By Donna Hemmila

Priscilla Hoffnagle knows a good deal when she sees one. On her first visit to the new Franklin Street office recycling event, she left with a box full of free supplies.

"This is really great," said Hoffnagle, a facilities manager for Continuing Education of the Bar. "It's a good deal, and it's better than this all going into a landfill."

That's exactly the point of the recycling program, which is held the first Friday of each month in the storage room off the Franklin Street lobby. (Doors open at 8 a.m.)

The Office of the President's Departmental Sustainability Coordinators group organizes the event, collecting unwanted office supplies from any UCOP office that wants to unload them and overseeing the monthly shopping opportunity.

"No one at OP should ever have to buy a Pendaflex folder," said Linda Furtado, a member of the UCOP sustainability coordinators and volunteer clerk during the July recycling.

The green hanging folders, binders and in and out baskets are among the most common things donated to the recycling program, she said. The only condition for adopting recycled items is that they be used at work.

"What we do here at OP makes the office greener and contributes to morale," said UCOP sustainability specialist Andrew Coghlan. "People seem happy to get free stuff."

The July recycling event saved UCOP $2,500, Coghlan estimates, based on the amount of items people took away and what it would cost to buy them new from Office Max.

Coghlan enjoys seeing the old office equipment that turns up such as a cassette tape answering machine someone donated. But potential donors shouldn't avoid recycling just because something seems outdated.

Hoffnagle, for example, scored some typewriter ribbons and correction fluid, essentials if one still keeps a typewriter around, and she does for filling out forms that aren’t online.

"Why buy this stuff when it's free?" she asked.

Chris Shipley and Terrell McQuitta, from the IT department, showed up for the July event to find things of use for their clients. Computer cables and surge protectors are the items OP offices commonly request from Helpdesk staff, and the pair found a few of each among the shelves of donated materials.

Good garbage. The office supply recycling is just one of the many green initiatives the sustainability group has come up with to make OP a greener place to work. Thanks to its efforts, the Franklin building now diverts 60 percent of its wastes from landfills. That milestone was achieved through the building composting program and desk-side recycling receptacles.

Since the composting program started in November 2006, more than 45 tons of food scraps, paper towels and waxed cardboard have been recycled into compost.

"That's enough to fill each of the building's elevator shafts from the bottom to the 12th floor and then some," said Coghlan. Before the recycling program started, paper towels made up one-third of the trash at OP, he said.

Other sustainability initiatives include the fresh organic produce delivery program employees can sign up for and the energy pledge started this spring to encourage employees to conserve power.

Tune in, turn off. Coghlan said the energy pledge has resulted in 31 percent fewer computers, 40 percent fewer monitors, 49 percent fewer printers and 42 percent fewer speakers being left on after work, according to inspections on selected floors.

Yes, the sustainability volunteers do check on the number of electronic devices left on after work hours. Before the pledge drive, they established a baseline of the number of appliances left on after hours. After the pledges were distributed, coordinators on floors 6, 7 and 10 again counted the number of appliances left on. In September they'll be conducting another inspection survey.

Silver lining. Thanks to efforts like these, the Franklin building is the first and only building in Oakland certified through the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design rating system for existing buildings.

The nonprofit sustainability industry group has certified the Franklin building at the Silver level for its recycling programs, non-toxic green cleaning chemicals and energy efficiency.

You can help. To keep UCOP's programs going, the sustainability group needs more volunteers. The group meets every six weeks, and those interested in joining or sharing sustainability ideas can contact andrew.coghlan@ucop.edu

UCOP employees wanting to donate office supplies to the program can contact linda.furtado@ucop.edu. The next event will be Aug. 1.

Donna Hemmila is editor of Our University.