FAIRFIELD – Southeast Iowa Sierra Club hosted an Earth Day celebration that attracted many visitors to the Fairfield Arts & Convention Center on Saturday, April 20.

The day before the big event, the Sierra Club put on a luncheon for a smaller group of people who got to hear from David Levine, co-founder and president of the American Sustainable Business Network. Levine flew in from New York to give the keynote address the following day at the Resilient Community Challenge, and on Friday, April 19, he spoke before a crowd of a few dozen people at the Fairfield Golf & Country Club.

Fairfield’s former mayor and current Executive Director of Grow Fairfield, Ed Malloy, introduced Levine as a “pioneer’s pioneer,” and that his organization ASBN represents over 250,000 businesses. Malloy said the group partners with brands such as Patagonia, Eileen Fisher, Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream and Etsy to “find business solutions that benefit both people and the planet.”

Levine started his talk by reviewing the history of the organization, which was formed in 2009 with roots in an earlier group called Social Venture Network. ASBN states on its website that it sought to be a new type of business group, because leadership viewed the traditional business organizations as overly focused on short-term profits. Levine said the group sought to “make the business case” for this new economy, one that advanced sustainable solutions.

Levine talked about the inroads the group made in meeting with federal officials around 2009, when members of ASBN met with the U.S. Secretary of Labor. Levine said ASBN’s presentation to the Labor Secretary impressed her so much that she called in 20 of her staff and declared, “You’ve never heard a business like this.” Levine said they had similar success meeting with the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.

In the years since, Levine said the ASBN has encouraged state affiliates to work on issues that are important to them. He talked about certain states where the group has work to do, such as in Texas, which passed a law in 2021 to prohibit the boycotting of fossil fuels by financial companies.

After Levine’s talk, Fairfield Mayor Connie Boyer talked about the city’s commitment to sustainability, going back to the role she and Bob Ferguson played in founding the Go Green Commission a decade ago. She talked about how the city once had a sustainability coordinator with Scott Timm, then went about eight years without one until Rachel Hillier was hired as the city’s sustainability coordinator in the summer of 2022. Faith Reeves is the current sustainability coordinator. Boyer noted that, when the city was without a sustainability coordinator, progress on its environmental initiatives slowed down, but she’s happy that the city, MIU and 54 business partnerships have allowed Fairfield to have a sustainability coordinator once again.

Boyer said the town’s volunteers are a big reason why the city looks nice, and noted that the most recent Street Sweepers Ball on April 13 was the largest ever with about 100 volunteers that day.

“It’s a testament to the pride in our community,” Boyer said.

Boyer spoke about how a grant allowed the Fairfield Garden Initiative to produce a series of gardening videos available to the public on YouTube. She mentioned how happy she was to see the opening of the new Fairfield Community Garden at O.B. Nelson Park. She hoped it would inspire the next generation to take an interest in growing their own food.

“Kids need to get their fingers in the dirt. It’s good for the soul,” she said.