We love soil all throughout the year, but coming up soon is the official Ohio Soil Health Week! It provides a time and space to celebrate, honor, and protect Ohio's soils. Is it soil’s birthday week? Maybe! We’re celebrating with Sips & Soils, a Cincinnati Compost Crawl, in partnership with Queen City Commons and the Ohio Organics Council. Spend the afternoon with us as we see how scraps get turned into soil at Common Orchard’s Camp Washington Perennial Farm, explore Northside with a walking tour of local compost drop-off points, and finish with a drink at Urban Artifact. Learn more and register here.

Want to celebrate Ohio soils’ honorary birthday week on your own? Supplement your own soil at home with Compost for the Commons from the Common Orchard Project! Buy bags here and add them to your garden beds, lawns, and flower pots for a boost before winter sets in.

November 19 | 6:30 - 9:00 pm | Cincinnati World Cinema

Join us for a screening of In My Backyard, a documentary series produced by our partners at The Nature Conservancy that highlights firsthand stories from people and communities most impacted by climate change. Our recent blog post here goes into more detail about the movie and its director, Tonyisha Harris, the Manager of Strategic Climate Initiatives at The Nature Conservancy.

The evening will begin with a reception at 6:30, followed by the film at 7:00. Post-screening, we will host a panel discussion with Tonyisha and other regional advocates.

Tickets are $25 in advance or $30 at the door and are limited. Cincinnati World Cinema has generously donated the theater space, and all proceeds will benefit Green Umbrella’s local climate initiatives. Presented by Green Umbrella with support from Taft. Buy tickets here.

As a regional and national leader in green school and outdoor learning practices, Green & Healthy Schools Director Cynthia Walters often shares her extensive experience with other organizations across the country, and sometimes the world. This fall, Cynthia represented Cincinnati at two big events: Slow Food International’s Terra Madre gathering in Turin, Italy, and the National Farm to School Network Partner Meeting in Sacramento, California.

In Italy, Cynthia served as a Regional Councilor for Slow Food USA, joining more than 1,500 food producers and leaders from over 120 countries at Terra Madre. In California, she shared how Greater Cincinnati's innovative approaches and resources are serving as replicable, customizable tools for lasting systems change in school districts nationwide. Cynthia’s work in Italy and California helped plug the Green & Healthy Schools Network's regional work to a global movement advancing sustainable food systems and empowering the next generation of changemakers.

Green Umbrella member Thomas More University was recently awarded a prestigious grant from the National Science Foundation to support its Biology Field Station, which includes funding to support and protect the eastern hellbender, a threatened species of giant salamander that was recently adopted as Kentucky’s state amphibian. This grant, along with another recent grant from the National Wildlife Federation and Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom, will support a major renovation of the Biology Field Station’s aquaculture facilities and the establishment of a hellbender head-start program in partnership with Kentucky Fish and Wildlife.

Thomas More University’s Biology Field Station Eastern Hellbender Research

The renovations will upgrade an existing facility, increasing its capacity to hold up to 500 hellbenders at various life stages and enabling research to examine the optimal conditions and acceptable ranges in which hellbenders grow, thrive, and survive. The research findings will help produce best management practices and guidelines to be shared with the hellbender community of practice, including aquariums, zoos, governmental agencies, and academic institutions.

The State of Ohio and the Ohio EPA’s attempt to deny citizen enforcement of Ohio’s Air Nuisance Rule has been declared unconstitutional by a Franklin County judge earlier this month. Ohio’s Air Nuisance Rule makes it an unlawful act for any person or entity to cause air pollution in amounts that endanger public health, safety, or welfare.

The case was filed last year by Sierra Club, the Ohio Environmental Council and other environmental advocates. Middletown resident Donna Ballinger was also involved in the complaint. She hoped to use the air nuisance rule and air monitoring data to document air violations. According to an article from WYSO from September of last year, Ballinger called the Ohio EPA every day about pollution from the steel and coke plants in the Middletown “steel corridor”. She said she’s even been asked by regulators why she continues to live there. “I'm not fighting just for myself. I'm fighting for the whole community. [And] it's too expensive to try to move. That's why everybody stays here, because they don't have the funds or the means to move out of the area," she said.

Image source: Digifly840 / Pixabay

This isn’t the first attempt at removing the air nuisance rule. The rule was deleted in 2020, until the U.S. EPA under the Biden administration reversed that decision in 2024.

Clermont County is removing its largest lowhead dam, between Cloverlick Creek and Harsha Lake, to improve human safety and stream health. The dam was initially built in the 1940s to provide water for the Village of Bethel, but it has been defunct since the 2000s. The blockage has shrunk the populations of aquatic animals and endangered people who paddle and fish in the creek. Once the dam is out, before the end of the year, officials expect to see improvements in the stream’s health quickly.

Image source: Isabel Nissley / WVXU

November 10 | 3:00 - 6:30 pm | Camp Washington Perennial Farm

Come celebrate Ohio Soil Health Week by digging into Cincinnati’s compost scene! We will spend the afternoon exploring how scraps get turned into soil at Common Orchard’s Camp Washington Perennial Farm with a guided tour from Farm Manager Mel. Afterwards, you can join Julia from Queen City Commons on a walking tour of Northside’s compost drop-off points. Wrap up the night with a well-earned drink alongside food system partners at Urban Artifact, courtesy of Ohio Organics Council.

Co-hosted by Common Orchard Project, Greater Cincinnati Regional Food Policy Council, Queen City Commons, Hamilton County ReSource, Ohio Organics Council.

Have an event to share? Green Umbrella members can submit events here. To learn more about the benefits of becoming a member, click here.

The Environmental Advisory Board (EAB) serves as a resource for the City in its ongoing commitment to enact policies, practices, and procedures that combat climate change, improve the health and well-being of our citizens and our environment, and position Cincinnati to be a leader in sustainability policy and city-level climate change initiatives.

Interested in being a member of the EAB? Submit an application here by Friday, November 6, 2026, for a 3-year term beginning in January 2027.

Bring your tree care expertise to a mission that matters! Join Great Parks’ Urban Forestry department as a Full-Time Arborist, where you will find a dynamic role focused on long-term stewardship and technical variety across diverse and beautiful conservation settings. Learn more and apply here.

Have an event, volunteer opportunity, or job posting to share? Green Umbrella members can submit them via the online Membership Portal. To learn more about the benefits of becoming a member, click here.