LOCAL COMPANY EXAMPLES
LARGE COMPANY EXAMPLES
CITY SUSTAINABILITY EFFORTS TO SAVE MONEY
Develop a concise Ashland City and Community Sustainability Action Plan.
TASKS
1. Create a baseline inventory of the Comprehensive Plan and select city services as well as plans and practices that relate to them.
2. Identify what the city of Ashland is currently doing to conserve environmental, social, and economical resources. Include current sustainability practices in Ashland, and the partially completed City of Ashland/Southern Oregon University Greenhouse Gas inventory.
3. Using the baseline as a point of reference, identify gaps (e.g. food security, climate change implications, and waste reduction).
4. Prioritize the order in which the comprehensive plan chapters, city services, associated plans and practices, and gaps will be addressed, and develop concise sustainability action items associated with each.
5. For each action item, develop sustainability performance measure(s), recommended timeframes to implement, and estimated impacts (environmental/social/economic) for each sustainability action item.
6. Present to City Council for Approval.
MEANS TO IMPLEMENT
A City appointed citizen ad-hoc committee or task force, with limited duration, that is comprised of members of interested commissions and established committees. This ad-hoc committee will provide recommendations to the City Council with minimal City Staff work and maximum citizen work. The amount of City Staff work will be at the discretion of the City Administrator.
WHO WE ARE
In alignment with Goal #1 of the 2010-2011 Ashland Conservation Commission, a “Sustainability Planning*” team was commissioned. This team is comprised of committee members and citizens who conducted extensive research and analyzed nine Oregon cities that are implementing sustainability plans. Examples of these findings, the team’s assessment, and other reference materials are available as a link on the Conservation Commission Goals page, under Goal 1: Page.asp?NavID=13602 .
* The Conservation Commission July 28, 2010 letter to the Mayor and City Council defined sustainability as "Meeting the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs; including protecting the environment, developing a healthy economy, and ensuring social equality" (follows 1987 UN WECD definition of sustainability).
Report of Sustainability Planning Team
December 30, 2010
BACKGROUND
Within the state of Oregon ten or more cities have initiated Sustainability planning efforts. Each city is approaching sustainability planning in a unique manner. Portland and Eugene city governments are driving their city-wide sustainability planning efforts. Corvallis is approaching city-wide sustainability planning with a citizen/partnership driven, city supported process. McMinnville and Lake Oswego are focusing their sustainability planning efforts on internal sustainability operations. Other Oregon cities are undertaking sustainability planning efforts to varying other degrees, each with varying degrees of success. Each Oregon City, with the exception of Eugene, began their efforts prior to the 2008/2009 economic downturn.
Beginning in 1981, various Ashland entities have pursued environmental and/or sustainability planning proposals .
· 1981 - The Comprehensive Plan (with select revisions) incorporated environmental concerns that the previous General Plans did not, but did not address sustainability concerns directly.
· 1990 - The City Council adopted the Valdez Principles of conducting the public's business as responsible stewards of the environment , and that the City must not compromise the ability of future generations to sustain their needs.”
· 2006 - The 20/20 Vision: Ashland Sustainability Master Plan was put forward to the City Council, and although pertinent, did not gain necessary traction for Council approval.
· 2008 - The Planning Commission created a Sustainability subcommittee assigned to take citizen input and make recommendations. Rejected by City staff as conflicting with imminent visioning process.
· 2009 - The Ashland Planning Commission co-sponsored the completion of a Sustainability Inventory of businesses that purport to engage in sustainable practices.
· 2009 - The Conservation Commission created a Sustainability sub-committee tied to 2009 Commission goals. This goal was renewed in 2010 with the task of preparing and presenting recommendations for sustainability planning to the City Council.
· 2009 - The Conservation Commission adopted a proposal to modify proposed 2010-2011 Council goals to include the wording: “Ensure that the City has a staff person whose job description it is to follow through on sustainability goals”. The City Council did not incorporate this proposed modification into their goals.
· 2009 - The City Council approved the 2010-2011 Goals which included sustainability as a centerpiece to the goals.
· 2010 - Mayor Stromberg put forward a Sustainability Proposal for City grant money to be allocated to Sustainability related projects. This proposal was
· 2010 - The Conservation Commission proposed that the City Council approve an Ad Hoc Committee of City Commission representatives and a City liaison to develop a recommended planning process, methods and tools for the City to implement a Sustainability Plan. Due to the severe constraints on City personnel, this proposal was not brought before the City Council for consideration.
· Current - The Conservation Commission convened a Sustainability Planning study team that researched and analyzed Oregon cities that are currently undertaking sustainability planning. On December 30th, the Conservation Commission approved and is recommending to City Council a 2012-2013 Goal, related tasks, and means to implement sustainability planning within the City of Ashland.
SUSTAINABILITY TEAM MAKEUP
· Caia Cupito (Citizen at large)
· Jim McGinnis (Chair - Conservation Comm.)
· Larry Blake (SOU, Planning Comm.)
· Megan Janssen (Citizen at large)
· Melanie Mindlin (Planning Comm.)
· Shelly Lotz (Vice Chair – Conservation Comm.)
