The Nation's Mayors to Gather for Environment & Energy Forum in Miami

Last update: 11:50 a.m. EDT Sept. 30, 2008

WASHINGTON, Sept 30, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire via COMTEX/ -- Mayors to Release Green Jobs Report and Work to Shape

Climate Protection Agenda for Next U.S. President

U.S. Conference of Mayors President Miami Mayor Manny Diaz will host a national meeting along with CEO and Executive Director Tom Cochran, called the Mayors '08 Action Forum on Environment and Energy, on Thursday, October 2 at the Intercontinental Hotel in Miami.

During the forum, the Conference will also release a national green jobs report -- the first ever report of its kind that estimates current green jobs in cities and their metropolitan areas across America. The report which was prepared by Global Insight, Inc., also highlights the job growth expected within the green jobs sector.

USCM Vice President Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels will also be speaking and co-chairs the USCM Climate Protection Task Force. Nickels launched the Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement during a USCM meeting in 2005, which challenges mayors who sign the agreement to reduce carbon emissions by 7% below 1990 levels by the year 2012, in line with the international Kyoto Protocol. To date, nearly 900 mayors have signed this agreement. (http://www.usmayors.org/climateprotection/agreement.htm)

This forum will be the forth in a series of mayoral forums in key cities around the country intended to challenge the next U.S. President to invest in America's cities and metro areas -- the economic engines of the nation accounting for 86 percent of the Gross Domestic Product and where over 85% of people in the country live. The first forum was on Crime in Philadelphia; the second was on Infrastructure in New York City; the third was on Poverty held in Los Angeles; and following the Environment & Energy Forum in Miami, the last forum will be held on the Arts in Palm Beach.

Recommendations from all five forums will be presented to the next President of the United States during the critical first 100 days of the new administration toward the creation of a metro/national/urban agenda.

Mayor Diaz, President of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, leads the nation's premiere bipartisan lobbying organization for America's cities and metropolitan areas believes that Washington no longer invests in its cities and its people. He has said, "Washington has lost its values -- lost its principles -- lost its sense of purpose -- engaging in endless debate and partisan bickering while people in this country continue to suffer. ... Plain and simple, Washington has abandoned us." Diaz also believes, "National problems demand national investments."

WHO: -Miami, FL Mayor Manny Diaz, USCM President & Host of Environment & Energy Forum

-Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, USCM Vice President and Co-Chair of Climate Protection Task Force

-Other U.S. Mayors including: Long Beach Mayor Bob Foster (USCM Environment Committee Chair); Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert; Stamford (CT) Mayor Dannel Malloy; Pembroke Pines Mayor Frank C. Ortis; North Miami Mayor Kevin A. Burns; Colorado Springs Mayor Lionel Rivera; and Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hanneman

-Former President Bill Clinton (INVITED) and other National Experts

WHAT: Environment and Energy Forum & Release of National Green Jobs Report: PRESS CONFERENCE AT 12:30pm

WHEN: Thursday, October 2, 2008

WHERE: Miami Intercontinental Hotel (Trade Room), 100 Chopin Plaza, Miami FL 33131

SOURCE U.S. Conference of Mayors

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/nations-mayors-gather-environment-/story.aspx?guid=%7B12BF8F26-9C4E-449A-9429-1C47243D0B3B%7D&dist=hppr

Cities seek federal aid to buck U.S. stance on Kyoto
September 1 2007
By Michael Joe, Taryn Luntz, Janet Ahn and Jonathan Weinstein
Medill News Service

WASHINGTON Tuscaloosa Mayor Walt Maddox is one of more than 650 mayors nationwide who have signed the 2005 U.S. Conference of Mayors Climate Change Agreement, called the “Cool Cities” agreement, pledging to reduce emissions to 7 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. The agreement was created in response to the U.S. government’s refusal to sign on to the international agreement. Now, as the cities struggle to meet the 2012 reduction targets, the mayors are looking to Washington for help. In Tuscaloosa, Maddox said the city is taking steps to expand its curbside recycling program and is switching the fuel for its vehicles from diesel to biodisel.

He and the other mayors and the other mayors are coming up against surging demand for higher energy, a tight market for alternative energy sources, years of planned sprawl and the absence of a comprehensive national program. With cities responsible for 75 percent of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions — primarily from burning gasoline, coal, natural gas, diesel and oil — mayors say they can’t complete the job without support from the federal government, possibly in the form of block grants to launch local energy-saving initiatives. “A lot of cities don’t have the money to do the kinds of things that are necessary,” said Mayor Douglas Palmer of Trenton, N.J., president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors. “This is just the beginning. But just like any beginning you need startup money, you need capital, an initial investment to have long-term sustainable impact.

