ECO SPEAKS CLE

Sustainability and the CAVS with Danielle Doza

• Guest: Danielle Doza • Episode 68

Share episode

Send us a text

In our first episode of 2025, we discuss sports and sustainability with Danielle Doza, the Cleveland Cavaliers' Vice President of Sustainability and Environmental Services. As the first executive-level professional in the NBA, Danielle shares how the CAVS organization integrates award-winning eco-friendly practices in fresh and exciting new ways and the collaborative spirit driving sustainability within sports organizations. 

Join us as Danielle speaks about her dream job and key initiatives at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse. These initiatives, including recycling, energy efficiency, education, and various partnerships with WM, Found Surface, and the Green Sports Alliance, drive sustainability in the sports industry. 

Finally, Danielle offers valuable career advice for aspiring sustainability professionals in our tip time. This episode is a must-listen for anyone eager to see sustainability thrive in sports.

Guest:
Danielle Doza, Vice President of Sustainability and Environmental Services with Cleveland Cavaliers (Rock Entertainment Group)

Learn More:
CAVS sustainability initiatives
Partnership with Waste Management (WM)
Green Sports Alliance
GOAL (Green Operations and Advanced Leadership)


 

Follow us:
https://www.facebook.com/ecospeakscle
https://www.instagram.com/ecospeakscle

Contact us:
hello@ecospeakscle.com


Diane Bickett:

You're listening to EcoSpeak CLE, a podcast for the eco curious in Northeast Ohio. My name is Diane Bickett and my producer is Greg Rotuno. Together, we speak with local sustainability leaders and invite you to connect, learn and live with our community and planet in mind. Hello friends, happy New Year. Did you make some resolutions this year? Are you sticking to them? Well, I gave up on dry January weeks ago, but I'm still resolved to staying positive this year by trying some new things, meeting new people and making time for friends and fun, and, of course, that means continuing to bring you this podcast, which is full of positivity, friends and fun.

Diane Bickett:

So here we are with our first episode of 2025. And we're here with my friend, danielle Doza, who is joining us. Danielle is a number one fan of the pod, that's right, which she says all the time when she can, and she is living her dream job as the Vice President of Sustainability and Environmental Services for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Please stay with us as Danielle shares all about her position, how she got it, the green initiative she's implementing, how sports teams are embracing sustainability and the broader impact this is having. Welcome, danielle, thanks for having me. I'm excited to chat today. Yeah, would you like to share any New Year resolutions.

Danielle Doza:

Ooh, that's tough. I don't do New Year's resolutions because it's hard, but what I like to do is a monthly challenge. So this month is trying not to buy anything unnecessary.

Danielle Doza:

Now, of course you got to buy groceries or things for the dogs. Some months I'm going to read a few pages of a book every day, or one month, it's okay. We're going to take a walk outside every single day. We did that one in January a few years ago, so that was definitely a challenge, but it's a little more manageable to do these monthly challenges.

Diane Bickett:

Yeah, it breaks it down. Manageable to do these monthly challenges. Yeah, it breaks it down. Those sound like some healthy resolutions.

Greg Rotuno:

So my other resolution which I didn't mention is to. I got to stop buying stuff off of like Instagram ads. It's such a waste of money, all right.

Diane Bickett:

So I understand that you are the first executive level sustainability professional in the NBA? Yes, that sounds really cool.

Danielle Doza:

Yes, it is really cool.

Diane Bickett:

And I think it's also some impressive leadership on the part of the Cavs organization. You've been there for a little over a year now. Congratulations.

Danielle Doza:

How did this position come about? Our organization joined this initiative called GOAL Green Operations and Advanced Leadership in the fall of 2022 as more of a commitment to sustainability and worked with the folks from GOAL to develop a full-time position. So the organization had been doing some small sustainability things, composting back of house. There was an internal sustainability committee, which we call the sustainability squad, and they wanted to bring someone in who had a professional background and expertise to develop and lead strategy throughout the organization and do something a bit bigger. So they made the decision to make a full-time position, intentionally made it at that senior level, which is really a testament to the investment of the organization into sustainability. That says yes, we want to invest in this, we want to lead on this, which is really exciting, and so it's. It's been a ton of fun for a little over a year, but that's how it came about and I was lucky enough to just get connected to the organization, apply, go through that process and get this, this amazing job.

