Blog Updates

Two volunteers, Curita Harper, cancer survivor, and Charlotte Kobayashi, from Corporate Visions, are making phone calls to 600+ hikers and runners inviting them to sign up for Marin’s Zero Breast Cancers event to be held on Saturday, September 26, starting at Old Mill Park in Mill Valley, California.
This hike or run is a wonderful way to do something healthy with your friends & family—in a beautiful environment—while supporting one of the leading Bay Area breast cancer organizations focusing on prevention and risk reduction. It is a noncompetitive, all-ages event for hikers & runners that with a selective 6-mile loop starting and ending at famous Dipsea steps [670 steps] and glorious views of Mount Tamalpais.

After the hike, attendees will join our celebration in Old Mill Park with food, music, and raffle prizes.

Zero Breast Cancer’s focus is a community based not-for-profit organization that is dedicated to finding the causes of breast cancer through community participation in the scientific research process. Their focus is on identifying environmental factors and the role they play in breast cancer of all stages of lie and across generations.

For more information, please visit website: www.zerobreastcancer.org
[By Charlotte Kobayashi]

On Friday, July 24, 2015, Jim Jordan and his wife, along with several of Jim’s wife’s Dow Chemical colleagues, joined approximately 200 other volunteers in the gym at Delaware Valley University to create, package and ship over 100,000 meals to families battling food insecurity in our community. The event was part of the annual months-long Bucks Knocks Out Hunger (BKO) program, coordinated by the local United Way.

Working in teams of 12, and using a process developed by the non-profit Outreach, Inc., they created a mini-assembly line. Ingredients, including rice, beans, soy, spices and dried veggies were placed in plastic bags, along with packets of vitamin powder. Each bag was then weighed and the amount of rice was adjusted to hit the designated target weight. Then the bags were heat sealed, stickers were affixed and they were packed, 36 to a box. Each team filled a minimum of 12 boxes per shift.

By the end of the day, more than 100,000, easy-to-prepare, nutritious meals were on their way to foodbanks throughout the region. Recipients need only empty the contents into a pot, add water and heat to make a tasty meal for 6. [by Jim Jordan]

Volunteers from the Pleasanton Office, Savannah Kimball, Korey Krueger, Mike A. Miller, Jeannie Frantz, Randi Newbould, Jason Weisfield, Joseph Coplans, Nina Vitvinchuk, and Leela Newman arrived at 7 am at the Castlewood Country Club in Sunol on June 1^st for the FOA’s 37^th Annual Dick Newmark Golf Classic benefitting the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA).  Over 125 golfers participated at raising over $5,000 for the MDA.  The P-town team assisted with making event goodie bags, selling raffle tickets and mulligans, and collected raffle ticket prizes.

The Muscular Dystrophy Association is the world’s leading nonprofit health agency dedicated to saving and improving the lives of people with muscle disease, including muscular dystrophy, spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and other neuromuscular diseases. It does so by funding worldwide research to find treatments and cures; by providing comprehensive health care services and support to MDA families nationwide; and by rallying communities to fight back through advocacy, fundraising and local engagement.

[Photo above: Left to right – Jeannie Frantz in dark pink top, front row – Nina, Leela and Savannah] [by Savannah Kimball]

Thursday, June 18, Diane Frate and Lisa Slen spent the morning addressing and placing stamps on the Save-the-Date postcards for the American Cancer Society’s annual roast.  This year, Bobby Valentine is being honored.  Bobby grew up in Stamford, Connecticut and is a former American professional baseball player and manager. He is currently the athletic director at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield,
Connecticut.

Proceeds from the event and live auction, “Hands Up For Hope” will benefit the American Cancer Society Research Program.

Lisa and I plan to assist again in mailing invitations in July and August for the annual roast.

Tuesday, June 23^th, Diane assisted in a second mailing for “Women Leading the Way in Wellness”.  For this event ,  the American Cancer Society hopes to encourage women to put their own health first and make lifestyle choices to stay well and prevent cancer.

Diane had the pleasure of working and meeting two other volunteers (Anna in picture above with Diane and Kathy not shown). By morning’s end, we were able to complete the entire mailing.   [By Diane Frate}

 

On May, 29, 2015, Dustin Ring and his girlfriend, Erin, volunteered for the Reno Tahoe Odyssey to support the Northern Nevada Children’s Cancer Foundation (NNCCF).  They started at 8 pm, helped setup, ran the South Lake Tahoe check point for the relay race. and finished at 4 am!  The purpose of this event was to help raise awareness for NNCCF and to accept donations for the children and families.

