By Nick Diamantides
Staff Writer
If community activists and city planners have their way, during the next 20 years Long Beach will make great strides toward becoming a city that lives in harmony with the ecosphere. Last year, the Long Beach City Council authorized the formation of the Sustainable City Commission and directed it to come up with a plan to make the city more earth friendly. The commission has completed a 35-page proposed plan, and now city staff is bringing it to the public for input, before the council votes on whether to approve it.
On Monday night, Larry Rich, one of the city’s sustainability coordinators, outlined the plan to the 20 people who attended a meeting hosted by the Wrigley Area Neighborhood Alliance at the community center of Veterans Park.
Rich explained that the city formed an environmental task force in 1998, and the Sustainable City Commission was a continuation of the work begun by that body. “There are 11 seats on the commission, nine of which are appointed by the nine council districts and two at-large that are appointed by the mayor,” Rich added. “The commission meets every fourth Thursday of the month and for the last year, the Office of Sustainability has been presenting, section by section, a Draft Sustainable City Action Plan, which is the first charge of the commission.”
Rich noted that, once the council approves the plan, it will serve as a road map to sustainability, which incorporates environmental, economic and social considerations.
“Sustainability in a broad sense is the capacity to endure,” Rich said, quoting from the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. “We want a city that will still be here in 100 years.” He explained that incorporating environmental, economic and social needs is a difficult task. “In some ways, this plan is successful at that,” he said. “In other ways, perhaps there are some things that are left out, but it is our best foot forward.” He stressed that even achieving all the plan’s goals would not make the city sustainable, but it would put it on the path toward becoming that way. “True sustainability could take 50 or more years to get there with all the components. This plan takes us to the year 2020 and gets us on that path,” he said.
Rich spent about 30 minutes outlining the plan’s seven “focus areas.”
The first of those— Energy— includes three initiatives: shrinking Long Beach’s carbon footprint by reducing greenhouse gas emissions; ensuring that all of the City of Long Beach’s operational needs are met through energy efficiency, conservation and renewable energy sources; and reducing the Long Beach community’s use of electricity and natural gas.
Under the heading Buildings and Neighborhoods, initiatives include using more green building techniques in new construction and retrofits to improve building efficiency, and enhancing the community to encourage people to walk more.
The Transportation focus area lists the goals of encouraging more fuel-efficient and alternative-fuel vehicles, as well as increasing public transit ridership.
Under the heading Waste Reduction, the primary goal is to increase recycling in the city.
The Urban Nature focus area’s initiatives include creating a more balanced network of open spaces though acquisition and restoration of land as well as the development of more greenway linkages.
Under the heading Water, the city’s primary goal is to ensure a sustainable water supply through conservation, which would reduce dependence on imported water.
The Green Economy and Lifestyle focus area includes two initiatives: establishing Long Beach as the leading California city for green business and green job growth; and promoting individual action that encourages active and green lifestyles, which would support a green economy.
Rich also spent about 30 minutes explaining a proposed timeline for establishing some of the plan’s goals.
For example, by 2012, the plan envisions using 100 percent of city-owned vacant lots for interim green uses and creating at least six new community gardens. The plan calls for increasing public transit ridership by 25 percent and converting taxicab fleets to alternative-fuel/low-emission vehicles by 2016. The plan also aims at having 50 percent of Long Beach residents working in the city (to reduce the need for commuting) by 2020. By that year the plan also calls for having eight acres of open space for every 1,000 residents and having 100 miles of green linkages between parks and other open spaces.
Rich noted that the Sustainable City Action Plan is meant to be a living document that can be changed as goals are accomplished and economic realities either reduce or increase the city’s abilities to meet remaining goals. He added that sometime before 2020, a second-phase plan would have to be developed.
“A lot of this stuff is being encouraged and called for at the state and federal levels, and there are a variety of grant programs that encourage these things,” he said. “By establishing goals like this, even if we don’t have the money locally to implement them, it gives us the inspiration to go after these grants.”
More Information
(562) 570-5839
www.longbeach.gov/citymanager/sustainability