Diane Bickett:

I mean I feel incredibly lucky to have this position and get to do what I do incredibly lucky to have this position and get to do what I do, yeah, and you've always kind of referred to it as your dream job, and I think all your experience has kind of led up to this too, because your background I mentioned. You have a law degree, but you were a corporate sustainability consultant. You worked in a nonprofit with Victoria Avery at Venture Forward Strategies. That wasn't, that's not nonprofit.

Danielle Doza:

No, no, no that was yeah, that was just a that was a small consulting firm.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, worked mostly with manufacturing consumer product companies on sustainability strategy and reporting, and it was a really valuable experience to have that and be able to bring that into this organization just to understand, okay, this is how other companies work and approach sustainability and bring some of those skills into this role in this organization, even though it's very different type of company, but a lot of it's the basics. You know, you've talked to a lot of sustainability professionals. Of course, when you think about you got a big building, you're going to create a lot of waste. You got to focus on that. You got to think about your materials, your energy, all that good stuff. So it was, yeah, very valuable. And I have a bit of a sports background, just one being a fan, played sports growing up, played rugby in college, I coached high school for five years. Sports growing up, played rugby in college, I coached high school for five years. So I've long been following the sports and sustainability space and it was just really lucky that this position was local my hometown, my hometown team.

Diane Bickett:

Yeah, love it, love it. Well, they were smart to hire you, and I also should mention that Danielle is our co-planner for our EcoMeet CLE events which we've been doing for the last few years, in which we got to get cracking on planning for the next one.

Danielle Doza:

One thing at a time. Stay tuned. One thing at a time.

Diane Bickett:

So what has been your focus at the CAVS organization since you started and what is your day-to-day like Day-to-day?

Danielle Doza:

is different.

Diane Bickett:

Different every day. Yeah.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, so it's always hard to explain, but I sit on the facility operations team so I heavily focus on the management of the facility when it comes to sustainability. So what we're doing is looking at all of the materials within the organization, right materials management. Everything that comes into our building has to leave our building. So how do we better understand what all of that is and how do we better manage all of those materials? By diverting more from landfill, you know, recycling, composting, just even reducing the amount of packaging coming in. But it is quite a bit, you know.

Danielle Doza:

When you think of a sports organization like ours, it's all kinds of food and beverage products. We have, of course, office products. We have over 500 full-time team members who work at the arena. Our offices are there. So that procurement, supply chain side of things, we have a whole retail team. All of our retail is in-house, which is, I guess, not the norm within a lot of other sports organizations. So everything we do is in-house. Our retail team is incredible. That's also a lot of packaging coming in. So we think about that. So we are in the process of just trying to evaluate all that. And, okay, how might we talk with suppliers to reduce the amount of packaging coming in. Yeah, and you see that with a lot of other companies. Yeah, you know how do you just reduce that material. So that's a big part of it.

Danielle Doza:

I work closely with the housekeeping team on the waste management side of things, you know, trying to reduce waste to landfill. We will be building out more of an education program, especially around waste internally. And then energy is, of course, a big one. Right, we have a large building. We use a lot of energy, so how do we think about our energy usage more? Invest in some conservation and efficiency? We did do an energy audit over last summer and that gave us an idea of how we can invest in some more efficiency measures. But it's tough in the sports industry when you think of energy.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, the Cavs game and all the flashing lights, Exactly yeah yeah, right, you know we're there to put on a show the fire shooting, the fire shooting. Yeah, yeah, right, you know we're there to put on a show the fire shooting, the fire shooting. Yeah. And every time that goes off I'm like oh, it's our. You know, propane scope one emissions.

Greg Rotuno:

But you need to offset those somehow. The good news is that it's all inside.

Danielle Doza:

So it's yeah, we want to put on a good show and also we want to make people comfortable, right? You want a comfortable temperature and when you have 20,000 people in the building, that can be tough to do, so it's just the nature of the business, if you will. So you know how do we do that better. And our building is 30 years old. Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse celebrates 30 years this season. Years old Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse celebrates 30 years this season. So we have to work with an older building that maybe wasn't designed with efficiency in mind.

Danielle Doza:

There were absolutely efficiency upgrades with the transformation in 2019, with HVAC systems and all that stuff. Our ice plant was upgraded, so we do have the Cleveland Monsters hockey team that plays there. That ice lives there all season long. It is just underneath the basketball court. Before, the ice plant was just essentially one giant unit. It was either on or off, so you had to keep it on for the ice. Now it's six smaller units and it uses CO2. So it's a much safer unit as well. So we can have as many as six on if we need them, or as few as one unit on to maintain the ice, so it's much more efficient that way. So, yeah, energy is just a big one.

