A Letter from the Executive Director
The Tour d’France is in full swing and that means my weekend mornings start with the whirr and hum of very fit cyclists speeding down city streets, clogging rural roads lined with avid onlookers and chugging through jagged mountain peaks still laden with snow.
This year these sights and sounds, which usually drift into the background as I sip a cup of coffee over the New York Times, were interrupted by my belly laughs at the impossibly ridiculous closed captioning of the play-by-play announcements:
“He came over the top to get second place” became “back together that was lace.”
The discussion about whether this was Mark Cavendish’s day became “is this the day for more cavities?” eliciting instead a bad trip to the dentist.
While certainly funny, it distracted from the intended content and drove home the importance of clear, concise communication. At Grey Bears we have embarked on a branding effort to clarify who we are and how best to convey that through the myriad ways we present ourselves to the community.
We Grey Bears are a unique beast. Mostly renowned for ensuring seniors live healthy and meaningful lives through our Healthy Food Program, some people do not know we also operate an award-winning Thrift Store, or operate a CRV redemption and recycling center at the Ben Lomond Transfer Station, a recycling center at Buena Vista Landfill and accept e-waste at our Chanticleer Ave. campus to be resold, recycled or parted out.
Others, mostly “old timers” who were here in 1989 for the Loma Prieta earthquake, remember Grey Bears stepping in to remove debris from downtown streets and remain aware of our continued work in the recycling realm. In over 50 years of service to the community, we’ve certainly come a long way from our original efforts of recycling newspapers.
Grey Bears remains committed to sustainability and consider it the backbone of the work we do. From recovering food from local farms and stores, rescuing groceries otherwise headed to the landfill and getting it to seniors’ tables, to our extensive recycling program with 3 locations through the county and an award-winning thrift store, we stand apart because our commitment to re-using and re-purposing literally feeds the Grey Bears through the revenue it generates.
Please read below to learn everything you’ve ever wanted about our resource recovery programs, and our exemplary employees who help keep seniors fed day in and day out. Also as promised, we are proud to present five exemplary board members who join our ranks this month. Please join me in welcoming Richard Beach, Marshall Delk, Jacob Guth, Judith Levin, and Satish Rishi to the Grey Bears community. I suspect once you review their bios, you will be as excited as I am.
In Service,
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Jennifer Merchant
Executive Director
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Grey Bears New Board of Directors
Like many nonprofits, Grey Bears is steered by a volunteer Board of Directors dedicated to serving their community. We hope you will join us in giving these grey-t additions to our Board a warm welcome!
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Meet Richard Beach
Richard, a resident of Santa Cruz County for 52 years, has worked in Silicon Valley startups, multinational companies, and local real estate, utilizing his knowledge and experience in engineering, marketing and sales, finance, and business management. He holds a BS in Engineering from SF State University, MSEE and an MBA from Stanford University. Richard, while managing a family real estate business, enjoys time focusing on his interests in healthy aging, the environment, and education. Grey Bears combines these interests, and as a board member, Richard uses his business background and love of community to sustain and grow the organization as it works to promote good nutrition, activity, and social connection as the perfect recipe for healthy aging. Richard also serves as the Chairman of the Scholarship Committee for the Santa Cruz Rotary and supports projects with Cabrillo College through the Presidents Circle, the Engineering Abroad Programs, and the Ventana Wilderness Alliance. He is married to his wife of 51 years, Susan, and has 3 children and 5 grandchildren. He enjoys woodworking, golf, pickleball, and cycling.
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Meet Jacob Guth
Jacob Guth, based in Davenport, CA, is currently the Director of Food Safety at CCOF Certification Services, a non-profit dedicated to advancing organic agriculture for a healthy world. Jacob specializes in the regulatory intersection of food safety and conservation of natural resources as it pertains to organic agriculture. As an AmeriCorps Vista volunteer alumni educated at Humboldt State and Hartnell Community College, Jacob contributes valuable insights to the agricultural industry and is passionate about serving his community. He currently sits on Santa Cruz County's Integrated Waste Management Task Force and is working to increase food donations as a board member of Grey Bears.
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Meet Judith Levin
Judith Levin is currently working as a social constructionist and EMDR therapist, as well as a Nurse Practitioner in mental health in private practice. She is also the President of the Board of Directors, which manages a community of 117 private residences. When she’s finished having fun at work, she plays in her garden, both in Phoenix and Santa Cruz. She also enjoys playing golf, pickleball, kayaking, and doing yoga with our Greybears Yoga teacher, Suzi. Photography is something she experiments with, and ukulele and singing are also favorite pastimes. She has been partnered for the past 27 years and has 2 adult daughters and 2 grandchildren, 16 years old and 2 years old, who call her Safta, which means grandmother in Hebrew.
