SANDPOINT — Environmental consciousness is all the rage both locally and nationally, and one of the area’s preeminent organizations is hoping it can become a leader in the growing “green movement.”

The Festival at Sandpoint has always employed environmentally-friendly practices, but this year organizers are taking it one step further by introducing a number of new policies aimed at using the least amount of resources possible.

Festival worker Ellen Weissman is leading the green charge, and has spent months working with members of the Sandpoint Transition Initiative, as well as city and county officials, to make the Festival an environmental trendsetter.

Weissman has embraced the spirit and ideas of the Festival’s original environmental planner, the late Barbara Veraniam, but has expanded the realm of what the Festival can actually accomplish in the areas of recycling and reusing.

In addition to the standard aluminum recycling it has used for years, the Festival now offers glass and plastic recycling and is phasing in a compost program that will soon require all of the venders to serve food and drinks on compostable plates.

A portion of the vendors have already agreed to the compost idea, and when the Festival is over, Weissman and others will drive the compostable materials to a Cocolalla farm to be reused.

Weissman said the Festival’s visibility and importance to the community can help educate others about environmental issues.

“It’s just the beginning, but it’s setting in motion the mindset that the Festival is a green festival and that, hopefully, other festivals like POAC and Lost in the ’50s and other events that generate large amounts of people and large amounts of trash will follow suit,” Weissman said.

For organizers, the Festival’s environmental transformation is less about the finite number of bottles and cans that will be recycled during the two-week event, and more about showing individuals and organizations how easy and efficient it is to be green.

“We want people to think about what they’re doing with the trash they create,” Festival at Sandpoint Executive Director Dyno Wahl said.

“And not just at the Festival, but in their own workplace and home.”

Despite their recent efforts, both Wahl and Weissman know there is more to be done before the Festival at Sandpoint reaches its ultimate goal of complete environmental efficiency.

“We realize that as we’re taking these first steps, we’re kind of opening up ourselves to criticism because there’s always room for improvement,” Wahl said.

“That’s why we’re saying we’re not green yet, but we’re going green. It’s a process, but we want to end up as a totally green festival.”

By 2011, Wahl said all of the Festival at Sandpoint’s vendors will use compostable dinnerware.