Bloomington is rightly proud of its namesake greenery and its long-standing status as a Tree City. But the growth of the city's built environment over the past several decades has cut its tree population by more than half. 

This was the impetus for the creation in 2021 of Canopy Bloomington, a nonprofit devoted to getting citizens to understand the importance of trees, to getting them to plant new trees, and to getting them to care for the city's tree canopy. Unlike most tree-planting efforts that focus primarily on public land, Canopy Bloomington tries to plant trees on private land. We talk all about their goals with Executive Director Ava Hartman and Community Engagement Specialist Jon Vickers (who we also briefly ask about his time as the director of the IU Cinema).

Later, a Last Pitch about what to name the soon to be dramatically expanded convention center.

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There's a reason that the city's Parks & Recreation Department is a two-time winner of the National Recreation and Park Association's prestigious Gold Medal. Their Program Guide is proof of it: 40 pages listing all the programs, special events, sports, fitness, outdoor, garden, and other opportunities open to little kids, seniors and everyone in between.

We go through the Guide with Community Relations Manager Julie Ramey, who highlights coming events like classes, seminars, the 50+ and Kids Expos, Adult Winter Recess, how Parks is handling the invasive species that is pickleball, and the new park facilities at Hopewell Commons.

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Our guests today are from the Arts Alliance of Greater Bloomington. It serves as sort of an arts chamber of commerce, representing six types of arts genres --  visual, literary, music, dance, theatre/film, and galleries/venues/festivals. Artists or organizations in each genre have very different needs, but all genres are represented on the Arts Alliance's Board of Directors. The organization owns the Arts Alliance Center in College Mall, and has just taken over management of the By Hand Gallery, a 45-year old co-op art gallery on the Courthouse Square.

We talked with Alliance executive director Charles Pearce and board president Henry Leck on First Friday about their services, and the organization's formation, in the wake of the 2011 management crisis involving the Waldron Arts Center that led to the demise of the Bloomington Area Arts Council. (This episode was recorded on February 7, also known as First Friday or Gallery Walk Bloomington, the date each month when 14 downtown galleries nearby each other coordinate to stay open until 8 pm to encourage evening visitors.) We also talk about next month's First Friday, when the Alliance will throw an event at Fountain Square Ballroom called "Gala Round the Table", at which they'll celebrate the founders of By Hand,...and announce the Alliance's new name, brand and logo.

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Hopi Stosberg returns to The 812 a year later, as the new president of the council in only her sophomore year. We talk about some of her priorities for her leadership year, including changes to the Unified Development Ordinance initiated by Council late last year, including making affordability incentives more practical, and returning Single Room Occupancy dwellings to legal status in the city. She also talks about the budget process and steps the Council is considering to make it better. (And...we may have talked a little about certain boards and commissions.)

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If you mix together your grade school math class, entrepreneurship, financial literacy, and life skills into a blender, add lemon, and press "liquefy"...you get Lemonade Day, which encourages kids across the community to set up lemonade stands on a Saturday in June. It's a fun way to learn the basics of business, which can be useful even if a kid doesn't ever start one and becomes just another consumer. Laura Blaker, Events Director at the Boys and Girls Club of Bloomington, is our guest today and, as she also holds the title of Lemonade Day City Director for Monroe County, tells us all about how it works. (Fair warning: She likes to make puns...with zest.)

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Are you fighting with someone -- a spouse, the city, a landlord, a tenant, even a family member -- and you just can't reconcile with them? At least here in Bloomington, there's a nonprofit devoted exclusively to mediating disputes. It's a nonprofit called the Community Justice and Mediation Center, or CJAM for short. CJAM has helped negotiate restorative justice between victims and offenders; separations and divorces; landlord-tenant disputes; even the custody of pets. And they get results. And...their services are free. We hear all about what they do from Liz Grenat, the outgoing executive director, and Wyatt Lawson, the incoming executive director.

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Instead of a guest from a city or county board or commission, which we do frequently, today's show is about ALL the city's boards and commissions, and how they get managed. Which, until now, has been haphazardly, by the individual departments that act as their liaisons. The city has created a new position in the Clerk's office just to centrally administer the city's dozens of boards and commissions. 

Our guest is friend of the show Jennifer Crossley. She was our guest in June, in her capacity as a member of the Monroe County Council. We talk with her about her day job as a Deputy City Clerk, whose new portfolio is the administration of boards and commissions. If you've ever thought about public service, listen to this episode and consider being on a local board or commission -- institution building is the antidote to the selfish chaos of national politics.

Today also: a Last Pitch about how best to benefit from the City Council's recent decision to make permanent the seasonal closure of East Kirkwood Avenue.

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This week we're inviting back some of our favorite guests with updates from their corners. Today we welcome back Holly McLauchlin to talk about the latest at City of Bloomington Utilities, where she's the Communications Manager. This time we ask about the new wastewater rate and how CBU handles rate increases in general; the health of Lake Monroe, the primary water source for the Bloomington metro area; and the installation of fiber across the city and how the digging sometimes affecting water service. We also pay tribute to the late, great John Langley, who served the city through CBU for 41 years.

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We welcome back to the show one of our favorite raconteurs, Christopher Emge from the Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce, who appeared a year ago when the show was first starting. We discuss current issues on the Chamber's agenda, including Bloomington's convention center expansion, public transit going outside the city for the first time, and the question of whether and how to dedicate certain streets downtown for exclusive bus or pedestrian use. (He also tells us about his new title, which Steve just can't get quite right.)

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Diverting waste from the environment is a value held dear by most Monroe Countians. There's a local government agency independent of Monroe County or its settlements that oversees the management of solid waste (not to be confused with human waste, which is managed by City of Bloomington Utilities). It's the Waste Reduction District of Monroe County, and it's a taxing district like the library or the school corporations: with a separate line item from Bloomington or Ellettsville on a property tax bill. 

Our guest today is Elisa Pokral, the Community Outreach Coordinator for the District. She conducts tours, seminars and K-12 classroom presentations, and generally spends her time advocating for the environment. She tells us about the District, its services, and how she approaches her job. Basically, for her, every day is Earth Day.

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