Green Ribbon Reports to City (26. June 2008, 09:43 by Erik) ~ Go green or go home

We dropped in at the City’s Environment and Public Works Committee last night. It’s not one of our regular stops, but the Green Ribbon Task Force, formed 15 months ago, gave their first report to the committee.

Co-chairs Ryan Mello and Joanne Buselmeier presented a summary of the task force’s recommendations. In total, they had 80 strategies grouped into a few main categories:

• Actions to be taken by City Government
• Moving people and goods more efficiently
• Enhancing compact/livable neighborhoods
• Gaining energy efficiency in our buildings
• Reuse and Recycle … from buildings to waste

Within those categories, they will be recommending a 2-year action plan for implementation in the next biennium. Some of those steps include small things like mandating double-sided copy and curbing bottled water use. Others are a little bigger, like the creation of an Office of Sustainability. The office would mostly draw from positions already in place into a single department.

This will be going to Tuesday’s Study Session where the full Council will hear and discussion the recommendations.

Previously on Exit133

More information can be found via the Green Ribbon Task Force