Grab your empty bins and buckets, and join us to celebrate and take home the compost that has been produced by the Tarrytown & Sleepy Hollow Food Scrap Recycling programs. Residents of our villages have been sending their organic waste to the compost instead of the trash incinerator–now it’s time to bring home the nutrient-dense compost that is produced, and use it in your home garden!

• Sunday, June 25th (Rain or Shine)
• 3 - 5 pm
• John Paulding School Parking Lot (Extra parking in TUFSD administrative building lot)

We’ll have a compost learning station for kids and families, and information about our Villages’ programs. We’ll also answer questions about John Paulding’s composting pilot, a new initiative to collect food scraps in the cafeteria and classrooms, which TUFSD plans to roll out to all of its campuses in the next few years. 

All residents of Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow are welcome to take up to two large bins of compost, first come first served. You bring the bins, we'll have shovels.

Co-Sponsored by: Sleepy Hollow Environmental Advisory Committee (SHEAC), Climate Smart Communities, and Tarrytown Environmental Advisory Council (TEAC).

By Cathy Ruhland, TEAC Zero Waste Committee

By Mai Mai Margules, TEAC Pollinator Pathways Lead

Our amazing Pollinator Pathways team has recently installed 4 new pollinator gardens in Tarrytown as well as beautified downtown with native plant barrels. We've created over 2500 sq. ft. of new pollinator habitat that will help our endangered pollinators survive, beautifying the Village in the process.

Despite sweltering weather (Sarah Michaels), rain (Metro North Station area), a marathon 7 hour install (Neperan Park), and fighting traffic (Main St./B'way) the team worked tirelessly to make these gardens a reality. 

We now have new pollinator gardens at MNR Station, Gracemere on S Broadway, a 1400 sq. ft. native garden at Neperan Park to complement Little Garden's existing  gardens, and extensions on the  Sarah Michaels garden.  We will also refresh plantings at the Rec. and Senior Ctr. and Broadway tree wells next week.

A special thank you to Oak and James Fitzgerald for their incredible generosity for sponsoring in full the MNR project as well as Oak's hands on gardening work!


We thank our Village leaders for their leadership and support in facilitating these projects. These projects could not happen without the dedicated work of our Parks and DPW crews who will be watering the plantings ensuring that they thrive. Without their help we could not have gardens.

 
Our real work is just beginning. We will need to care for our gardens, checking for weeds, staking as needed , deadheading etc. from June through Sept. Please contact me and let me know which project you would like to help with.

We will send out a maintenance schedule next week. Any amount of time that you can contribute will be very helpful! I can promise lots of free plants, our existing gardens at Patriots and Warner are already giving back.

BY Annie Kravet, TEAC member

If the sight of wilting vegetables in your fridge and other food/ leftovers gone to waste is getting you down, get inspired to reduce food waste with Tamar Adler’s new cookbook, “The Everlasting Meal Cookbook, Leftovers A - Z”.

Adler’s take on using up leftovers is creative, practical, and tasty, too.

I know I struggle using up certain ingredients or leftovers before they go bad, and while composting is a more sustainable alternative to tossing food in the tash, the best thing to do is eat what you buy, grow, or make.

Examples of creative, thrifty, and sustainable recipes in the book include “Empty Jar Nut Butter Noodles”, which uses the last bit of peanut butter (or any other nut butter) in a jar by adding warm water and scraping off anything stuck to the sides to use in the sauce, along with the “nut dust” at the bottom of a bag of nuts.

Other recipes use ingredients that you may have otherwise thrown directly into the compost bag, such as potato peels and leftover dressed salad.

“The Everlasting Meal Cookbook” is available through the library in both hard copy or ebook - check it out!

ON THE WATER
Boating Law Reminders from the Tarrytown Harbormaster
______________________

From Kevin Lustyik, Harbormaster, Village of Tarrytown 

The Village of Tarrytown welcomes you to a new boating season on one of America's most picturesque rivers. To ensure a safe, clean, and tranquil experience we require that the following Federal, State and local regulations be adhered to. 

