I'm gonna kind of go big picture down to this community engagement. So, you know, as we talk about sustainability as a field, we are interested in the a field, we are interested in the environment and then, I think, a large responsibility that universities should fulfill. We should teach it in the classroom so that we train the next generation of leaders. We should drive innovation through the research. We should model our values through the way that we care for our campus. We should foster a culture on our campus so that students understand these values and understand their voice within the field of sustainability.
Speaker 2:And then the part that starts to get at your question is, I think, that universities have a role to serve the communities in which they exist.
Speaker 2:And so, as we have been building out what sustainability is at Baylor, that is the goal that we are working towards, and so, as I've been able to partner with Carol and other people that are, you know, doing the work in the community, it is a mechanism to make sure that Baylor is not just, you know, talking about it in the classroom, but the strategic plan that we've launched is Baylor Indies. We want to make sure that what we are doing is evident and visible and impacting people and through partnerships for the green communities conference, litter cleanups and various other ways that we're able to partner with kind of those that are on the front lines doing good work in the community. It is something that we hope we are providing value to Waco and I know that it provides value so that students are able to have experiential learning, hands-on experiences, to understand not just the theory of sustainability but understand what it looks like when you go do the work.
Speaker 1:You know that's super important. We talk about experiential learning and community-based learning and I think something we've fallen into in academia and it's something I've noticed here. You know I can't speak for anyone else, but here I've noticed that like we sort of like, oh, we're going to do this campus cleanup, we're gonna do this, whatever we're gonna do x, y and z and then you look around town and it's like, oh, we could be having such a big impact. So I think what you're talking about of like, okay, we, we learn in the classroom, we learn hands-on on campus, but then we take it out and we engage with our community because, like we were discussing there's, they go hand in hand. They're so like inexorably related and intertwined From the outside.
Speaker 1:Looking in, carol, sort of like, what's been your experience? Like I don't know how much like FaceTime you put in with students or how much you actually practically work with students. What's that like for you from the outside? And I asked that question for a specific reason because, selfishly, one of my roles is in outreach and engagement and getting students to go do things in the community. And I'm going to be very honest with you, that is terrifying for me sometimes as an educator because I listen to conversations that my students have sometimes and I'm like why would you think to say that, how, where did that come from? And then we send them out and it's like you'll be adults. So I'm curious, from the outside, looking in, what is that like?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a great question. Well, we're so privileged because Baylor has kind of a rule with anyone who's involved with any sort of on-campus organization that there's a requirement to contribute a certain amount of community service hours each semester, a certain amount of community service hours each semester. And we have had an influx of Baylor students for years and years and we're a 45-year-old organization. So we have established, we are the community organization to volunteer with in Waco. Since I've assumed the role, I have worked really hard at the nitty-gritty detail of forming our volunteer programs, hard at the nitty gritty detail of forming our volunteer programs, where it's a program that people want to join and whether it's a family, youth or Baylor students or the community college students that are nearby, and so we actually have a lot of our volunteers are actually Baylor students and I do program a lot of our work towards them and in the timing of that I know that they will be able to want to volunteer, but also that's when they will get their hours in. And so it's really fun because, to your point, while I'm not an educator and I haven't stepped foot in academia in quite a while, hearing those conversations even at our volunteer events, I'm like man, I'm really glad to be of safety vest. There's those little moments.
Speaker 3:But also, at the the same time, it gives me so much joy to see, as time has gone on, this generation, this age group that has this passion. And you know, they're still figuring it out, they're still getting their feet under them and they are still spreading their wings and really starting to see the world for the first time. And you know, we're all parents, you kind of see that with your own kids and you can still see that bit of wonder and sparkle in their eyes and I'm like, oh good, you're not where I'm at, like you're not, you're not, like you know that feeling of, oh you're, you're just not there yet. I love this for you. You are going to take it and you're going to grow this and I really feel like this generation is going to save us in a lot of ways and I have a lot of hope for them and I feel like they have proven a lot of that hope to still be valuable because they are, they're showing up and it's beyond their community service hours that are required of them that they're showing up, and so it's.
Speaker 3:It's been a really a great pleasure for me to see this from the other side, even when I'm like, okay, maybe not a chainsaw for you at this event, good to know, we will be careful with that tree clearing project. But otherwise it's honestly incredible to watch our Baylor students and I always reach back out to you department heads when I can and just compliment their hard work, because when you're an educator at these universities that you guys work at, it's kind of a mixed bag of what you could be getting and you don't know what that could look like and engaging them to the community and bringing them out of their shell a little bit. It can be a little bit difficult, but I feel like we just have such a great group of kids that have worked with us over the years and they're passionate, and that's what I think is really important is that we all subconsciously have the same mission. Even if they don't know our mission, they just have it in the back of their minds.