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Meet Marshall Delk
Marshall Delk is the Vice President and Senior Business Banking Officer at Santa Cruz County Bank, having worked at the bank for 10 years. Marshall is a long-time community banker, having been both the founder of Santa Cruz County Bank and Lighthouse Bank and, prior to that, the President of Monterey Bay Bank. As a 30-year resident of Santa Cruz County, Marshall has been involved with a number of non-profit organizations, including the Dominican Hospital Foundation, Cabrillo College Foundation, Big Brothers, Big Sisters of Santa Cruz County, and the Santa Cruz County Workforce Development Board. Marshall received a BS in Accounting from the University of Louisville as well as a MS in Taxation from Golden Gate University. In his spare time, Marshall enjoys outdoor adventures including hiking, rafting, and travel, as well as being a 20-year participant in CrossFit.
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Meet Satish Rishi
Satish Rishi recently retired from Habitat for Humanity Monterey Bay, where he was the CEO for the past four years. During his tenure, the organization was able to house nineteen families and build thirteen homes in Santa Cruz County. Prior to joining Habitat, Satish was the Chief Financial Officer at Rambus Inc. He also worked at Dupont Photomasks, Dell and Intel and was fortunate to have lived and worked in India, Japan, Hong Kong, and the U.S. Satish has also served as a Board Member for public companies as well as non-profit organizations. Recently retired, Satish is looking forward to traveling, golfing, reading, and being involved in community organizations.
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Employees of the Quarter Awards
What is the "secret sauce" to Grey Bears? Grey-t community! And our community would not be what it is today without the tireless work of our employees.
This quarter, we would like to recognize our Resource Recovery Staff, Jerry Madrigal, and our Thrift Store Associate, Marccon Salib!
Jerry has been working at Grey Bears for eleven years! This shows his passion and commitment to the Grey Bears mission. He’s been a great team player, making the Resource Recovery team’s lives much smoother by handling any role that is given to him. He helps run all three of our recycling centers located in Ben Lomond, Buena Vista, and on campus in Chanticleer. He has even helped ship out books. We relied on Jerry to do it all, and he stepped up and exceeded expectations.
Marccon, our Thrift Store Associate, has displayed profound integrity and is a very reliable person you can trust to handle any situation that comes his way. It stems from his hard work and his consistency in being amazing every day. He cares about our community, going the extra mile to ensure that people are taken care of while they’re enjoying their experience at Grey Bears. An example is when he returned an item that someone accidentally donated. An item that’s really close to that person’s heart, and they were very thankful that he noticed and acted on the mishap.
We are grateful to have both of them with us at Grey Bears, and we can’t wait to share our winners for the third quarter!
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Grey Bears Gift Cards
Grey Bears Thrift Store now offers Gift Cards! For your next celebration, give the gift of sustainably sourced items while supporting feeding seniors in the Santa Cruz community. Your continued support means the world to us and drives our mission forward! Thank you for being a part of our journey!
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Grey Bear is a New Leaf Foundation Envirotoken Recipient!
We are very excited to announce that we are one of the recipients of the New Leaf’s Envirotoken Program! A huge thank you to everyone who participated in the voting. We really appreciate your dedication to serving our seniors and community!
If you use a reusable bag when you shop at New Leaf locations in Aptos, Capitola, and Westwide, you will receive 10 cents worth of Envirotokens per bag. After that, you can donate your Envirotokens to Grey Bears by placing your token in the box. Together, we can nourish our seniors one reusable bag at a time!
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Target Circle Program
We are honored and excited to announce that we have been chosen to participate in a special charitable giving campaign sponsored and funded by Target. And you have the chance to help direct a portion of Target’s donation to us! Now through September 30th, vote for us through the Target Circle program to help determine how Target’s donation will be divvied up.
Find out more about Target Circle here:
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We’re asking our supporters to help us make the most of this incredible opportunity. Every vote counts to help us receive a portion of the available Target funds as we continue our mission to feed our seniors and help our community thrive. Don’t forget, as you earn more votes, you can keep voting multiple times during the campaign! Thank you for your support, and we encourage you to share your support for us (and your thanks to Target) on social media throughout the duration of the voting!
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2nd Saturday Sale
Our 2nd Saturday sale is this week! All items in the thrift store will be 50% off this Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
We truly appreciate all your support. This will help us continue our mission to help our seniors and community prosper!
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Seniors Night Out
For this month’s Seniors Night Out, we will be partnering with the Alzheimer’s Association, who will be presenting on healthy aging for your brain and body on Friday, July 26th. Please join us for a presentation, followed by a group discussion where you will have the opportunity to ask any questions that are most important to you.
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Embracing Resource Conservation for a Better Community
At Grey Bears, our commitment to resource conservation is one of the main pillars of our mission to positively impact our community. We believe that by conserving, repurposing, and extending the life of resources, we can create lasting benefits for our planet and all the lives that depend on it.
Here are some of the ways we strive to achieve this:
Recycling Initiatives: We actively participate in recycling through our Resource Recovery Program. We ensure that items such as cans, glass bottles, metal, plastic, computers, cell phones, TVs, and more are properly recycled, reducing harmful waste.
