MINUTES
Sustainable Green Bay Task Force
City Hall, Room 604
3:00 PM
MEMBERS
PRESENT: Gary Delveaux, Ian Griffiths,
Andre Jacque, Annette Weissbach, Bill Lockery, Derek Lord, Jeff DeLaune, John
Miller, Luann Rudolph, Ray Janssen, Robert Laskowski, Tom Lesperance, Erik
Hoyer, Mary Haupt
The
meeting was called to order at 3:00 p.m. by Co-chair Gary Delveaux.
1.
Introduction of new members.
Erik
Hoyer, from Silver Lake College was re-introduced and welcomed; members
introduced themselves.
2.
Progress report from subcommittee chairpersons.
Reports
were given on the various subcommittees as follows:
Land
Use/Economic Development--John Miller reported that they are nearing the end of the
process of getting letters ready to builders, developers and other entities,
residential, large and small commercial, that are hopefully going to get handed
out as part of the permit process. He
said basically they are asking people to consider incorporating sustainable
building practices as part of the project they are working on. He stated that
it’s important to get groups interested at the start of the process rather than
trying to take a project that has already been designed and trying to incorporate
sustainable practices, adding that it’s not financially feasible and you don’t
maximize the potential of the environmental benefits when you tack everything
on at the end. A copy of the letter
that will be given to developers of large buildings was distributed; comments
can be sent to John. He stated that at
least three of the letters are nearly complete. Mr. Miller said they would welcome one more member on the Land
Use subcommittee. Bob Laskowski said he
and Derek Lord can attend some of the various subcommittee meetings and help
out, or get updated by the Chair. Derek said they will be interviewing an
intern soon, who can help out.
Mr.
Miller said the Resolution was passed by the Economic Development Authority and
also by the City Council, with no discussion, with Andre commenting that it may
have been good to have some discussion at the Council level, but there were
other items on the agenda that took up much time. Andre said the next step is
education at the Council. Derek said he
sent the Resolution to the Press-Gazette and Paul Srubas said he wil
look at it.
Transportation—Andre stated that this
committee is down to two members as Jessica Garrels will be going to Madison on
a job promotion. Jessica said her
replacement in Green Bay will be told that she has a responsibility to this
Task Force. He said they need more members and suggested putting on the website
to contact the group if people are interested.
Andre reported that they are having a problem finding a qualified
distributor for bio diesel fuel and said they are seeking legal opinions as to
if they go with an unqualified source.
He stated that Chris Phelps will check with First Transit and have an
answer in a week or two. The issue is that there is not a qualified source in
the state, with Andre adding that he is optimistic that they will find a
source.
Andre
stated that T.J. Sorensen, Fleet Manager for the City, is working on the
anti-idling campaign and is very knowledgeable on best practices, having
recently received the Public Fleet Manager of the Year Award. The Hybrid
vehicle parking signs are up; bike racks are up. Andre said there is nothing
new to report on additional trail funding and said the city committed to being
a full sponsor for the trail maps. He indicated that the Transportation
Committee will be looking for new projects.
Ian
said he will be meeting with Fred Schnook in the next week or so and said Fred
has some ideas for new projects. Luann
said Fred is going to be meeting tonight with people from the City of DePere
who are interested in forming some sort of a Sustainable Committee and are
looking at an eco municipality. She said there may be an opportunity for some
joint projects and gaining more people.
Water/Air—Derek gave an update
stating that more than half of their committee has been actively involved in
the CFL challenge and they haven’t had time to focus on other projects. He said now that that project is wrapping
up, they will begin working on the storm drain marker program and said they are
waiting for the city budget to be approved, to be certain they have money for
the markers. They are looking at implementation for late spring. He stated that there are two kinds of markers;
metal ones to place in new concrete (cost a couple of dollars each) and
adhesive stencils to stick on existing storm drains. He said there is a two
faced pad that can be bought and is more expensive, which requires getting
adhesive glue to place on the back of the pad and is expected to last ten years. Derek said they may divide the city into
quadrants and will involve high school students to assist with the program.
Luann
said the rain barrel program will be an ongoing project and they talked about
rain gardens as a future project. The
City is required to use native species in planting. Luann relayed a TMBL study that is being done and she will report
back on that.
3.
Update on CFL Challenge/Energy Days
Jeff DeLaune reported on the CFL Challenge stating that 31
organizations are signed up and are turning in their orders for the number of
CFL bulbs that they wish to purchase.
The next step will be Focus on Energy assigning a retailer for each one
of the organizations and these organizations collecting the money for their
bulb order. Bob Laskowski said that
Public Service is pushing 5,000 bulbs just with their company and said KI is
doing well also. Bob said at least ten companies contacted him saying that they
needed more time to put this program together, which is something to keep in
mind for the future.
J. DeLaune said on October 26th all coupons, results
forms and payments will need to be turned in by 3:00 at Bay Park Square at
Energy Savings Days. The orders will be quickly tallied and awards will be
given out at 4:00 by Mayor Schmitt, in 3 categories with 3 tiers in each
category. The results forms and payment
will be turned over to the retailers who will acquire the bulbs and deliver
them, or Bob Laskowski has offered to make the deliveries, hopefully
accompanied by the Press-Gazette.