Speaker 1:That's, that's cool and that actually it makes me feel really good to hear you say that, because I think there is unfortunately, like a I don't know. You hear people talk. You're like, oh, these kids and maybe I'm just getting old and my friends are also getting old, so I hear them talk as well but, like, the kids are okay, like I spend a lot of time with Gen Z and, like you said, they're passionate about what they do. You know some of the things they're passionate in the way they approach it is different than I think what a lot of people are used to. But, like you said, they'll go over and above for things in a way that, like myself when I was in college, my friends, my colleagues, like we never did, yeah, it'll be. Like, yeah, we need you for two hours today and they end up spending the whole day with you, like pulling weeds, it's incredible.
Speaker 1:Whatever, it's really cool.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you know, I think back to my own college experience and I was in student government.
Speaker 3:I was changing policy on campus and I really enjoyed that and I was in marching band Like I mean, literally a nerd over here and I was doing stuff like climbing buildings and sitting on the rooftops watching kids move in and then, you know, instituting actual policies of identifying who was on the leadership of the student government, like embedded into, like you know, proclamations, so that's in their bylaws now, and then changing out the picture frames of some of these previous leaders to us students in these important halls.
Speaker 3:I wasn't doing litter pickups, I wasn't out there, really embedded in the community that I was living in. And it's just, it's really impactful to see these kids actually show up eight o'clock in the morning on a Saturday. It's hot and they're getting into the river and they're pulling out the trash and they're they get excited about it and that's what's so cool to see is that they actually decently want to make a difference in the community that they're living in. And I don't know that maybe our age range was doing that as much, and so I really think it's really special for us to see this happen.
Speaker 2:Carol, to kind of build on what you're talking about too, I think that having partnerships like what we have with Keep Waco Beautiful, it changes lives and I know for me, as I think about kind of my trajectory, where I was a biology major and I didn't know what I was going to do with it. I was asked if I was going to be a doctor and I knew I wasn't going to do that. I was asked if I was going to be a teacher, and I knew I wasn't going to do that. But literally the last class that I took, being a guy that just likes being outside, I saw that I could get six upper level credit hours for backpacking in Colorado taking a course Alpine Lake Ecology and so I went and I did that and it was incredible and I didn't know it at the time, but like that was the inflection point that took me from undergraduate that didn't know where he was headed to somebody that is working in a career that is completely fulfilling.
Speaker 2:I the work I helped do some water quality testing in the mountains.
Speaker 2:I got along very well with the professor, was recruited to grad school because of that and ultimately built my education such that, you know, I found myself working in higher ed and I now have a real passion for engaged learning because, like y'all are discussing, you know students want to do good and they are here for it.
Speaker 2:But the challenge with sustainability, I think, is that you know sometimes you don't quite understand what you bring to the table or where you would fit in, and you also may not feel like you have agency over these issues. You know, if you're 19 years old and trying to figure out your way through college, not to mention your way through the world, how are you going to feel like you have some agency to address food security in your community? Well, it's through these community partnerships where students can go and, with mentorship, they can work on the front lines and they can see what progress really looks like and they understand the value of their education towards doing good in the world and over time that can really change the trajectory for students. And it's a real passion for mine and that's why these types of partnerships are something that I value very highly in the work that I do.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's amazing and I think, vikram, it's important to note that Gary has absolutely transformed Baylor's efforts in this realm. I mean, the guy wasn't even officially in the job yet and we were putting him to work on last year's conference, didn't even know him. I was like here's everything you need to do and he just jumped right in, and so it's been so impressive to see the transformation happen, both on and off campus. And, like I mean, right now you guys have move-ins and you guys are actively helping support that in a sustainable realm and just making sure that everything is being diverted correctly, and that is such a huge feat to tackle. And so, yeah, it's really cool because, like you say, you can easily lose hope and think what's the point of what we're doing? Then you get with some of these people who work across the city in their own respective industries and you collaborate. That's just where the magic happens.
Speaker 1:We've talked about partnerships and some of the high level things that I think both organizations do with Baylor Sustainability and Keep Wake Up Beautiful but I'd like to get just a little more specific and talk about, like you know I know it's a lot of different things, I know it's not just one thing and, depending on what day it is, there could be 15 different things that you do but could y'all just both tell us about, like one kind of project you do, like a specific kind of project, like whether it is like a city cleanup that we do with or that you do with Keep Waco Beautiful or Gary, you were talking about being out helping with move-ins and recycling and things like that. Like, I would just like to hear and I think it would be really interesting for folks to hear some of the like rubber meets the road kind of things about how we're impacting communities and what kinds of projects go into that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I am a big fan of, you know, tapping into that idealism and energy with students, and so the most meaningful work is always those where students are alongside and I kind of open doors and share a little bit, but they do a lot of the work. An example of this would be during move out. It is just, you know, madness on campus, all of the students are eager to get out the door. They've taken their finals, they've got exciting plans over the summer, and there's often a lot of waste. That happens during move out and some students had spotted this and they came to me, and they came to our campus living and learning director and asked you know, what can we do? We want to do better, and so we we workshopped some ideas and we ultimately settled on, you know, if we are able to get these large pods they're eight feet by eight feet by 16 feet and we put them near every residence hall.
