Eugene School District 4J

So, you know, this, as I've, as we've said, this fund would have a lot of co-benefits, but I wanna stress that schools can apply for this funding directly for projects that would help them reduce greenhouse gas emissions, uh, do carbon sequestration projects, um, and make, make the schools more green, and that does reduce costs for them.

That does free up money that they can spend elsewhere, and that's why the Oregon Teacher Federation of Oregon, the Eugene Education Association, and a huge host of, um, our school board members, um, Tom Diliberto, um, Jenny Jonak, Maya Rabasa, all 4J board members, Austin Fullniggy, the head of the LCC board, uh, Ty Probst-Zimmerman, uh, on the, on the Bethel School District board, have all supported the Eugene Clean Energy Fund.

So I understand the fear, but we have our community leaders who are dedicated to education saying, "No, we support this.

This is what Eugene needs." So I think that's really re- important to remember.

And so I wanted to also like that reminded me that I'll.

4J, the school district, has actually signed a GNA, it's a good neighbor agreement, with Neighborhood Leaders Council.

And they have committed to making sure that communication is passed to the neighborhood leaders so that when there are impactful things happening with the schools, maybe large events, possibly parking lot closures, things that could actually affect the entire neighborhood, 4J has committed to making sure that we know about that and we're able to share the information with our communities as well.

Thank you.

And with that, I'd like to thank the speakers, Jensina Hawkins and Fabio Andrade.

Schools across Lane County are cutting.

4J alone sent out 177 layoff notices this spring and faced a $46 million deficit.

Many of those layoffs were teachers and counselors.

Our schools are underfunded and we have a housing and homelessness crisis.

It can address the housing crisis through building energy-efficient, affordable homes.

Laura mentioned schools.

Schools can apply directly to the Eugene Clean Energy Fund for their own projects to help reduce costs and make sure that students are getting the very best from our 4J and from our Bethel school system.

And so, I mean, climate is not something that stands on its own.

And today I want to welcome Ben Shapiro.

Ben is a senior network engineer at the Eugene, Oregon School District 4J, the sixth largest public school district in Oregon.

He's also a misfit with HPE Networking.

They're our proud sponsor today.