Northern Nevada Children’s Cancer Foundation is the only organization dedicated solely to supporting children with cancer and their families in Northern Nevada and Eastern Sierra region. Dustin and Erin felt privileged to be part of their fundraising and community outreach programs.  [by Dustin Ring]

The morning of June 4, 2015, Diane Frate and Lisa Slen had the pleasure of taking part in the first annual Homes With Heart fundraiser sponsored by The First Congregational Church in Darien. Each year the church grants over $80,000 to twenty charitable organizations serving the youth, elderly and the disadvantaged through the outreach budget.  Funding sources include 10% of pledges as well as proceeds from their annual fundraising event –this year Homes With Heart!

The morning was spent checking in, registering, providing instructions, presenting raffle tickets and supplying attendees with maps of the homes on display.

Each attendee was provided with booties to wear in the homes along with the following firm instructions:

• No food/beverages
• No smoking materials
• No recording devices
• No cameras
• No sketching, measuring, photographs or pace out concepts
• No locations on the tour

Five Darien residents graciously opened their homes to Homes With Heart. Homes viewed were titled: Southern Hospitality (stately brick clad Federal home), Fieldhouse of Dreams (residence with three athletic boys – batting cage, turf field, indoor pool, squash court, bowling alley, fitness and massage rooms, ping pong and games and outdoor hot tub and fire pit), The Devil’s in the Details (home was renovated to capture the contemporary with Old World details), Sophisticated Simplicity (classic New England clapboard colonial with an open airy design.) and Artist Retreat (perfect mix of old and new architecture).

Summary of the fundraiser:

The event surpassed the organizations highest goals with over 500 people attending the tour.

Homes With Heart raised over $50,000 to benefit Person-to-Person and other local charitable organizations.

Attendees were impressed by the quality and scale of the homes on tour, but also by the organization and spirit of the volunteers.

This event was a tremendous success that the organizers are already at work for next year.  [by Diane Frate]

 

 

Here are photos from Lafayette’s Earth Day celebration that took place on April 26, 2015. The festival ran from 11am-3pm, with an estimated attendance of 1,500 – significantly up from last year. The street behind the library in Lafayette was shut down to allow vendors in the green industry participate in this year’s theme, which was transportation.

There were 30 plus vendor booths including participation from Bart, BMW (including 2 iSeries cars for display), several local solar companies, food vendors, farms, bicycle shops, and local government agencies. The weather was perfect, and the turnout was fantastic.

Jaime Farrar, from the Pleasanton Office, spent about 6 hours helping to coordinate the vendors, setting up, and taking down displays.   {By Jaime Farrar}

 

[Photo above: Geoff Kinnaird pulling weeds]

On May 26, 2015, four employees from Larkspur Office volunteered at Bayside Martin Luther King School in Marin City, California. Preston Kawaguchi, Geoff Kinnaird and Charlotte Kobayashi, worked in the garden pulling weeds and hauling them to the dumpster.  Vegetables grown in this garden — celery, lettuce, parsley, cilantro, tomatoes, strawberries, artichokes, eggplant, and herbs — are used in Conscious Kitchen by Chef Sean.

[Photo above: Charlotte hauling weeds away.]

While the three worked in the garden, Teresa Kwan returned to volunteer in the kitchen serving lunches to the elementary school children.

[Photo below: Teresa and Chef Sean]

Bayside Martin Luther King School is grateful for all the donations and volunteer help Corporate Visions has provided them in 2015 in the kitchen and garden. Tangible donations include 40 bicycles and helmets,  15 bicycle horns,  3 potato peelers, 500+ envelopes and hundreds of certificate papers.   [by Charlotte Kobayashi]

The effort is called Neighborhood Cooking Project. The project happens every third Wednesday of the month and is located at the heart of the Madrona neighborhood in Seattle—just a block away from our Seattle office. To volunteer, simply show up, bring your own knife, chopping board, peeler and apron—then cook away. You prep, peel, slice, fry, grill, boil and set.

Christine Horvath and Eileen Suico volunteered on April 15, 2015 from 9am to 1pm. It was their first time to join in this beautiful effort. They worked alongside residents, families, business owners and many others working in the neighborhood to prepare gourmet meals that will serve the homeless people through a number of organizations in the Seattle area already doing great work in the city. A few of these organizations are: YWCA, The Blaine Center, Angeline’s Center for Women and a few more.