Speaker 2:We recruited a team of volunteers that during move out, we tried to make it as easy as possible to you know, we want everything staged here. Here are the items that we know we can take. We arranged with community partners so that we were getting furniture and drawers and clothes and hygiene items that community partners could put to good use and collected them all and we ultimately filled up 13 pods that were 8 by eight by 16 huge amount, and we began to get nervous because we weren't sure if we were going to be able to ultimately get these all to somebody. And we did. We had people come out of the woodworks. We have community partners that weren't originally on our radar. I heard what we were doing and raised their hand and we got a lot of you know furniture to teachers that needed in their classroom an amazing story. And it was all because students saw an opportunity to do better, but they just needed a little help and have the door open for them.
Speaker 2:And, to your point, with you know the hustle that this generation has the students. I saw that they posted on LinkedIn that during the course of that move out week he was talking about his step counter counted 80 miles of walking back and forth. So I mean sweat equity like crazy. And now this is going to be an ongoing initiative. We we branded it barely used because we're the Baylor Bears and we have the kind of the infrastructure in place such that we'll have student leaders that are able to do this year over year, with it supported in a budget in the office. So those are just. Those are really rewarding and I like to think that as they leave campus and go into the world, they're going to take some some valuable lessons with them as leaders.
Speaker 3:That is very cool. That's such a cool project. Yeah, that's awesome. Is that my turn? Yeah, so I think I'm kind of finding a fun way to tie into this a little bit on our end what I think we're all finding here. It's like if you give people the tools necessary, they're going to do something, and so one of our big things is that I really wanted to make those sustainable actions accessible.
Speaker 3:We brought glass recycling to Waco in 2023. And that was with a major partnership, and before you only had one place to drop off glass recycling, and now we have four locations that people can drop off at any point of any time of the day, especially if you have a lot of wine bottles, like I do Great way to hide your. You do at home, I guess. And so you know there's a just like those little things like I. Just we wanted to start with like, okay, what does it look like if we just made things accessible? And so we branched out from there. We expanded our little cleanup supplies and we worked with our local library. So there's little kits you can check out. We have supply requests. So people, if they want to get a group together but maybe it doesn't align with some of our existing events. They can do a supply request. They can do a supply request and you know, the whole point is just to create that opportunity of like.
Speaker 3:We want to do something, to being able to actually do it, and our whole mantra is that you make wake up beautiful just by showing up. That's what I have to do. The bar is so low. You just show up, you can be hung over, you can be wide awake, I don't know what you are, but you just show up and I give you exactly what you need and you just have the best time. And it is incredible to watch the tenacity of our volunteers, because our river can be pretty gross and they will get in it Like they will. Literally they'll fight. What we are understanding are alligators. We have alligators in our river so far in Naukong, where we haven't been bitten, anyone that hasn't been bitten. That is probably the day I'll leave my job. Thank.
Speaker 1:God, we have good insurance. We're all just gone.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm like every clean up I'm like, okay, no, snakes. That's really what I'm more worried about is snakes. I'm always like, watch for snakes, watch for paraphernalia of heroin needles, things like that, because we're in a park area, Apparently we have alligators Just don't bother them, I guess. And so it is absolutely impressive to see them. They're just so dedicated to getting that piece of trash or whatever it is and pulling it out. And I mean, those are the heroes of our city, our story of what we're doing, and I absolutely love being able to watch this in real time.
Speaker 1:Our story of what we're doing and I just I absolutely love being able to watch this in real time. So that's very cool and I like, I think that message of accessibility is so important because I think people feel sometimes like, for whatever reason, right, whatever limitation whether it's a perceived one or an actual one like, oh, I can't do anything to help, I can't be a part of this. But they want to help. But I love the message of just showing up is like 95% of the battle for like so many things in life, just in general. But if you come here, we'll get you a way you can help, like the way you can be involved, and I think so.
Speaker 1:We have a community garden that our department oversees. One of my grad students I'm on his committee runs it right now and that's what we've just kind of seen. It's like students or student organizations or community organizations are like we want to come help but we don't know how we're like show up, we'll show you right, like here's weeds you can pull. Sometimes they'll show up and the weather's bad or, you know, for whatever reason they can't actually get down and pull weeds. Like hey, we need some signs repainted. You could clean this like table off, like there's always something I think we can do and it gives us ownership of our communities and it gives us kind of like uh, I don't know, it lets us take the reins of our lives and our and our space a little bit better. I think that's super cool.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and to that point you know we have been communicating just how much the impact of our volunteer hours actually make on our city. The national average is $33.49 of economic impact per volunteer hour. So with our current volunteer load you know we work with over a thousand volunteers every year Our volunteer hours are insane and it's at least usually close to $200,000 of economic impact just from our volunteers showing up. The way you've been able to communicate that impact beyond the fact that obviously we're pulling out litter or planting trees or beautifying spaces being able to tell that economic impact number is actually what's been transformative for them to hear and that's actually helped us strengthen our partnership with the city.
