Scrap Gallery schedules Butterfly Festival March 15 and Spring Fest/Earth Day in April; mayor to sign monarch pledge

The Scrap Gallery gave commissioners details of two upcoming environmental-education festivals: the fourth annual Butterfly Festival on Saturday, March 15, 2025, and a Spring Fest timed to coincide with Earth Day in April.

Karen Riley, introduced as executive director of the Scrap Gallery, said the Butterfly Festival will emphasize monarchs and include milkweed and wildflower seedling giveaways, a moth station, an environmental art contest with international student participation (students from the United States, Canada and Mexico), and a free-distribution book titled The Truth About Butterflies. Riley said the gallery has already grown about 400 seedling cells for distribution.

Riley noted recent counts showing western monarch butterfly numbers were "less than 10,000" and characterized that as a steep decline from historical counts: "It's about 95% down from 1980 totals," she said in the meeting. For Spring Fest — described also as an Earth Day event — Riley said organizers will hold a 6K early in the morning (to avoid heat), focus on pollinators with a bees art contest and host a Sunny Sands third-grade sustainability squad exhibit.

Riley said the Scrap Gallery will coordinate with schools to distribute flyers (subject to school-district approval for materials) and will mail community flyers a couple of weeks before each event plus a targeted neighborhood mailer about five days before an event. The gallery also noted a promotional electronic billboard on I‑10, sponsored by an Evening Rotary chapter, will run an ad for the festival.

Riley said the mayor will sign a National Wildlife Federation mayor's monarch pledge at the event; the gallery described the pledge as requiring cities to complete at least three actions from a menu of about 30, and said the city intends to meet multiple pledge actions. The gallery also said it will provide free books in coordination with the library and expects partners such as the library and local sponsors to participate.

Volunteering and logistics: Scrap Gallery staff said volunteers should arrive early to help set up (set-up begins around 8 a.m.; the Butterfly Festival programming begins later that morning). Organizers will coordinate with the city communications office to publicize dates and times; exact event agendas and the grand-opening timeline for other projects will be set by the city manager and communications staff.

The presentation was informational; no formal commission action was taken.