Danielle Doza:

Any plans for renewables? Not quite yet. I'm not quite there. So we, what you know, what we are going to do is look at energy more holistically over time. But we are working on those plans and I hope to share more in the near future. But you know we're going to consider every option. Yeah, we're going to consider every option that's going to be best for us and you know I'll jump ahead, I guess. And a lot of people ask why don't you put solar panels on the roof? Well, the roof is curved.

Danielle Doza:

So it is not a it's, not it's just not a great roof to put a bunch of solar panels on top of. So that's one tough part. It would be prohibitively expensive to do something like that.

Diane Bickett:

But there are other options that we're absolutely going to consider in the future. Maybe you can tap into the county's microgrid somehow.

Greg Rotuno:

I was going to say you could turn Evan Mobley and Jared Allen into windmills.

Danielle Doza:

Right, we absolutely should. I don't know Greg's here for the sports references in this episode, because I know nothing. I don't even know who those people are. I like your idea better.

Diane Bickett:

So your job kind of you cross-populate or pollinate between the venue itself, which is owned by Gateway right, and which is owned by Gateway right, but then your ultimate employer it's the Cavs, but it's the you mentioned it earlier.

Danielle Doza:

So Rock Entertainment.

Diane Bickett:

Group Rock Entertainment Group. Okay, explain that whole structure.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, yes, the building is owned by Gateway, which is essentially an entity of Cuyahoga County in the city of Cleveland. We are the only tenant of that building, so we do all of the operations, maintenance, everything within that building is our organization. I see, yes, so we're the only people in there. We do everything. It's all our organization, but our, you know, rock Entertainment Group is the overall entertainment side of things. We host a lot of concerts, corporate events, any other type of event there. Of course, we've got basketball and hockey, and then our like I mentioned, our offices are there as well. So all of that happens within the arena and that's all under our purview as one organization.

Diane Bickett:

Okay, Thanks for explaining that it's not just the basketball team that you work for. So you've recently gotten some recognition by that organization that you mentioned earlier called GOAL, which is Green Operations and Advanced Leadership. So the CAVS and the Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse sustainability efforts have been nationally recognized. I understand you've gotten eight GOAL medals for your efforts in waste reduction, health and wellness, diversity and inclusion, esg strategy and commitment and sustainable partnerships.

Danielle Doza:

Yes, which one of?

Diane Bickett:

those do you want to talk about?

Danielle Doza:

I will say, all of those medals just speak to the work of our whole organization and the culture and values ingrained in our organization. So you know the health and wellness side of things. We have someone on staff who's dedicated just to the wellness of our team members, so we really focus on that side of things. You know, our social impact and equity team, I think, has 12 team members on it, which is one of the biggest social impact teams within the league, and we've been doing social impact community work for years and have developed really deep relationships with organizations throughout the community. So sustainability was a natural extension of all of that work. You know, like I think I mentioned, composting was started a few years ago, before I even got there right, so we were able to speak to that work.

Diane Bickett:

And the local food purchasing through your food vendor goes way back too.

Danielle Doza:

Exactly so. A lot of this work was being done. There was sustainability there. Right now we're just going to expand that and develop more of a comprehensive strategy, which is in the works right now. So just a big shout out to our whole team for all of the work they do every day, and we're certainly going to apply for more medals, so hopefully I can come back next year we talk about more recognition.

Diane Bickett:

Okay, good, you mentioned your team members. Are you drawing from the facilities team? Are you drawing from the management? You know a good green team has everybody. Are any of your players involved with some of your initiatives?

Danielle Doza:

The players, not on the athletic side of things at this time. However, our sustainability squad is about 20 team members from across the company squad is about 20 team members from across the company and anywhere from you know, housekeeping, procurement, social impact, communications, our partnerships team, so it's people can come together and they provide some input on whether it's our strategy ideas or volunteer ideas, or they're also those champions that you know take sustainability back to their team and work on integrating sustainability throughout them. But our co-chair of the sustainability squad is our senior director of procurement services. So I work closely with our procurement team as well, which is really exciting, because that's a huge part of sustainability, you know, is your vendors, your suppliers looking at that. So it's nice to see folks engaged, you know.