Speaker 3:Because if you start to peel it back, you're going to be paying someone for that anyway. You're going to be paying a contractor. You are going to be paying someone to eradicate graffiti. You're going to be paying a contractor. You are going to be paying someone to eradicate graffiti. You're going to be paying someone to mow, you're going to be paying. Like that. That number exists and I know what that number is because I see it every year whenever we're starting to do all of our reporting, and so for me, I think we're just a tiny cog in the whole spiel of what it looks like to maintain a city and it's a lot. But just with our volunteers showing up they are able to transform a lot and it's just. It's so cool to see that in real time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's amazing. I think that's actually a good segue. We'll take a quick break so I can say whatever random stuff I say to the listeners during the break, and then we'll come back and I want to talk about a couple of things One about urban conservation and maybe the public perceptions of urban conservation, and then I want to keep us with plenty of time to talk about the upcoming Green Communities Conference that we're all involved with and how exciting that is. So we'll take a quick break, come right back and then we'll talk some more. Well, hey there, welcome to the mid-roll. I hope you're well. Please tell your houseplants I said hi and that I've missed them just so much. Give them a little extra water, just for me. Thanks for listening to Plantthropology and thanks for being a part of this journey and for hanging in there and all the times that I just disappear for six months. I try not to do that.
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Speaker 1:So again, I hope you've been enjoying this conversation so much with Gary Kaki and Carol Ferguson. They have so much practical information and so much practical advice, and I think you'll enjoy the second half as well, and I feel like there's things I'm forgetting to tell you about. Yeah, come see us at the Green Communities Conference If you are near Waco, texas, on September 17th and 18th. You can just show up and I will shake your hand and probably give you a sticker. I know you like stickers, you've got to like stickers, so there'll be a link for how to get there in the show notes. What are those called Show notes? Right, show notes? It hasn't been that long since I've done this, maybe it has. At any rate, click on the thing down in the thing. There'll be links for all the things and come see us in Waco and, aside from that, get ready for the second half of this episode. Okay, bye now. All right, we're back.
Speaker 1:I want to talk about, I think, something that is sort of close to my heart as an educator and as a community educator and someone who works in the sustainability, climate conservation space, and that's like the public perception of what y'all do, and I know that there's there's going to be a wide range of responses we get, because I hear them too. But you know, as you are talking about, you know, some of these issues we're trying to deal with are worse because of climate change, as we talk about conserving water through drought, if we, as we talk about recycling and all of the green things we try to do. But in your community, in your specific jobs, what's that like? What is the public conception of that and the public adoption of that? Do you feel like the ship is turning? Are you still running up against roadblocks? I'm just I'm curious to hear your thoughts, cause I know what I see, but I like to hear the perspective of other people that do this for a living.
Speaker 2:So I I'll. I'll jump in first, carol. I know the initial perception that people often have is so you're the recycling guy. I'll kind of well, you know, sort of let's talk about recycling a little bit too, and you know it's definitely good, but there are also some issues there. But it's a good conversation starter and so I really love these conversations because it's really a way to bring people into sustainability, because it is such a broad field and so we can talk about. Yeah, you know, it's really.
Speaker 2:You know, in higher ed it is all of the things I spoke about earlier is, you know how we teach, how we research, how we care for the campus, and then it's these environmental issues.
Speaker 2:But it's also the way that these environmental issues are rippling through our communities, and so I can talk about that breadth a little bit.
Speaker 2:But I try to listen more than I talk, because once you talk about these issues that speak to that thing inside of this generation that does compel them to want to do good, their eyes light up somewhere along the way and you can find what interests them or what their passion is and make sure that they understand.
Speaker 2:It is a broad field and there are a lot of niches that need to be filled within the field and to help them understand, you know, what they might be able to contribute towards a better world, is a really fulfilling conversation. Um, and just making sure that you know I'm listening and I'm trying to extend an olive branch such that it is not, you know, a defensive. Here's what the field is and what we do and why it's valuable, but it is more. You know we aren't going to be able to accomplish what we want to accomplish without having as many people like you at the table, kind of doing what they can where they are, with what they have, and helping them to understand what that could look like. Helping them to understand what that?
Speaker 3:could look like, yeah, sorry, I'm so sorry, vikram. I'm like that's exactly it. I feel like listening is half the battle, for sometimes, when we're like, yeah, that's not exactly how that goes, but interesting, interesting thoughts continue. And I think you know, for me, even I'm I still feel like I'm so new to this realm of what we're doing. I have the privilege of being able to learn from these experts, like you guys, in every room I'm in, when we're discussing these things and just learning along the way.
