Dear Friends,

At Green Map System, we nourish an engaging new form of community media that provides a critically important antidote to the images of human and environmental tragedy that so often fill the media today. Our contribution takes the form of engaging Green Maps that connect everyone with local green living options, nature, social and cultural resources – everything from sustainable energy and mobility options to healthy habitats and restored watersheds to green school environments that transform students’ lives. We offer potent images of people working together for ecological health, climate care, social justice and security across many nations and cultures.

Led by local map teams in over 50 countries and linked by the coordination efforts, communication services and adaptable design tools provided by us at Green Map System, all 436 Green Map projects utilize our award-winning globally shared Green Map Icons and many other digital and printed best practices resources. Each Green Map is a guide and inventory, an authentic expression of community character, a record of change and a perception-changing landscape of hope.

Energizing Communities Worldwide to Chart a Sustainable Future

Since GMS’s founding in 1995, over 330 Green Maps have been published online and in print by local students, professionals, city officials, NGOs and grassroots groups. Each helps guide the community’s newcomers to more sustainable everyday choices, encourage longtime residents to get involved with their communities in new ways, provide visitors with best practice models to bring home, and motivate decision-makers to act for the common good.

Supporting Green Map System for Healthier, Greener Hometowns!

2007 has been a remarkable year for our global network and also for our own hometown Green Apple Map projects that benefit New York City.
• Our small, dedicated staff has launched an interactive, multi-lingual communications platform at this website, through which you can explore Green Maps around the world.
• Thanks to a Pratt student’s inspired design and success with Sappi Ideas that Matter competition, we published wonderful organizational materials.
• Momentum is building behind our corporate social responsibility program. A great outcome from a recent case study: over 200 tons of CO2 and upwards of $1 million was saved during the Green Mapping of Delta Electronic’s 25,000 employee plant in Wujiang China!
• We have released a suite of new ‘community as classroom’ curriculum tools for teens inspired by our 2006 energy-themed NYC Green Map, downloadable free at GreenAppleMap.org/page/modules.
• We published the second edition of the Compost Green Map of Manhattan – a copy is enclosed. We celebrated with a cycling tour, one of our many public events, indoors and out, this year.
• The regional US EPA presented us with its 2007 Environmental Quality Award. Find it and global recognition on the Awards page in our online News section.
• And we continue to welcome interns and volunteers from around the world at our New York headquarters to help create new mapmaking resources, develop leadership skills and then make tangible change back in their home countries.

2008’s Expansive Plans

• We are in the final stages of a 5-year process to update the award-winning icons that enhance and link all Green Maps. Version 3 will reflect our deeper understanding of sustainability when completed in early 2008. New tools, outreach and education resources will follow.
• We have begun developing the Global Green Map, an interactive online compendium of sustainability sites, routes and resources around the world, designed to facilitate public submissions, ratings and discussions, translations and videos alongside those researched and contributed by official Green Mapmakers. Global Green Map will present and preserve widespread evidence of positive change. Please help us create this powerful map – we expect it to grow into a vitally important resource. Preview it in slideshow and video formats here!
• We’ll begin piloting the Green Schools Green Map in NYC, a timely interactive resource for healthy learning environments that will help students inspire communities as they chart improvements in school facilities, purchasing, eco-programs and youth projects on school ‘report cards’.
• We expect to dramatically broaden our impact in many world regions, and especially in China and Latin America, where Green Map Hubs are being strengthened. Our first book in Portuguese will be published soon as well.

Green Map System is all about inclusive participation in the real world and helping EVERYONE embrace green lifestyles, preserve culture and combat climate change. Our maps and mapmaking methodologies move entire communities along the path toward balancing ecological health, social equity and economic integrity. Even though we have leveraged all this with a small annual budget, we have proven that we can accomplish perspective-changing goals with measurable community impacts, spur leadership and engage meaningful action.

With your help we can do so much more! Your support will reinforce our work for a better future.

We welcome questions from you about our work, as well as your tax-deductible donations and advice. Donors of $250 or more will receive a color copy of our community mapping book, Mapping our Common Ground, 2nd edition. We would be pleased to discuss sponsorships or stock transfers. We’d love to host your visit to our gallery of Green Maps, introduce you to our staff and share ideas for bringing sustainability to light in your community.

Warm regards,

Wendy E. Brawer
Founding Director
Green Map System