Danielle Doza:

And then every time we bring on new team members, they go through an orientation and they hear about sustainability. So if someone's coming in new to the organization, they have the opportunity to hear about sustainability or get involved. But, as I mentioned, there's, you know, team members across our organization working on it in some way, because I have the you know, the fun job of getting to work with all these other teams within our organization. So it's just, it's pretty cool just to see people really lean in and be engaged. And you know, I get messages all the time about, hey, I've got this idea, or you know this potential partner, or hey, is there a recycling outlet for this? So people, you know more and more people are really starting to think about it, which is pretty cool.

Diane Bickett:

Yeah, and knowing you, I'm sure I mean you're very approachable and you're inspiring, so I'm sure everyone loves to help contribute to the effort. Yes, let's talk a little bit about some of your partnerships that are new this year.

Danielle Doza:

Yes, we are really working on aligning more partnerships with sustainability, and when I say partnerships, I mean a corporate partner. You know, when you come to a game you're going to see marketing all around. It's some company's logo, whether it's on the Humongotron or Sideboards.

Diane Bickett:

Is that what you call it, the Humongotron?

Danielle Doza:

Yes, it's called the Humongotron.

Greg Rotuno:

Have you been there?

Diane Bickett:

I have. Danielle invited me last year to go to the Monsters game when it was Sustainability Night. It was my first and only hockey game. It was my first and only hockey game. It was fun. We'll get you back out.

Greg Rotuno:

Yeah, gotta get to a Cavs game.

Danielle Doza:

Oh yeah, yeah yeah, we'll get you to a Cavs game. Yes, you can see that large humongotron. Um so, uh, where was I going?

Diane Bickett:

with this.

Danielle Doza:

I'm sorry I didn't know, oh, so a big partnership we entered into this year is with WM, the waste management yep waste management, the, the waste hauling company. So they became our waste hauling provider, right, so they come to the field house, pick up our dumpsters, haul them away. They are also a sustainability advisor, as you know, in addition to to some marketing and stuff. So we work closely with their sustainability advisory team. Wm has essentially a consulting arm for sustainability and they have a sports-specific section.

Danielle Doza:

So we meet at least every other week with their sustainability advisory team to work on, you know, reducing waste to landfill, how do we develop better standard operating procedures? How do we develop better education and training materials for our team members? You know, eventually we'll build out more around fan education. So they work hand in hand with us. They answer lots of questions, they're helping us better track our data around waste, so they're just a really awesome resource for that. And, you know, we I don't think could ask for a better sustainability partner with that, as far as, hey, they really want to invest in us and help us, you know, reduce our waste into landfill and better manage all that, better understand our materials, like I mentioned.

Diane Bickett:

Yeah, and that's not easy to do because with any, how many people will go to one Cavs game, Like how many?

Danielle Doza:

thousands. You know it is up to 19,000 or more at, you know, say, a playoff game or something, but we have about 20,000 plus people in the building for a game. So imagine the waste created right Just from that. And it's people buying food and beverage, people buying stuff at, maybe at the retail shop Sometimes we might have a giveaway. So we know waste is going to be created. So, again, how do we do that more responsibly is something we're still working on and figuring out, but every day we're taking a step there.

Danielle Doza:

We work closely with our food and beverage partner, aramark, again, to think about all of those food and beverage materials, think about that sourcing. So it takes time. That sourcing, so it takes time. And then you know when you, when you want help. We want people, of course, to help us sort the waste and recycle right. But how do we do that? And it's hard to do because people are there to watch a basketball game or a hockey game. They're not there to think about recycling or sustainability. You know, unless it's me and you or Greg at a game.

Danielle Doza:

We might be thinking about it, but most people aren't. And at the end of a game, people are rushing to get out of there, maybe, and they just want to, you know, throw their stuff away, which I totally understand, yeah Right. So it is hard to.

Diane Bickett:

Especially when they lose.

Danielle Doza:

they just want to, which we don't do too often, right?

Greg Rotuno:

Thankfully finally.

Diane Bickett:

Well, I think you have in terms of kind of engagement for the fans. You have a unique opportunity because you're reaching people who are not part of the choir you're. I mean, this is the general public, general public and this is a great exposure opportunity to expose them to proper recycling. I know when you have your sustainability nights, you are talking about what efforts are going on there and how to properly recycle, and I think waste management is also trying to make it fun because they have the upcycled couch seat of the game.

Danielle Doza:

I'll explain what that is yeah, yeah, the dumpster couch.

