Making Nice with Money

by Tim Carter

MakeChangeLogoMoney has always been, and will continue to be, a hard topic to write about. Wars are fought over it, it’s inherently exclusionary, and it’s one of those topics (like religion and politics) that you’re not supposed to discuss at a dinner party.

Many of us in the non-profit sector, as implied by that description, are not inherently driven by the desire for our organizations to make gobs of money; therefore, the relationship to funding is always one laced with tension. We need it to do what we do, but we strive to not let it drive our operations. To put together successful grant applications, like our recent one from the National Science Foundation, it takes a lot of partnerships, months of planning and conceptual development, and creativity to fit your proposed activities within the funder’s framework.

Which is why it’s so refreshing to encounter a program privately funded by Smallbox called “Nice Grants”. Nice Grants started in 2013 and the premise is simple: if you have a good idea that helps to improve the city, fill out a short application and potentially get $1,000 to make it happen.

CUE’s proposal, along with nine others, was selected for funding this year. Our project is to expand the “Make Change” initiative that we piloted in the Mid-North area of Indianapolis into all of Indy’s Midtown neighborhoods.

Make Change also directly engages the monetary system. When you do something good for your neighborhood’s environment, you earn community currency that can be redeemed at participating businesses.

Be on the lookout for the official launch of Make Change expansion this summer! In the meantime, if you see a coin with a logo that looks like this, you know that person has done something that improved their local environment. If you see a sign in a business that looks like this, you know the next time you receive one of those coins, you can redeem it at that business.

Nice Grants and Make Change are two ways to rethink how money can be used in service to community. When we are creative about the use of currency, it may help us operate out of a mindset of abundance rather than scarcity.

Tim Carter is director of the Center for Urban Ecology at Butler University.

Experience Nature Through Our Waterways

by Kelly Harris

Waterstride

Waterstrider

As the sun filtered through the leaves warming my back and the cool water flowed around my ankles, I stooped to watch water striders dance along the surface of the stream – this was a common occurrence in my childhood. I grew up on a 400-acre dairy farm that has woods with a spring feed stream flowing through it. I would spend all my free time outside and it was here that I my love affair with nature began.

I nurtured this love through school. I earned my Bachelors of Science in Conservation Biology and then a Masters of Environmental Science in Applied Ecology. Now, I work at the Center for Urban Ecology (CUE). I could have gone down a much different path if it wasn’t for all the opportunities I had as a child to explore nature.

However, you don’t need to live out in the boonies or in the woods to experience nature, it is everywhere, even in a city (see Tim’s post for a more in-depth look into the ecology of a city).  Along waterways is one of the best places to interact with nature, especially in an urban setting, for waterways are a mecca for wildlife. Waterways provide water, food, shelter, and corridors for wildlife. Indianapolis has a multiple waterways flowing through it that are brimming with life and possibility.

Indianapolis’ waterways have been overlooked and neglected for years. They have been hidden by invasive plant species, used as dumping sites and polluted with sewage. Over the last several years, the Indianapolis community has join together to change the perception and treatment of the waterways through the formation of the Reconnecting to Our Waterways (ROW) initiative.

ROW seeks to make Indianapolis’ waterways a community asset by “helping neighbors strengthen waterways, and in turn, helping waterways strengthen neighborhoods.” ROW is currently focusing on six waterways and their surrounding neighborhoods which are:

ROW takes a holistic approach to its work around Indianapolis’ waterways by integrating six elements. These elements are aesthetics, connectivity, ecology, economics, education and well-being. These elements function as lenses to craft solutions to problems and to developing projects and programs around the waterways. ROW’s holistic approach is essential to making Indianapolis’ waterways vibrant, safe and healthy destinations for people to experience nature in our city.

I feel providing people opportunities to experience nature no matter where they live – be it a city, the suburbs or a dairy farm – is a critical educational and developmental opportunity that could lead to better environmental stewards. As Baba Dioum says:

“In the end we will conserve only what we love; we will love only what we understand; and we will understand only what we have been taught.”

So much of learning is through experience; you can’t learn about nature only through the Discovery Channel. You have to get out in it. Go explore one of Indianapolis’ many waterways and you might just see a heron, turtle or water striders. I have seen them all and more in Indy’s waterways!

Kelly Harris, MSES/ MPA, is an Americorps SPEA-VISTA Fellow at the Center for Urban Ecology.