About Us

Mission Statement

The purpose of Do It Green! Minnesota (formerly The Twin Cities Green Guide) is to educate Minnesotans about green and sustainable living and promote building healthy, local communities through:

• The printed guidebook Do It Green! Magazine and web site www.doitgreen.org
• Community workshops and skillshares
• Creating a model eco home for educational tours

Do It Green! Minnesota will ensure that people of all incomes will have access to our publication and activities, and we will serve as a model for other cities and states nation-wide.

Our Organization

Do It Green! Minnesota consists of a core Do It Green Team and over 100 volunteers. Other organizational activities include e-newsletter, skillshares, workshops, information tabling, and working toward a model eco home.

Publication Manifesto

During the entire production of Do It Green! Magazine, the Do It Green! Team made every decision based upon what is best for the environment. Many of us bike, bus or walk for transportation, we use backsides of paper, reclaimed materials and email correspondence as much as possible. The publication itself is printed with soy ink on 100% post-consumer paper from an ethical company that offers only recycled papers. We chose an ecologically-minded Great Printer and used digital imaging that allowed us to electronically send our file directly to the printing press. In addition, the binding is made with non-toxic, water-based glues. Last but not least, the design of the pages and size of the guidebook ensured the least amount of paper waste possible.

Design Manifesto

The main goal of the Do It Green! Minnesota is to promote sustainability. A large part of that goal includes supporting local, small “industries.” These industries are not merely businesses but are often individuals supporting themselves and preserving their autonomy. The resulting attitude is a D.I.Y. (do-it-yourself) mind-set, breaking the cycle of dependence on corporations, technology and governmental policies.

Do It Green! Minnesota walks a fine line between these two worlds; in many ways we are selling a product – a product of thoughts and ideas. We have the frustrating task of competing with mainstream, commercialized culture and media. As a result, the overall design of the Do It Green! Magazine will portray a genuine interest in the hand-made instead of the computer-generated/technology-driven design. Whenever possible, the publication will include hand drawn lettering, illustrations, and diagrams. This often means accepting imperfections (or better yet, relishing them) and reassessing how society views “good design.” Overall, we expect the design of the Do It Green! Magazine to reflect the idea that art and design are not tools to sell and make money but expressive instruments inherent in the human species.

Authors of Articles in the Database

There are over 100 different authors’ voices in the articles in this online database. Many of the articles were written for Do It Green! Magazine and others were reprinted from other publications or web sites. Most of the authors are Minnesotans who wanted to share the information they feel is important for you to know. Their names are listed with the article(s) they wrote and can also be found in the table of contents.

Green Guide Team

The Do It Green! Team donates 100% of their time to our organizational activities on top of holding other full-time jobs or attending school.

Do It Green! Team

• Ami Voeltz - Executive Director/Programs Director
• Sara Grochowski - Do It Green! Magazine Co-Editor
• Heidi Meyer - Office Assistant/Green Gifts Fair Coordinator
• Moira - Resource Center/Workshop Coordinator
• Katy Boyle - Workshop Assistant
• Jessica Houlihan – Events Assistant
• Todd Fink - Eco Haus Coordinator
• Emily Darnell - Graphic Design
• Cara Engelstad - Distribution Coordinator
• Amber Schmidt - Bike Distributor

• Mark Snyder – Board Treasurer
• Ellen Telander – Board Member
• Andy Schakel - Board member

Green Beginnings…

Ami Voeltzs’ interest in environmental issues and sustainability first began in 1998 when she lived in Japan and saw all the packaging waste, bags of perfectly good clothes and electronics behind buildings because of a lack of reuse stores or donation opportunities in Tokyo and finding out that there is actually a ‘garbage island’ where trash in the city is sent to! Her passion has always lied in animal rights and seeing this waste in Japan brought opened her eyes to the connection to taking care of all life. When she returned to Minnesota, she was motivated to lessen her environmental impact. Through research, she began to collect the vast amounts of green living information and the ball kept growing involving the community in creating a 501(c)3 non-profit organization called The Twin Cities Green Guide. A group of dedicated community members worked for a year to create the very first Guide to Living Green and Sustainable in Minnesota published in 2000. Since then the Twin Cities Green Guide has expanded our work and renamed ourselves to Do It Green! Minnesota.