Diane Bickett:

I want to sit on the dumpster couch if I come to the game. I explain what that is yeah, yeah, the the dumpster couch. It's a. I want to sit on the dumpster couch if I come to the game.

Greg Rotuno:

That's basically what they call brown stadium. Oh, no comment, that's the dumpster fire oh, I'm sorry, hey, yes we do, you know we feature.

Danielle Doza:

We get to upgrade a, a member of the game who gets to sit there, and they get some other perks from that. They get featured on the Humongotron. So that was a. It's a fun perk and when we've got WM folks on site, they love to go up and see that as well. So it's right, it's a fun way to engage people.

Danielle Doza:

Wm also came on site and did an activation on the concourse where they had two garbage cans with little basketball hoops on them and kids would come up. They had to answer recycling questions and if they got it right, they got to shoot the basket and if they won or if they made it, they got a prize. So trying to think about how you engage people in fun ways, you know. So we're going to be testing out more of that. Or, or you know, try just trying to recognize people for doing the right thing. And we recently had a sustainability night for the monsters and we did some sustainability trivia Right, so it's a fun way. So you know, as a mom and a daughter who got to stand there on the Humongotron and answer some fun trivia, that we a lot of it. We did about Lake Erie. I did a brief interview just to talk about our sustainability initiative, so trying to capture attention that way.

Diane Bickett:

How did they do?

Danielle Doza:

They did, they did pretty well it was you know we tried to make it not too hard and then we had a recycling shootout. So two fans shot aluminum cans into a recycling, can you know, just as a way to okay, you know people can think about that a little more. Okay, oh yeah, it's aluminum, can of course you recycle it? So you know a recycle shootout is just again another touch point for folks. Yeah, so hopefully they'll carry that off the court, exactly, yeah exactly yeah, and hopefully they'll carry that off the court and back home.

Danielle Doza:

Exactly, yeah, exactly.

Diane Bickett:

And your other partnership with an organization called Found Surface, which is Aiden Meany is a local clothing manufacturing company.

Danielle Doza:

Tell us more about that. Yes, this is cool, so you know. Bringing it back to EcoMeet, Sally, we held one of our EcoMeets about clothing, right?

Diane Bickett:

Building a circular textile economy. Yeah, yeah.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, so the textile economy, and he was on that and you know we connected there and a while later I started working at the Cavs and just kept in touch and eventually we connected with our retail team and said, hey, you know to our retail team, if you're interested, check this out. They immediately jumped on board, thought it was cool. We went to visit their site, their manufacturing site in Cleveland. So our retail team was really excited about this. So we launched a fully traceable sweatshirt and T-shirt as part of our city edition collection. So it's a collaboration with us. Found surface in the cleveland museum of art and the organic cotton was grown in texas, it was milled in and died in pennsylvania and then manufactured right here in Cleveland Ohio. So it's sustainable. It supports the local economy. All of these scraps from that manufacturing process were composted with Rust Belt Riders, which is really cool.

Danielle Doza:

And then I found out as well that Found Surface hires about 80% of their employees are from Kent State, which has its design school, so it's a lot of keeping talent local. So it was really exciting to do that. I have not found another team that has launched a traceable item, at least in the United States. I'm not going to say we're the first, but I'm still looking to see if anyone else has done it, but I think it's really cool, or at least traceable with natural materials.

Diane Bickett:

Aiden's been working on this for a number of years, going back to the pandemic in Syracuse when he was in college, and he's come a long way. He now has a plant and he's doing. What is the term for printing? Oh, like screen printing, 3d printing of the clothing. Oh, right, right, right. So, he's got quite a vision for bringing back clothing manufacturing in Cleveland in a really sustainable way, so excited to have him on the show.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, yeah, and it was great to work with him.

Diane Bickett:

Yeah, yeah Cool. So we can find that in the team shop or online.

Danielle Doza:

You can't find it online, unfortunately but you can find it on our team shop at Center Court at the Arena or you can find it at the shop at the Cleveland Museum of Art. They are selling it as well, which is pretty cool, well done. Museum of.

Diane Bickett:

Art. They are selling it as well, which is pretty cool. Well done, very exciting. Let's talk about sports and sustainability overall now, because we have a couple other sports teams in Cleveland. Back in the day I used to work with the manager of Progressive Field with their sustainability efforts and Brown Stadium like the first grind to energy, where they were taking the food scraps and putting them into a large grinder and that food waste was then taken to Quasar and that was like a waste to energy biodigester in Collinwood.