Speaker 3:And there is this part of what we all are working on that the interconnected landscape of sustainability that has in our lives is so much more than just recycling or planting a tree. It's hitting financial security, it's hitting health, it's hitting access to education, access to health. It's hitting so much and I don't know what it looked like in Lubbock, but Winter Storm really hit Waco hard and I was without power for an entire week. I'm thankful that I didn't have a pipe burst, but there were so many businesses that did. Not only is that setting you back financially as a business owner, but you're now having to reconstruct your entire business completely from scratch, taking it down to the studs, and that's not a cheap thing to do. And so when people know, when people get a little anxious around the idea of climate and what that looks like with sustainability, I'm like there's so much more going on than we're actually aware of.
Speaker 3:And personally, beyond winter storm area, having to deal with constant allergy and asthma issues that I didn't have as much of growing up, you know, I've always had them. But it's to the point now that I'm on every possible solution out there to maintain to live in Texas and I'm still having issues, and so that's hitting other people harder too. People who haven't had allergy issues are also having those issues. People without breathing problems are having breathing problems. Air quality is really hitting them hard, and so I think there is so much more going on that we are starting to kind of step back and be like, oh wow, that's interesting. Why are we all of a sudden having this long heat spell or this long cold spell? Why is this different than what has been normal in the past? And so, yeah, I think as a community, locally, we're open to these ideas and these discussions, and I think statewide, we're really starting to hit the nail on the head of actually trying to build resilient community so we don't have to go through those storms per se in a difficult way.
Speaker 2:Well, carol, too, to kind of build on what you're saying with, you know the, the winter storm, yuri, and these just the.
Speaker 2:You can walk outside and you can feel. You know summers are hotter and longer than they were whenever we were kids, and so it's unfortunate that. You know it takes us having it being so visibly apparent to perhaps compel the change that we're working towards. But I do think that most fair-minded people can acknowledge that the climate is changing and we can have discussions about okay, so what do we do about that? And kind of to my previous point, that if we can have those good faith conversations about what should we be doing to take care of our neighbors as the climate is changing, if we can do our best to listen and honor the perspective of others and step back from our knee-jerk reaction to think that we have the only perspective, when there are many different perspectives that we really do need to account for when we think about what we are going to do to respond as a society to a changing climate.
Speaker 2:These are big, big questions, and so, at the root of it, I do think that if we can try to assume the best in the people that we're having these conversations with, understand that you know they have a personal history that we should honor and that we should try to find that common ground, because I do think that, like we've said, with young generation, but I think all people, you know people want to be good, people are good at heart, and if you can assume the best and try to find that common ground so that, yeah, we, we all want a livable environment for our kids and we all want to to care for our neighbor, and so let's set aside some of those things that can divide us and work towards what we, I think, can agree towards, as you know, something that is good and something that we should prioritize as communities.
Speaker 1:I love that and I love the practical boots on the ground solutions to some of these things, because you know the this concept that all struggles are connected, right and and how at the heart of it. The one of the big things about climate change is that it is going to become, and already is in a lot of ways, a human rights and a human survival kind of issue, right? So when we talk about food availability and community food systems and all of these things, they're all part of this big picture. And you know, I'm someone who I think sometimes and I love hearing y'all talk and it's really encouraging and inspiring to me because I spend way too much time on the Internet, right, I do a lot of like online science, communication and like I end up in these spaces where everything is so negative and like everyone's fighting all the time and everyone's mad and it's like this is the worst and you're the worst if you think this and blah, blah, blah in every direction. Right, it's so encouraging to see and hear the stories of no, the community showed up and we cleaned up a neighborhood with not really an ulterior agenda, that this is our community and we needed to clean up the neighborhood, right, or hearing students that said, gosh, we're generating a lot of waste, maybe we could help someone through all these pieces of furniture and toiletries and whatever it else is.
Speaker 1:I think those are the stories that carry us so much farther and that need to be told more. I think that's really cool, really, really cool stuff. And that actually leads us into this conference that's coming up, because you know, this is my second year being involved and I was so excited to be asked to be involved. I have loved it, even though I'm probably not a great team member, because I'm so all over the place all the time. The Green Communities Conference that's coming up tell us about where that started, like what it is, what we're trying to do, but I think that it is in so many ways, a cool educational attempt to address all that stuff we were just talking about, to give people practical ways to do it. But I want to hear more about where it started and kind of where we are now.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so this actually began in 2019, a woman named Michaela McCown who, gary, actually, I believe her dad was your professor. Is that correct? There was some connection there. I can't remember.
Speaker 2:I knew her from a while back. If I knew her dad, then unfortunately I didn't realize it.
