LAMORINDA WEEKLY | Green Awards given for work done locally and globally


Members of the council pose with this year's winners of the Green Awards and their families. Photo Pippa Fisher

Mayor Mike Anderson, recognizing outstanding efforts that contribute to a more sustainable community and help the city achieve its environmental goals, presented this year's annual Lafayette Awards of Environmental Excellence, otherwise known as the Green Awards, at the July 22 city council meeting to two very different recipients.

The winners this year are husband and wife team Corie and Peter Knights for their work on helping to end the demand for endangered wildlife products through their long-established, global organization WildAid; and Julian Jackl for his work as a fifth-grader this year at Burton Valley Elementary School to eliminate single-use plastic utensils, replacing them instead with metal cutlery.

Now in its 13th year, Lafayette's Environmental Task Force selected the Green Award winners with consideration for how successful the candidate's activities were in reducing current and future footprint, how much the candidate has helped achieve the city's environmental goals, and how much they have inspired others in the community.

Jackl addressed the council to explain how he persisted in his efforts to cut down single-use plastics in his school following his concern over seeing how much plastic was heading to the landfill rather than being recycled (see the link below to read about Jackl in the April 17 Lamorinda Weekly archives). As a result of his dedication other schools have been inspired to do the same.

Peter Knights, who 20 years ago founded WildAid - an organization that works globally with celebrities such as Prince William, Jackie Chan and Lupita Nyong'o to produce high end public service announcements to end the demand for endangered wildlife products such as elephant ivory, rhino horn, lion bone and shark fin - also spoke, giving recognition to Jackl.

Knights told Jackl to keep at it. "It really takes that determination." He added that one of the things they find is that it often is the children who lead these changes, explaining that in China, through their PSAs they have reduced the imports of shark fin by 80 percent in the last three years largely because of children changing the thinking. "There's a shark fin trader in Hong Kong who no longer buys shark fin because his grandchildren told him not to," said Knights.

To read more about Jackl's work go to www.lamorindaweekly.com/archive/issue1304/

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