This week on Sustainability Now!, your host, Justin Mog, rips out his lawn for an exciting conversation with Becca Trueman, a local advocate for native plants who is engaged with Kentucky Watershed Watch and Wild Ones Louisville. She serves on the board of the Kentucky Conservation Committee and is a former supervisor for the Jefferson County Soil and Water Conservation District. She was a presenter at the October 17, 2025 Ohio River Confluence on the topic of “Planting for Change: Native Plants as a Catalyst for Restoration, Community, and Advocacy” (you can see her slides at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1reRX3EWIgie2k0AXBueCj3JbhUEQSRoJ/view?usp=sharing).

Listen in as we discuss how native plants help connect people, nature, and community. Cultivating native plants is an easy way to make a difference at home and small gardens and local efforts inspire learning and connection. We dive into the role that programs and partnerships play in making it easier for people to get involved; how community, education, policy, and business all work together; and why supportive city and county rules matter for native landscapes. But we also dive into larger scale change such as how restoration and native plants can grow local economies; how small efforts add up to massive collective impact; and how the same ideas that guide big restoration projects also work in our own backyards.

Becca shares these resources:
Kentucky Conservation Committee: https://kyconservation.org/
Kentucky Native Plant Society: https://www.knps.org/
Kentucky Invasive Plant Council: https://www.se-eppc.org/ky/
Kentucky Watershed Watch: https://www.kywater.org/
Kentucky Master Naturalist Volunteer Program: https://naturalist.mgcafe.uky.edu/
Wild Ones Louisville: https://louisville.wildones.org/
Jefferson County Soil and Water Conservation District: https://www.jeffcd.org/
Growing Natives KY-IN Swap Hub: https://www.facebook.com/groups/growingnatives

As always, our feature is followed by your community action calendar for the week, so get your calendars out and get ready to take action for sustainability NOW!

Sustainability Now! is hosted by Dr. Justin Mog and airs on Forward Radio, 106.5fm, WFMP-LP Louisville, every Monday at 6pm and repeats Tuesdays at 12am and 10am. Find us at https://forwardradio.org

The music in this podcast is courtesy of the local band Appalatin and is used by permission. Explore their delightful music at https://appalatin.com

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