Diane Bickett:

So I know the other sports teams are involved. I won't ask you what the current status is or anything but overall I've read that there's various organizations that are kind of assembling around this. There's the Green Sports Alliance, there's this Play to Zero recognition platform, there is Green Sports Day. Are you guys involved with all of those? Can you talk a little bit about those?

Danielle Doza:

We are members of the Green Sports Alliance and Great Cleveland Connection. The board president, eileen McManaman, is a Clevelander, so she grew up in the neighborhood where I live, which is pretty cool. Yeah, she lives in Vancouver now and her company, 5t Sports Group, works with organizations on aligning sustainability and partnerships. So you know, big shout out to Eileen. So great Cleveland connection there. She still has season tickets to the Guardians and comes back to Cleveland quite a bit, really. Yeah.

Danielle Doza:

But Green Sports Alliance is a membership group of professional sports organizations, collegiate sports venues and service providers so they can connect their members with potential service providers. They do an annual summit that focuses all on sports and sustainability. They have webinars throughout the year that talks about specific areas of sustainability within sports. They do a reuse symposium every year Well, I guess the past two years. They'll have another one this year about reusables and they also put out these playbooks. So they have a handful on their website now and they're all free to download about implementing sustainability within sports, whether it is collegiate sports, even grassroots sports, or professional sports, whether it is collegiate sports, even grassroots sports, or professional sports, and they focus on waste, for example, or water, or food and beverage, and I know they're working on a couple more. I think they came out with an energy one recently. They just put out a couple more, so it's a great resource if people are interested in sports and sustainability. If you're not already following the Green Sports Alliance, you should follow them on social media. Go check out that website. Attend a webinar if you can.

Danielle Doza:

There's also an organization out of the UK called Sport Positive, which is great. They do an annual summit as well, but it's over in London so it's, you know, not as easy to get to. However, they put out a lot of information and coverage around sports organizations, mostly a lot of professional but even down to grassroots information about sustainability and sports. They have a great newsletter you can sign up to. They also do a podcast and put out some episodes with interviews around sports and sustainability. That's not membership-based, that's just more of an informational or information-gathering type of organization. There's an organization now called EcoSportsPro I believe yeah, eco Sports Pro and that organization also does some webinars. They have some educational opportunities for people trying to maybe break into sports and sustainability and they do a lot of job postings. That one is based in Europe, but they post jobs for a lot of European and North American organizations. So if you're maybe looking for a job in this area, follow them on LinkedIn or go to that website, and so that's a great organization and you're starting to see more pop up.

Diane Bickett:

So, with having all these sports organizations that are so high profile? How is that helping to amplify sustainability issues and general public awareness of climate change and other issues?

Danielle Doza:

The benefit of a sports organization is we have a really big microphone so we can reach a lot of people, right? You know whether it's thousands of people coming to a game, or you know folks following us on social media. The Cavs have the fifth largest social media following of any professional sports organization in North America, which is pretty cool. So that's, you know that's a lot. Anytime we put out some sort of social media posts, you know however many people see that. So that's the power of sport, right? And when you think about sport, most people in the world are connected to sport in some way, whether that's a grassroots club they might play with or it's rooting on their favorite team part of cultures all over the world. So people listen to their favorite sports team. They trust that brand. Right, we are a trusted brand by a lot of people. So if we say something, people know they can trust what we're doing or what we're saying, right? So that's a really big benefit. And you know, as much as I love a good manufacturing company and they're doing great work.

Danielle Doza:

You know they probably don't have the reach.

Diane Bickett:

Yeah, you have a bigger microphone, and when the Cavs win the championship this year, we'll have an even bigger microphone. That's exactly right.

Danielle Doza:

That's exactly right. So that's just the really cool, unique thing about sports. Or even the music industry, for example. You know you see big musical artists everywhere focused on sustainability in some way and their fans are going to listen and follow that, which is really cool. So you're starting to see much more of a growth, of a focus on sustainability within sports.

Danielle Doza:

You know the NBA, for example, has the NBA Green Initiative. It's their sustainability initiative that's been around for about 15 years, and we also have a sustainability working group within the MBA. So we meet regularly and we can chat with our counterparts at other teams. We can tap into the resources at the MBA, which is really awesome. So you're awesome. So at the league level, they are focused on that as well and we can really engage with them. So it's just a really cool ecosystem. And with sports, too, we're a competitive bunch. Of course, there's a lot of competition in certain areas, but when it comes to sustainability, it is very collaborative, right? We all know that we're only going to get better if we do things together. We share resources, we share these best practices, so it's just a really fun space to work in.