On the Federal Level: 

• All boats are to be equipped with all Coast Guard mandated equipment. I.e. life vests, flares, sound producing devices. (Manually-propelled boats have some exceptions: https://www.paddlinglight.com/articles/u-s-coast-guard-required-signalling-devices-for-kayakers - Editor)
• No anchoring or loitering within 25 yds of the Tappan Zee-Cuomo Bridge
• Use of any Marijuana is prohibited on the river since it is a Federal/State waterway and is patrolled by the USCG who enforces Federal law.
• All motorized boat operators born after Jan 1, 1983 must have taken a NASBLA approved boating safety course (Brianna's Law).
• All Personal Watercraft (jet ski) operators must have taken a boating course; the minimum age to operate a PWC is 14.
• Persons under 13 must wear an approved, properly fitted and fastened life vest before launching and while in motion.

On the State Level:

• All motorized watercraft must be registered with the State of NY.
• If you have moved here from another State you have 90 days to obtain a NY Registration.
• NY State Navigation Laws are available on the NY State Parks and Recreation Website
• NY waters do not allow the discharge of any sewage (treated or untreated), gray water from sinks, or the disposal of any refuse or garbage of any type from boats.

On the Village Level, laws have been enacted to maintain safe navigation and clean waters:

• "No Wake" speed limit of 5 mph when operating within 200 feet of a dock, seawall, shoreline, or anchored vessel 
• 25mph speed limit from 200 feet to 1000 feet from the shoreline, and under no circumstances will a harmful wake be allowed from any boat. 
• No personal watercraft (jet skis) are allowed in the "near shore zone" to protect shore dwelling wildlife. 
• Personal watercraft may not "wake jump" or operate at speed in close proximity to boats in accordance with State laws. 
• Personal watercraft, water skiing, or tube towing will not be allowed after sunset or before sunrise. 

Resources:

• Boat equipment lists may be found in the Code of Federal Regulations or in the NYS boater's guides provided by the Harbormaster or the local U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary unit. 
• To schedule a free vessel inspection provided by the Coast Guard Auxiliary go to www.vesselsafetycheck.org  or call 1-877-875-6296 or contact the Harbormaster.

The next Rivertowns Repair Cafe will take place on Sunday, June 25th from 1-4pm at the Irvington Public Library located at 12 Astor Place in Irvington, NY. Repair Cafes, like the one we had in Tarrytown in April, are wonderful events, helping to keep our well-loved items in use and out of our trash bins. Repairs are also a teaching tool, helping visitors learn how things work and how they can be repaired. There are activities for kids, too, so the whole family is welcome.



The Irvington Repair Cafe is looking for repair coaches/fixers of all ability levels as well as general volunteers for set up/breakdown and to keep things running smoothly. If you can’t stay the whole time PLEASE don’t let that keep you from helping out, they'd love to have you for whatever time you can give. Email IrvingtonRepairCafe@gmail.com.

They would also like to run a ‘bike clinic’ from 1-2 as the weather and location will provide an excellent outdoor space to do this; if you have basic bike maintenance experience and would like to help out with this, please let them know. Need not be an expert! All levels of bike experience welcome and helpful.

By Dean Gallea, TEAC Co-Chair

The Greenburgh Town Board unanimously approved a new leaf blower (and lawn mower) law on May 16th. It only applies to portions of Greenburgh outside the boundaries of its Villages, each of which has their own leaf-blower regulations.

The new Greenburgh leaf blower law prohibits any gas or electric mower, leaf blower or other lawn or garden equipment that exceeds a sound pressure ("noise" level) of 75 dBA. There are also time windows for operation of these devices. Finally, operating more than one leaf blower on property of 10,000) square feet or less in area is prohibited, as well as more than three on any property.



Greenburgh's noise limit applies to the property line of an offending property, which is a more reasonable that that of Tarrytown, which specifies a 60-foot distance. I have personally measured 90 dBA in my back yard when simultaneous gas-powered blowers were being used on the driveway adjacent to mine.

There's a great disparity within leaf-blower regulations among the many communities in the County, as demonstrated by this list posted by the Town of Bedford. It's dated 2018, so doesn't include some more recent prohibitions, such as the complete ban Irvington has instituted beginning at the end of 2023.