· Sheri Safreno (Conservation Comm.)
· Stuart Corns (Conservation Comm.)
· Tom Beam (Conservation Comm.)
· Tracy Egan (Citizen at large)
MEETING DATES
· #1 – November 4, 2010
· #2 – November 16, 2010
· #3 – December 9, 2010
· #4 – December 16, 2010
TEAM GUIDELINES
· Keep it simple
· Back findings up with substantive research of Oregon cities sustainability planning efforts.
· Consider that the City budget is in decline.
· Consider that City personnel are very tapped-out.
· Understand that the City believes that we are operating in a sustainable manner: how does Ashland stack up within Oregon?
CITIES RESEARCHED
· Bend
· Corvallis
· Eugene
· Gresham
· Lake Oswego
· Lincoln City
· McMinnville
· Portland
· West Lynn
EVALUATION OF EXISTING AND POTENTIAL SUSTAINABILITY PLANNING APPROACHES
Approach |
Example City/Source |
Plus |
Minus |
Internal City sustainability planning |
· Bend · McMinnville · Lake Oswego |
· McMinnville followed ICLEI protocol of measuring GHG emissions · Relatively low cost · Support new projects via cost savings |
· Requires unified City Staff to implement. · Focus is on City operations only. · Does not involve the community in development of plan or participation in sustainable practices |
City wide sustainability planning |
· Eugene · Portland |
· Eugene involved whole community with meetings. · City driven initiative, fully supported by mayor and council. · Relatively small capital outlay by Eugene per capita ( Total $160k funding or $1/capita) |
· Significant City Staff and money outlay for both Eugene and Portland. |
Citizen driven, city-wide sustainability planning |
· Corvallis |
· Citizen driven with City buy-in · Well planned, with large citizen participation · Sustainability plan contains goals, strategies, actions, responsible parties, and timelines. · Strong business, community, organization and University partners. · City saw value to allocate $50K ($1/capita) to the effort, plus some 1-person part time dedicated to process. |
· Could have benefited from more City Staff support. |
Interject sustainability principles in each ongoing planning process |
· Team Idea |
· Can be marketed in a way that is not overwhelming to the Council. · Could be a council goal that is simple to adopt. · This could augment the existing 2010-2011 City Council Goals. |
· Not a unified approach · Not simple to implement · Goals not specific enough |
Augment the City comprehensive plan with an action plan that includes sustainability objectives and strategies. |
· Team Idea |
· Create an overarching action plan that augments the 30 year old comprehensive plan (updated). · Action plan will define how these things will be implemented. · Can this be partially/wholly citizen/partner driven? |
· Dealing with a 30 year old plan (some updates) · Does not include food security, or climate change. · Is not comprehensive like Corvallis plan. · Need to figure out who is doing it and if a consultant or city is doing it, how to pay for it. |
Write up what is currently being done in terms of sustainability and lay them out as a sustainability plan. |
· Team Idea |
· Low cost · Acknowledges current work · Creates coherency · Good PR · Could be done in conjunction with volunteer support (SOU, Citizen, a oversight by CC) · Demonstrates what gaps need to be filled, and where there are redundancies. |
· Does not engage community · Does not set new goals/action plans |
QUESTION
LOCAL COMPANY EXAMPLES
LARGE COMPANY EXAMPLES
CITY SUSTAINABILITY EFFORTS TO SAVE MONEY
Develop a concise Ashland City and Community Sustainability Action Plan.
TASKS
1. Create a baseline inventory of the Comprehensive Plan and select city services as well as plans and practices that relate to them.
2. Identify what the city of Ashland is currently doing to conserve environmental, social, and economical resources. Include current sustainability practices in Ashland, and the partially completed City of Ashland/Southern Oregon University Greenhouse Gas inventory.
3. Using the baseline as a point of reference, identify gaps (e.g. food security, climate change implications, and waste reduction).
4. Prioritize the order in which the comprehensive plan chapters, city services, associated plans and practices, and gaps will be addressed, and develop concise sustainability action items associated with each.
5. For each action item, develop sustainability performance measure(s), recommended timeframes to implement, and estimated impacts (environmental/social/economic) for each sustainability action item.
6. Present to City Council for Approval.
MEANS TO IMPLEMENT
A City appointed citizen ad-hoc committee or task force, with limited duration, that is comprised of members of interested commissions and established committees. This ad-hoc committee will provide recommendations to the City Council with minimal City Staff work and maximum citizen work. The amount of City Staff work will be at the discretion of the City Administrator.
WHO WE ARE
In alignment with Goal #1 of the 2010-2011 Ashland Conservation Commission, a “Sustainability Planning*” team was commissioned. This team is comprised of committee members and citizens who conducted extensive research and analyzed nine Oregon cities that are implementing sustainability plans. Examples of these findings, the team’s assessment, and other reference materials are available as a link on the Conservation Commission Goals page, under Goal 1: Page.asp?NavID=13602 .
* The Conservation Commission July 28, 2010 letter to the Mayor and City Council defined sustainability as "Meeting the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs; including protecting the environment, developing a healthy economy, and ensuring social equality" (follows 1987 UN WECD definition of sustainability).