Diane Bickett:

Yeah, so you really, it is really your dream job, you do have a dream job. And they say you know, if you do something you love, you never work a day in your life. So, on that note, I think we should just wind up with our tip time maybe with some career advice, for I know you hosted a workshop or a meeting with college sustainability professionals a couple months ago. I think I read that on LinkedIn. Yes, what advice are you giving people who want to take your job or just work in general?

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, we did a college sustainability event, which was awesome. It was 250 students and faculty and staff who came to Rock and Roll Fieldhouse From Northeast Ohio schools.

Danielle Doza:

From Northeast Ohio, western Pennsylvania, I think. We had a couple Columbus schools. They came up. For a lot of them it was their first time at the arena, their first time at a Cavs game and they came to hear about sustainability. So we did a panel discussion with myself, emily Keller, who's the Director of Sustainability for Greater Cleveland Partnership, and then Sandy Reed, who is an Executive Vice President with Davie Tree Company, who is an executive vice president with Davie Tree Company, who is a incredible partner of ours. Davie sponsors our Trees for Threes program. So for every three-point shot made during the season, we have a tree planted in northeast Ohio and that partnership is just incredible.

Danielle Doza:

So students got to hear about you know their, their jobs, you know what they do, what we're doing at the field house, so that's just a really cool event. People are already asking when we're going to do that again. But if you are thinking about this, you know I mentioned the EcoSports organization to follow them. Try to connect with a local network. You know. Come to an EcoMeet CLE event. The network is super powerful, right? Just think about the benefits of the network.

Danielle Doza:

Attend some webinars A lot of webinars for Green Sports Alliance or other organizations are free to attend. Start reading about it and maybe you're a college athlete and you're listening to this. You can engage with your own organization or you know your own school. I did a presentation to students from the MAC, the Mid-American Conference, earlier this season to talk about sustainability because the students wanted to hear about it, which is really cool. So just trying to engage, whether it's your team or your sports organization at college. There's an organization called EcoAthletes that athletes can join, whether you're a collegiate athlete or up to a professional or an Olympic athlete, and you can essentially claim that you are committed to sustainability in some way and join that organization and then follow along. Just, you know, follow people on LinkedIn. You know, read some coverage because it very much is a growing area. I think we're going to start to see more professional organizations around the world starting to hire more sustainability-focused positions.

Diane Bickett:

Very exciting. I'm so happy to hear that all this is taking place and it's just kind of growing and yeah, it's a good, positive way to start the year.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, and I you know I love talking about it. I've been on some other, whether it's podcasts or webinars, for you know you've been on a lot of podcasts. Every time I turn around, so you know, some are US based.

Danielle Doza:

What I'll say. Some are US based, some are European based, but I get to share about what we're doing in Cleveland. You know, not just with the Cavs, but all these cool things we're doing in Cleveland, right? You know we have a really incredible sustainability community within Cleveland, because people ask me well, you know, how do you get connected to resources? How do you figure this out? I'm like I know a lot of people in the city. I came in with the benefit of having this incredible network that I can reach out to for resources to help make things happen, which is just the coolest thing. So Cleveland's got it going on.

Diane Bickett:

Thank you so much for being an ambassador for Cleveland and sustainability. Greg, do you have any other questions?

Greg Rotuno:

I should say you've confirmed my suspicion that the Cavs are the best run organization in the city by a very large margin. Thank you.

Danielle Doza:

Yeah, thanks for having me on. It's been really exciting. I hope people follow along. So we're going to continue to build. There's still so much to do and we'll have more to share in the future. Yeah, you'll never run out of things to do no Congratulations.

Diane Bickett:

Thank you, happy 2025.

Danielle Doza:

Yes, go Cavs, go Cavs.

Greg Rotuno:

We hope you've enjoyed this episode of EcoSpeak CLE. You can find our full catalog of episodes on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes are available the first and third Tuesday of each month. Please follow EcoSpeak CLE on Facebook and Instagram and become part of the conversation. If you would like to send us feedback and suggestions, or if you'd like to become a sponsor of EcoSpeak CLE, you can email us at hello at ecospeakclecom. Stay tuned for more important and inspiring stories to come.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Diane Bickett

Host
Head Shot

Greg Rotuno

Co-host