Speaker 3:Okay, I couldn't remember. There might've been some sort of connection there, but she is a professor at McLennan Community College, our local community college, and in 2019, she put on a full day sustainability type of summit. All come from different backgrounds, whether they have worked in water, at the city, baylor or the zoo, for instance. A bunch of people came together and created the Waco Sustainability Network and it was quite an informal group of people that just shared a passion around what could we do? So, similarly to these students who are like around what could we do? So similarly to these students who are like we can do something. We know we can do something, but what is it? And some folks would just kept bringing up Michaela's work in 2019. And we're like man. That would be just so great if we could just try to engage our local leaders, whether it's city of Waco leaders or educators or just people in the community working. Let's start there and try to engage them and build this baseline conversation around sustainability that we're all coming in at the same level and growing it from there, so that way we can all have the same level playing field of this.
Speaker 3:And I'm sitting in the room and I'm still fairly new in my role and I'm looking around and I'm like, all right, these are the pros in the industry on the content. They're not the pros in the industry on events, and I actually had some similar work in this at a previous job. I worked in an entrepreneurial, startup type of industry and did a lot of like startup grind, startup week, if you are familiar with those types of things and so I've already had put these events together and I was like, well, this is easy, I already know what to do. This would be a great way for me to learn all the content of what's related to my field, while flexing a skill I already have. And so, of course, I volunteered myself to help put this on together, not knowing I'd be doing it four years later still, and it has grown so much since that 2022 conference, and that was just an absolutely most incredible day. We met at the Baylor Research, innovation and Collaborative. We had a great group of people putting on the conference together, wonderful speakers and, honestly, after that, we all were just looking at each other like we have to do this again, and so every year, it's been roughly a nice mix of some of the same people, some new people.
Speaker 3:Obviously, vikram, you've been involved in this year and it's just really cool to see how it's grown from like, okay, let's start small, let's focus on our own community. Okay, let's start a little bigger, let's focus on the area, let's focus on Central Texas. All right, now we're focusing on all of Texas, and so that has been part of not only the planning aspect but also the audience aspect, and so we are four years strong. We have hovered around anywhere from 300 or 350 attendees each year.
Speaker 3:Most of our attendees actually come from academia, government positions, nonprofits, and we also have what we call the concerned citizen or resident, or you know, just folks who are just interested in learning more, and then those who are also educators, but also people who you know are working in industries that maybe you don't think of relate to it. So, like construction, there's a lot of overlap, and you know we're at this point that all of our jobs are actually relating to sustainability in some aspect. You might be an engineer, but your job actually has a lot of overlap with sustainability. You might be an educator your job has a lot of overlap with sustainability, and so we're, as a society, moving more into that direction, and so I think that's what's so great about this conference is that you don't have to be a PhD in. I don't know what your PhD is and I'm sorry.
Speaker 3:But let's say something about plants? I don't know. You know you don't have to have a PhD to have this conversation. You could just be someone like me who has no prior experience, but maybe it wants to learn more. I think that's what's so wonderful. And so you know, we do have those higher education components. We do have those. Let's go ahead and get you your continuing education components.
Speaker 3:There's really a place for everyone at this conference and it's just been really incredible seeing it be put together year after year, and I'm just the one like behind the scenes just putting all the little tiny structures together. I'm not even the one forming the like what I like to call the meat and potatoes or, in this instance, if we're sustainable, you know the eggplant and I don't know noodles. I'm like what would feel like a vegan option. I'm just joking. We have so much breadth behind this and it's just so cool again just to sit back and watch you guys put together these incredible presenters who are coming with amazing backgrounds, just to come share what they know and what they've studied, or how we can transform our cities to be more resilient and grow them for the benefit of everyone.
Speaker 1:It's very cool.
Speaker 2:I know it's been a blessing too.
Speaker 2:So, as I joined Baylor about a year and a half ago, to be able to plug in with people like Carol that you know are able to organize these amazing events and bring together the practitioners from across the community, and to have that resource for Baylor, to you know, engage students on these topics, has been incredible.
Speaker 2:To me, this conference exemplifies what should be happening and what I'd love to see happening in communities all over, where you know, when we talk about sustainability, we're often talking about global challenges like climate change and biodiversity loss and water quality and food security, but the reality is is that, although these are global issues, they manifest very differently from community to community. Climate change in Waco is going to look very different than climate change in Miami, and so we need to bring together people that what the issues are, what the resources are to address these issues locally, and to convene government, nonprofit, education and industry so that we can have clear-eyed conversations about what should we be doing to address these specific issues that are affecting our community, and the Green Communities Conference, I think, is an exemplar for what I think we should be doing more of exemplar for what I think we should be doing more of.