The gentleman standing between Christine and Eileen in photo is John Platt, one of the founders and the Lead Chef in this project. He has been cooking for the homeless since 2001. St. Clouds, the restaurant where all foods are cooked, prepped and sent out from is owned by John Platt and Paul Butler. Both were teachers for several years at Charles Wright Academy in Tacoma before they both established St Clouds and then founded Homeless Cooking Project. According to John, “We’re providing an hour of dignity and good food to people who find too little of both in their lives.”

“I have heard many times of the hopelessness in the life of someone experiencing homelessness, but a simple gesture to extend honor either by a simple chat or in this case, well prepped gourmet meal, can reawaken hope and set someone up to a new path of trying life out again.”    ~ Eileen Suico

Christine and Eileen are doing this again on Wednesday, May 20th.

For more information about this project: http://www.neighborhoodcooking.org/

[By Eileen Suico]

Good Earth Natural Foods, Cavallo Point Chef, Milagro Foundation, & Conscious Kitchen model lunches for Bayside Martin Luther King School are making it happen!

These five organizations unite to establish model school kitchen and garden directly on the premises to provide nutritious, non-packaged, seasonal non-gmo, organic food breakfasts and lunches for Bayside Martin Luther King School in Marin City, California.

Cavallo Point Chef, Justin Everett, takes time from his busy work schedule to help guide The Conscious Kitchen the lunch program. Chef Justin became involved when he chaperoned a group of 5 young children on a field trip to the tide pools in Marin County; he noticed that one young student opened up his lunch which looked like something purchased from the 7-11 Store — lunch-ables, snicker bar and a soda.  He remarked to the student, “This must be a special lunch for today?”  The student replied, “This is what I eat every day!” 

Soon after this incident, he was approached by Judi Shils of a local non-profit Turning Green to partner with Bayside MLK school to establish a lunch program permanently.

[Photo above, left to right: Rachelle and her mom, Dana who both work in the garden]

Rachelle, a student at BMLK, spoke about helping in the garden on the school ground where students learn how to plant vegetables and flowers.  The vegetables are used to make salads served on a regular basis.  This gives students the knowledge on how to grow organic vegetables and to take pride in what they actually helped to provide freshly grown vegetables for lunches to the entire school!  Milagro Foundation was the initial funder of the MLK garden in 2010 and were the sole support for the first three years.  Milagro Foundation continues to be a partner of The Conscious Kitchen and the garden at the school.

Photo from garden: left to right: Sarah, Garden Coordinator; Dana, Volunteer Mother; and Al Baylacq, Owner/Founder of Good Earth Natural Foods

Conscious Kitchen, located in Sausalito, California, began August 2013 with Judi Shils, at the helm, who had this vision of bringing fresh, organic, seasonal, non-GMO foods to all schools. She approached Good Earth Natural Foods owner/founder, Al Baylacq, [in photo above] who agreed to help jump-start this program by supporting lunches two days a week for the first 6 months, along with Milagro Foundation, an organization that continues to be an active supporter for both garden and kitchen programs.

[Photo above, left to right: Jonathan Foley of Conscious Kitchen, Justin Everett Chef at Cavallo Point, and Shaun Dayton, Chef at BMLK]

The combined efforts of Good Earth, Cavallo Point chef, Milagro Foundation, Bayside Martin Luther King School chef, Shaun Dayton, and all the staff at BMLK,  has enabled Conscious Kitchen to established a very successful nutritious, healthy pilot food program for past tw0 years.

Conscious Kitchen is now ready to replicate this program into a neighboring charter school in Sausalito called Willow Creek Academy to provide another program of nutritious foods soon. The plan is to have every school in this country use this model for providing healthy, nutritious lunches for children to model for their families and to sustain a healthier, active lifestyle and to become successful in their lives.

How does CVI fit in this mix?  Several of our employees from the Larkspur Office have volunteered in BMLK kitchen, working side-by-side with Chef Shaun in preparing and serving lunches – Preston, Teresa, Lexin, Francisco and Charlotte. Additionally, CVI also donated to the kitchen with new potato/carrot peelers.

[Photo below: Charlotte Kobayashi at entry way of school]

Larkspur CVI office will soon set up a “Corporate Visions Volunteer Day” at Bayside to help in the garden and the kitchen by staggering our schedule for one whole day! Please check out website for Conscious Kitchen:  http://www.teensturninggreen.org/the-conscious-kitchen/                                                                                                                              [by Charlotte Kobayashi]