Potsdam resident Bali MacKentley created the original educational and directional signage for the Zero Waste program of the Local Living Festival in 2011, and they will be in use at the upcoming Festival in Canton Sept. 26 as well.

CANTON -- The third public participation gathering for people interested in helping with the Local Living Festival will be held Wednesday Sept. 9 from 6:30 to 8 p.m. featuring a work party to assemble large posters for the Zero Waste stations.

The event will be held at the Deep Root Center, 7 West Main St., 2nd floor, and all are welcome to attend.

The actual festival is set for Saturday, September 26 in the Village Green in downtown Canton. It features skill-sharing demonstrations, numerous workshops, speakers, exhibits and vendors, children's activities, local traditional craft demo's, art, music, dancing, and good local food.

There are over twenty theme areas of the festival, under the broad topics of local food and agriculture, renewable small-scale energy, green building, forestry and woodlot, and general homesteading skills. Demonstrators of practical, rural skills are particularly sought and will be given special placement in the festival grounds, or indoors if needed. Contact 347-4223 or LocalLivingFestival@gmail.com for info.

At the public participation meeting Sept. 9, attendees will have the opportunity to learn of festival plans, how they can participate, and assist in creation of an important aspect of the Zero Waste component. Zero Waste is a philosophy and a design principle that includes recycling but goes beyond it by taking a whole system approach to the astronomical amounts of resources and waste that we generate. Zero Waste principles include maximizing recycling, minimizing waste, reducing consumption and ensuring that products are made to be reused, repaired or recycled, either back into nature or the marketplace.

In 2011, the Local Living Festival was awarded as a Gold Certified Zero Waste event, the first ever in New York State, by the nearest certifying agency, in Pittsburg, PA. Organizers strive to live up to that standard and more at each successive Festival. The Festival is set up with clearly marked, color coded bins for recycling, composting, cardboard, redeemable bottles and cans, and "landfill."

The signage that is used for these stations is what will be created at the September 9 work party.

The goal is to reduce the landfill segment as much as possible, so Festival organizers ask that attendees bring a place setting of their own for food purchases and vendors are not allowed to use single-use, disposable items and ideas such as always printing double-sided are promoted.