Housing and Dining
University Housing Services
Housing Services continues to update the Sonoma State residential community
with
new innovations in energy saving products. All furniture in the community
is produced by Furniture by Thurston, a leader in sustainable furniture production.
Compact Flourescent Lightbulbs have been introduced in all table lamps and
low flow showerheads and toilets are present in every living space. The housing
office has done its best to be as paperless as possible by sending all communications
through email and utilizing online room reservations for returning residents
further cutting down on paper use. At year end, Housing Services helps cut
down on move out trash be educating students about local donation and recycling
options with Salvation Army, Goodwill Industries, St. Vincent De Paul Society,
etc.
Dining Services
For years, University Dining Services has been supporting the local community by purchasing as much as possible from local suppliers. Local suppliers often provide the best quality goods and by keeping the money local, we can help our community to thrive. Whether it is the Milk from Clover Stornetta in Petaluma or the Bread from Full Circle Bakery in Penngrove, University Dining Services is proud to serve products right from our "back yard". See a more complete list of our efforts here.
Reducing Waste
The
battle to reduce food waste is a constant struggle at Dining Services. Having
an all you care to eat facility like Zinfandel Dining Room creates a definitive
hurdle as patrons have a habit of taking more food than they can consume.
To help alleviate this problem, Dining Services is working on an education
campaign to help make customers aware of how much food they are throwing
away. In addition, Dining is working with a student group to develop a program
to compost the food waste to lessen the amount that is taken to the landfill.
The areas that Dining Services has the control to regulate are the type of packaging and other materials that are used to support the operation. For example, 95% of the Meals-To-Go packaging at Zinfandel Dining Room are made of corn. This includes the to-go box and utensils and all are 100% bio-degradable. Charlie Brown's Cafe is moving towards a cup that is also made of corn product which is 100% bio-degradable. As a unit, Dining Services has begun to purchase environmentally friendly cleaning products and move away from the toxic cleaning chemicals that have been the industry standard for years.
SONOMA STATE UNIVERSITY • UNIVERSITY AFFAIRS