Welcome to New Board Members
Ched Meyers and Margaret Tarmy The Ojai Valley Green Coalition welcomes two new Board Members Ched Meyers and Margaret Tarmy, who bring valuable community building skills to our organization.  Ched moved to Ojai with his wife Elaine in 2005 from East Los Angeles. You may have met them already as their remodeled home was on the first Green Home & Building Tour in 2008. Since that time, Ched and Elaine have supported the work of the Coalition.
"One of the reasons we moved to this valley was in order to focus our life-long social justice work more on environmental issues," says Ched. "I regard the Coalition as exemplary in its integration of a wide spectrum of environmental concerns, and want to help the organization broaden and deepen its work and influence." Ched, involved in justice and peace organizing and education for more than 35 years, is the founder and co-director of Bartimaeus Cooperative Ministries based in Oak View. The ecumenical non-profit organization focuses on building capacity among individuals, churches, and movements committed to all forms of social justice, peacemaking, restorative justice, and watershed health.  Coalition members may have already met Margaret, too who recently moved to Ojai from Vermont and immediately became active in the Ojai Food Co-op project.
"I have been very impressed with the range and depth of Coalition activities," says Margaret, "And I look forward to being more involved." In Vermont, Margaret was a licensing manager at a non-governmental organization doing international development work. She managed the educational branch for their short term training programs and a manager of a short term training program at a graduate institute previously. Margaret has a Masters Degree in Conflict Transformation. While living in Putney, Vermont she was a member of a Transition Town group focused on community building. The group helped start a community garden, a weekly farmers market, and held twice-monthly workshops teaching life skills, such as cooking and raising chickens. She was also the Board President of their local Waldorf School. We're excited to have Ched and Margaret joining the Board to help forward our mission and increasing our community building capacity. Thanks for saying yes! | 
The Ojai City Council has voted to waive the building permit fee for solar energy systems for one year until August 14, 2014. The waiver was requested by "Solarize Ojai Valley," a joint program of the Ojai Valley Green Coalition and the Community Environmental Council. Through this program the two organizations hope to help and encourage homeowners to convert their homes to affordable solar power.
With the recent passing of an updated city 
We'll be wrapping up the year with our 