As Earth Day approaches, most of us are thinking of ways to contribute, in big ways and in small, to making the world a cleaner, safer and healthier place to live. There are, of course, others, who are doing this year-round.
Milwaukee filmmaker Howie Goldklang is one of those people. As owners of The Establishment Salon, 4503 N. Oakland Ave., he and his wife Carly operate their business as greenly as they can, and he's used his own company as the spring board for his submission to The CW network's film contest, Green Your World.
Goldklang is representing Milwaukee as one of four finalists in the national competition that requires five shorts films in five weeks. Each contestant is to showcase how his or her city is being actively innovative in the green movement.
"People already know all the stuff on Oprah about reusable shopping bags and new light bulbs, so this was meant to show what is new and fresh in your city."
His original submission film highlighted what The Establishment has been doing for years: operating on 100 percent wind power, shipping their surplus of hair clippings to San Francisco's Matter of Trust organization to be repurposed into hairmats used for cleaning up oil spills, donating sales from reusable bags to the Alliance for the Great Lakes, recycling old magazines into wall art and giving discounts to bicyclists during Bike to Work Week.
He started poking around Milwaukee to see what other companies were up to. He visited Growing Power to discuss the value of urban farms and their help in reducing the miles-to-market number. He went to recycling plants and reported on the impact that recycling has had in Milwaukee, not only environmentally, but also economically as it's become an important part of the job market in the Midwest.
Goldklang says he was inspired by the contest to showcase what his business and the rest if Milwaukee are doing for the planet, but that his environmental values were solidified long before the filming began.
"This has just become the way we operate -- we try to be as eco-friendly as possible."
The Green Your World Film contest ends Friday, April 3 and Milwaukeeans can still vote for their fellow eco-warrior here. IN conjunction with the popular vote, the winners are judged by a panel made up of members from The CW Network and Wisconsin's own SC Johnson.
OnMilwaukee.com staff writer Julie Lawrence grew up in Wauwatosa and has lived her whole life in the Milwaukee area.
As any “word nerd” can attest, you never know when inspiration will strike, so from a very early age Julie has rarely been seen sans pen and little notebook. At the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee it seemed only natural that she major in journalism. When OnMilwaukee.com offered her an avenue to combine her writing and the city she knows and loves in late 2004, she knew it was meant to be. Around the office, she answers to a plethora of nicknames, including “Lar,” (short for “Larry,” which is short for “Lawrence”) as well as the mysteriously-sourced “Bill Murray.”