Speaker 1:Very cool and you know, for anyone that's interested in coming, if you're in I mean, you know the Waco area or if you care to travel, to come see us a couple of great days of stuff tours on the first day, some really interesting panels, you know, and if you're interested in I'm looking at the schedule right now and there's a great panel on the first day about dealing with climate anxiety. You know, if you're in this space and you're like, oh my God, what's happening? Like there's some really interesting folks that are going to talk about okay, how do we deal with that? How do we practically deal with that? You get to see all kinds of cool community stuff throughout Waco waste streams, zoos, there's a kayak tour that's so cool, like so many cool things. And then a great day of education on the second day Lots of speakers, lots of tracks. You can choose lots to do and I think it's going to be a lot of fun. I'm really looking forward to it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's going to be a great year and I'm really excited.
Speaker 3:And I would like to point out that we do have.
Speaker 3:You know, even if you aren't intending to come to the entire conference, if you want to just dabble, we do have a happy hour at Balcones Distilling, which is actually one of our partners who they themselves have been working really hard at sustainable actions, and they'll have a little bit of a touch point to kind of share more about their sustainability at the distillery, which fun fact I actually worked there back in the day helped open the front of house and some of the tours that they they still offer, and most people don't know this, but whenever they do the mash, which is basically the oatmeal of creating the whiskey, they actually give that back to local farmers to feed their cattle, and so it is exactly that, it's just oatmeal. There's probably hardly any fermentation in there for them to get a little drunk off of, and if they do, then great, good for that cow. So it's like those little things of just kind of hearing how our local businesses are actually making some sustainable actions themselves to help support other community partners and, again, economic development, economic impact.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's very cool. Development economic impact yeah, that's, that's very cool. And so this for everyone listening is Wednesday September 17th and Thursday September 18th, so if you'd like to join us you said you can just walk up right, there's like walk-up attendance and stuff.
Speaker 3:We will have walk-up registration, but if you want to learn more, keepwakeupbeautifulorg. Slash green communities.
Speaker 1:Very cool, awesome Again. I'm really looking forward to it. As we record this, I still have to fill out all my travel stuff, so I didn't do that too much by our front office. I think Carol and I messaged about this like last week and then I didn't do it. I stay in trouble.
Speaker 3:It's okay, it's okay, they still have you there, so that's a good sign.
Speaker 1:I don't know. Future of sustainability, of conservation, of all the things we do. Where do you see us going, like in your specific? You know, I know it's hard to talk at a global scale because it's it's hard to know, there's so many moving pieces. But in what you do, where do you see us headed in the next few years in terms of conservation and sustainability?
Speaker 2:and sustainability. I continue to be optimistic. I think that sustainability is, it needs to speak more to the human component. I was drawn to the field because of my passion for the environment, but what I've learned through my community-based work is that it's about people. At the end of the day, it's about the harm that communities suffer whenever the environment is harmed. It's about the fact that vulnerable communities will bear the brunt of that suffering, and it is about working with communities so that we understand what we can do to have a better future. And so the more that we are able to speak about sustainability in human terms, I think, the more that people are able to see themselves in that work, and I think that most people are good people, and if we are able to talk about environmentalism as a way to love your neighbor, then I think that everybody can get on board with being an environmentalist Very cool.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I completely agree with Gary. And on top of that, even before I got into this, it sounds like I was an alcoholic in my past career, but I also worked at a wine shop. I worked for a wine importer. I was in the booze industry for quite a while, so it makes sense. I'm a nonprofit now, I guess, but I worked for a wine importer and I remember you know he sourced a lot of his wines were actually biodynamically grown, they were sustainably grown, they're all natural.
Speaker 3:There's no any sort of intervention when it comes to growing the wine, fermenting the wine, making the wine, bottling the wine, and so it's kind of this really cool concept. And it's grown. If you're in the food and beverage industry, it's grown a lot, especially in Texas, houston and Austin, especially Dallas is a little bit more too now. But this was back in, I want to say, 2015, 2016,. We had a vintage from France in the Loire Valley that their summer it was really rainy and then they got pegged by a lot of hail just randomly throughout, and so it killed a lot of the vines and then they weren't able to produce as many bottles of wine.
Speaker 3:And when you start to peel back again, looking at this from a bigger picture, you're like, oh wow, this is obviously hitting the human aspect, like Gary's touching on, but it's also hitting on the business aspect and I think, as we continue to go forward, we're really going to have no option other than to face it head on that this is impacting us at a global scale, not just in Texas, but it's making us see it as a economic issue Again. It doesn't not touch anything, it touches everything, and so there's going to be no other option but to realize, oh wow, this is so much more than we're having our vulnerable communities suffer the most. It is also hitting us from an economic impact perspective, and so it's interesting to see this, as this was years ago before I really started to understand this as a professional in my space now, just someone who happened to work in the industry and really seeing how much that actually made a big difference with these business owners, not only the importer here in the United States, but also the growers in those regions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's. I mean that's really interesting. That's really, I think, when it starts hitting people's pocketbooks more like and the bottom line, so I mean that's you know, and from insurance companies to everything else, like, we're starting to see more and more of that. But yeah, that's really. I think both of those are great messages. I love the message that people are basically good, and I think it's.