Donations and Our Thrift Store: We welcome donations of items people no longer use. These items are either sold or donated to those in need through our thrift store. This also includes taking in broken electronics, which we attempt to repair and redistribute, giving them a new lease on life. Through conscious consumerism, we can be more meaningful in our connection with our items, while finding joy through earth-friendly ways.
Food Recovery and Composting: We partner with grocery stores and local food producers to collect leftover food that would otherwise go to waste. We try to ensure that the food is of great quality and safe for consumption. For food that cannot be used, we turn it into compost, helping to grow more food and plants.
Repair Cafés: Our Repair Cafés are events where people bring their belongings to be fixed rather than discarding them. As exemplified in their motto "Throw it away? No way!" this not only conserves resources but also fosters a culture of repairing and reusing.
Why do it? Resource conservation is more than just one act. By shifting small habits over time, little acts have the power to leave big impacts, creating healthier living spaces for everyone. Here are just some of the benefits of resource conservation:
Reducing Landfill Waste: By recycling and taking in donations, we significantly reduce the amount of waste sent to landfills. This helps prevent soil, air, and water pollution and mitigates factors contributing to climate change.
Creating New Products from Waste: Recycling and e-waste initiatives transform waste into new products and items, diverting potential pollutants from landfills and providing our community with useful goods.
Nutrient-Rich Compost: Food composting not only prevents food waste but also returns nutritional value to our soil. This supports the growth of fresh, nutritious food and plants, benefiting local gardens and individual households.
Extending Landfill Life: Our efforts to keep toxins out of landfills also extend the lifespan of these sites, ensuring they can continue to be used for managing unavoidable waste.
We encourage you all to practice resource conservation in your own homes too! At Grey Bears, we try to maximize the use of our resources to the best of our ability as well. Some examples could be using donated items that aren’t being sold or given away for our Seniors Night Out events, or even something as easy as printing on double-sided paper, to get the most out of each sheet we have.
Try to think of any way you can preserve, repurpose, or extend the life of your own resources in your own home. Like sharing food with your neighbors or fixing your items instead of replacing them.
The good news is by recycling, donating, and shopping at Grey Bears you're already contributing. Even your shopping helps more than you may think— every dollar you spend at Grey Bears goes towards all the initiatives we have to help impact our community, while giving an item a second life out of the landfill.
Thank you for being part of our mission to create a nourished, sustainable, and thriving community. Together, we can make a significant difference.
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Recycling at Grey Bears
Our Resource Recovery Program is one of the primary ways we contribute to our community and the environment, while supporting our Healthy Food Program. We strive to be a resource that anyone can use to help our planet.
We recycle e-waste, but only at the Grey Bears campus at 2710 Chanticleer, every day of the week from 7:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. We either recycle the material we receive or fix it to sell or donate back to the community, so we can do our best to extend the life of the items, like we mentioned earlier in the passage. We refurbish some electronics and resell them in our store in order to support our food program for seniors.
Some e-waste accepted items are computers, laptops, radios, cameras, camera equipment, video games, video game consoles, monitors, TVs, cell phones, tablets, some working speakers, cables, chargers, power supplies, routers, printers, scanners, lead-acid batteries (no household batteries), car batteries, ink, servers, routers, modems, musical instruments, DVD/VCR/BLU Ray players, newer keyboards, newer mice, brand new sealed electronics, and more.
We have 3 different locations for resource recovery: the Grey Bears Recycling Center at Chanticleer, Buena Vista Landfill, and the Ben Lomond Transfer Station. The Chanticleer location is open every day of the week from 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., and the last two locations are open at the same time from Monday to Saturday.
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Grey Bears Chanticleer Recycling Center gladly accepts
the following items:
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Unfortunately, not everything is recyclable. Some times items are not designed with recycling in mind, or are made of different materials that must be processed in very specific ways which are not always earth or people-friendly. Grey Bears has also had to make changes to its recycling program due to fluctuation in the markets.
These are the items the Grey Bears Chanticleer Recycling Center doesn't accept:
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Here are the items Ben Lomond and Buena Vista Recycling Centers accept:
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California Redemption Value (CRV) redemption hours at the Ben Lomond Transfer Station are from 10 AM to 2:30 PM on Wednesday and from 10 AM to 3:30 PM on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. It is the only North County location where you can get CRV redemption.
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Here’s some information on CRV eligibility:
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Help us Continue our Conservation Efforts
Thanks for embarking on our journey through Resource Recovery with us! Reflecting on Grey Bears' journey, we couldn't have come this far without the compassion and support of the Greater Santa Cruz community. With your support, we were able to grow from recycling newspapers to an entire multi-site recycling operation! Your continuous support has been critical to our efforts to be good stewards of our resources while improving seniors' lives. With your ongoing acts of kindness, we can provide unique care for our beloved seniors, allowing them to thrive as they age. Together, we envision a future in which every senior leads a healthy and meaningful life. Please consider supporting Grey Bears to help us fulfill our mission for the future. Together, we can address senior food insecurity while also fostering a meaningful, sustainable community. Thank you for being such a vital part of our journey!
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