Organizations that are participating in Energy Savings Days
are asked to bring their materials by 3:00.
Valley Cabinet donated some plaques and Luann is printing certificates for
the award winners and another certificate for every organization who
participated. Luann is trying to
calculate some sort of statistic related to the organization’s contribution to
the environment, which will be placed on their award. Organizations/groups that will be present at the Energy Savings
Days event are: Sustainable Green Bay Task Force, Lake Michigan Wind & Sun,
a greenbuilder, Martin Hardware to sell CFL’s, Berners Schober, WPS,
Naturewise, and Toyota. The hybrid car
from Preble High School apparently will not be available. The hours of the Energy Saving Days are 10
am to 7 pm. The Sustainable Task Force will have two tables; one to answer
questions about projects in the various subcommittees and one to collect the coupons,
sign the results forms and collect payments. Sign-up sheets were passed around
for members to indicate when they would be available to work the event on
Friday and/or Saturday, October 26th and 27th. There will be bins at the event to recycle old bulbs and recycle
fact sheets will be made available with the delivery of the bulbs. All of the
retailers have recyclable bins at their stores and Brown County Hazardous Waste
will also have brochures at the event relative to recycling of the bulbs.
Discussion
surrounded what materials the Task Force would like to have at the table and a
sheet was passed around to include ideas for materials. Suggestions were a rain barrel, hybrid
parking sign, CFL’s, brochures, trail
maps.
Jeff said when the CFL challenge is finished in mid
November, the Energy subcommittee will look toward other projects in early
spring. He indicated that the Sustainable GB Task Force will have a slot at the
spring Homebuilders event in January; volunteers will be needed for this event.
Luann stated that Debbie Lindgrem is head of Citizens Energy Cooperative and
owns a business called Solar House, which looks at plans and audits them as to
how they can become more energy efficient. Debbie suggested contacting Joe Nagan
from Energy Star and Luann will contact him to see if he could be present at
Energy Savings Days and said Debbie committed to being there. Apparently the Brown County Homebuilders are
getting lots of questions on green building and asked the Task Force to be at
their event in January.
Annette said one of the priorities of the Land Use
subcommittee is to offer workshops on green building and suggested joining
other groups in this effort to get more interest and make builders more
knowledgeable. She suggested involving the realtors to push the better energy
homes and it was mentioned that energy audits could be done on homes listed for
sale. Annette mentioned rating or a point system and a separate listing for
energy efficient homes. Tom Lesperance shared information on a national ranking
system of homes, where the homes are ranked according to their energy
efficiency. He said we should
understand how our community thinks in terms of green/environmental issues,
including water use and suggested possibly doing a survey. He suggested having
a survey available at the Task Force booth and also putting a survey on the
website to get feedback. Luann
mentioned how to develop and convert to green.
It was suggested advising Ashwaubenon Village President,
Jerry Menne that we will be present at the Energy Savings Days and let him know
what’s happening, since it will take place in Ashwaubenon.
4.
Miscellaneous discussion on pertinent Sustainable Green Bay
topics.
Derek
Lord said a student approached him about doing a project on the Sustainable
Green Bay Task Force. She is putting a report together for a senior project and
asked permission to present the report at the group’s December meeting. Derek
asked for projects that the student could work on.
Jeff
DeLaune said there is a student working with the Energy Subcommittee doing a
case study of the CFL challenge. Ian
reported that he received an email from Dean Rodehafer from UWGB, asking for
participation in his classes from some of the Task Force members. Annette mentioned getting one or two student
members on the committee. Crystal, the
student who is doing the case study, is keeping abreast of what the committee
is doing.
Gary
Delveaux said this group is working hard, has done a lot of things it set out
to do and is living up to their expectations, it was mentioned that the UWGB
Sustainable Group is falling apart. Luann
said she will be speaking to the Brown County Multifamily Homebuilders Group to
talk to them about water efficiency. Ian suggested it might be beneficial to have semi-annual meetings
with DePere when they get up and running and keeping up with what other
communities are doing as well. Suggestion was made to have Fred Schnook attend a future meeting.
Andre
stated that Christine Fossen-Rades is organizing an event called National Step
It Up, which will be talking about climate change. The event will be held on
November 3rd at St. James Park. Christine will probably be sending an email to
Task Force members and will place the event on the website.
Bill
Lockery said the local cable access channel is always looking for things to
fill the time slots and he thought a half hour show on sustainability would
help to get the word out. Bill will check on it.
Annette
distributed information on an event being held on Tuesday, October 23rd
at Lawrence University on Green Design.
She is planning to attend and invited anyone wishing to carpool to
contact her.
5.
Date for next meeting (November 8th, 3:00).
The next
meeting will be held on November 8th at 3:00 p.m. in Room 604 of
City Hall.
Respectfully
submitted,
Mary Haupt