Speaker 1:It's super easy to villainize people. We're trying our best. We're all doing this for the first time, right? Nobody really knows what they're doing. I'll just making it up as we go, and so I think giving like extending grace, but holding your convictions at the same time is really important. I think that's super cool. So the last question I ask all of my guests is if you could leave, like, if the people listening to this hour long episode take one thing with them. That could be about being a better like member of your community. It could be your favorite way to make green tea If your allergies are trying to kill you, like, like, whatever it is, like what? What would you like to leave people with?
Speaker 2:Oh man. Well, I think we've. We've come to agreement. You know, people are generally good, so we can assume the best. Maybe stay out of the comment sections so that you don't undercut that. Um, and then I guess the the message that I would say is get involved, don't be, don't be intimidated, don't think that you don't have a voice, Don't think that you don't have something to offer. You can show up at Carol's doorstep at Keep Lake O'Beautiful and she'll hand you a litter cleanup kit and you can go make a difference in your community. It's not going to be, you know, one brilliant solution that will solve all of our challenges for sustainability. It's a bunch of people that do what they can, where they are, with what they have.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and to that point, you know, I have kind of personally done some of my own aspects, really started to grow into composting, really starting to almost do my own personal waste audit to see, okay, does this even make a difference, you know, and knowing how much I can fill up my trash can, because I am, unfortunately I'm quite waste producing despite Don't worry, they're just coffees I'm only double fisting coffees. At this moment of the day it's only 12. I have been kind of assessing like, okay, obviously I have a tendency to do this, but I also don't keep paper plates in my house. You know it is annoying to have to wash every dish, but I also just find that it's important to do it that way. And with my own personal waste audit I have found that it actually has made a huge difference, not only by diverting recycling, but also diverting what I could compost-wise, and from that I have been able to transform my garden in a whole new way that I didn't even imagine was possible.
Speaker 3:And there is nothing like finding what we all know is that black gold of our compost, just turning it over and being like, oh my God, there it is, and just getting your hands in it. Not only is it actually psychologically healing, like your skin absorbs these beautiful microbes to help with depression. You get in a depression just by sticking your hands in the dirt, which is incredible. But all the way to incorporating just native plants, drought-tolerant plants, pollinator plants like Vikram you've seen me go over with my. Now I'm on my third round of black swallowtails. I lay eggs on my fennel, like I have purposely grown fennel just to see this whole process happen. And these are just my little pockets of joy. And I think, as you all have probably highlighted, like we can get lost in the negativity in the comment section, but we also can find pockets of joy with these little actions and it doesn't take much to change little behaviors and little habits and it actually is pretty transformative.
Speaker 1:It's awesome Both, both really great pieces of advice. Well y'all, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate your knowledge and your wisdom and your experience. You know I just again that was very encouraging for me as someone who really values the on-the-ground sort of aspect of this conservation work that we do. So thank you for what you do, thank you for being a part of it, and for coming on and being part of the show.
Speaker 3:Where can we find you and where can we find more info about the Green Communities Conference? Yeah, so you can find all the information at keepwakeabeautifulorg slash green communities and you can find me hopefully not always at my office, hopefully outside and you know, enjoying nature. So yeah, Hopefully outside and you know, enjoying nature.
Speaker 1:So yeah, gary, do you want to be found on the internet, or would you prefer?
Speaker 3:Oh, is that what you meant? Sorry, gary, do you want?
Speaker 2:No, I actually mean it. I don't do the social media. If you want to find me, come say hello, I'm on Baylor's campus.
Speaker 1:Okay, Well, y'all thanks again. That was a lot of fun and I guess I'll see you in a couple of weeks at the Green Communities Conference.
Speaker 3:Thank you. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1:Y'all. I so much love the concept of just doing what you can with what you have, whether that is planting plants for black swallowtails or making sure you compost all of your coffee cups. I'm sitting at my desk in my office and looking at three paper coffee cups that I can definitely compost. Whatever it is, do what you can Find people in your community to plug in with and find ways to help. We are all part of the solution and I think we all want what's best for our families, for our communities and for each other. So thanks again so much to Gary and Carol for being a part of Play Anthropology and for just doing what they do and fighting the good fight in their own communities. Thanks to you for listening. You know that I do this for you and you know that how much it means to me that you listen and you follow along and that you are a part of this. You know how much I love all of y'all for being a part of Flanthropology and just being a part of my life.
Speaker 1:Flanthropology is recorded, written, produced, hosted whatever else I do by me, yours truly, vikram Baliga. Our intro and outro music is by the award-winning composer, nick Scout, who you should definitely look up, and the mid-roll music is called Yarrow by my buddy, rui, and you should go listen to his cool dad jazz. Thanks for listening, thanks for being a part of it. Keep being kind, keep being safe. If you have not been kind to one another, maybe give that a shot. It's a great way to build community. You're the best. Keep being cool. Plant people and I will talk to you next time.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