Palmer said what’s needed is a federal-local partnership.Adopting Kyoto goalsSix years ago, Bush criticized the Kyoto accord because developing countries like China and India were exempt from the requirements. Committing the U.S. to the limits outlined in the protocol would put the country at a competitive disadvantage and cause companies to relocate up to five million U.S. jobs overseas, Bush said. That attitude was at odds with most of the rest of the world. More than 170 other nations have ratified the agreement to cut greenhouse gases, primarily carbon dioxide, the chief contributor to global warming. The U.S. alone emits roughly one quarter of the globe’s greenhouse gases, though it has just 5 percent of the world’s population.

To fill the federal gap in environmental policy, cities are taking on the task themselves.In Burlington, Vt., hotels, the city’s electrical utility, and companies like Ben & Jerry’s have signed up to reduce emissions by 10 percent. In the Washington suburb of Takoma Park, Md., city vehicles run on biodiesel and the middle class residents are encouraged use alternative energy and make environmentally aware decisions in their homes.

In Tuscaloosa, all 250 pieces of city-owned equipment now run on diesel to biodiesel fuel, a mixture of 20 percent soybean oil and 80 percent diesel. “It will reduce the amount of diesel we’re burning by 100,000 gallons,” Maddox said. That reduces carbon monoxide by 12.6 percent, hydrocarbons by 11 percent, and air toxins by 12 percent, he said. The city also has plans to expand its recycling program. Although each of the city’s fire stations has drop-off recycling bins, curbside recycling is currently limited to select neighborhoods.

“In this year’s budget, we’re recommending a new recycling truck,” Maddox said. “Once it’s delivered it will increase our recycling by 4,500 homes.” A proposed landscape ordinance would increase greenspace in the city and reduce erosion, he said. Expanding the city’s site development permitting authority to include its police jurisdiction has helped control runoff into Lake Tuscaloosa. And the city has also formed an advisory committee to preserve the natural environment at Lake Nicol and Harris Lake.

Learning from cities

While the city of Northport has yet to make the strides Tuscaloosa has, Mayor Harvey Fretwell said he’s hoping to become a greener government within the year. He said the city already has a limited recycling program, with bins set up at the Public Works Facility and two schools. But Fretwell said he also hopes to employ strategies he’s read about elsewhere. Through a city and governmental planning magazine, Fretwell and planning director Katherine Ennis learned of Keene, N.H., a city of about 23,000 about 15 miles north of the Massachusetts state line.

Fretwell said Keene had begun using biodiesel to fuel the city’s fleet, using LED lights for traffic signals relying on bicycle police “We are looking at having an adviser come in and give us some information on that,” Fretwell said. “There are some great ideas, and it’s something I think we can move into gradually.” John Bailey, a research associate at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance in Minneapolis, authored a study this year that examined the progress of 10 “Kyoto” cities. He said cities still need help. “The cities have committed to doing good things but they need the state or federal government to do things to help them,” he said.

Bailey found just one city, Portland, Ore., on pace to come close to the goal. Other cities in Bailey’s study included Seattle; San Francisco; Ann Arbor, Mich.; Austin; Boulder, Colo.; and Cambridge, Mass. Bailey found that the cities were counting on factors largely beyond their control, such as tighter state or federal standards for vehicle emissions and miles-per-gallon efficiency.

Federal aid obstacles

The block grant program that mayors are seeking was included in wide-ranging energy bills passed by the House and Senate aimed at alleviating climate change and relieving the nation’s dependence on fossil fuels and foreign oil. But it’s far from a done deal. The Senate and House versions still need to be negotiated, and Bush has threatened to veto the bills because they don’t increase domestic production of oil and gas. The president also opposes other major provisions sought by mayors and congressional Democrats, including mandatory caps on harmful emissions and national production targets for renewable fuels, like wind and solar power. Under the grant program, which would be administered by the Energy Department, financial awards based on population would go directly to larger cities and counties, and to states to allocate among smaller communities.

Bailey’s study, released in January, found that cities have been relying on state and federal grants and voter-approved special tax levies for green programs. Palmer said, however, that many city budgets are stretched by other priorities, such as law enforcement, recreation and senior citizen programs. And less tax revenue is likely to come in from property assessments caused by the nationwide housing slump. “The budgets are tight,” Palmer said. “We just can’t do it.”

http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20070901/LATEST/70901006/-1/NEWS03

Crotty wants Orange to be a little greener
David Damron
Orlando Sentinel
August 16, 2007

Orange County Mayor Rich Crotty has become the latest Republican leader to declare himself green.Next month Crotty plans to hold Central Florida's first regional summit on climate change, where he also likely will pledge to sharply reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and encourage other governments, businesses and residents to do the same. Just weeks after Florida Gov. Charlie Crist gathered leaders in Miami to battle pollution statewide, Crotty is taking the fight to Central Florida.

Political experts and those cheering him on say it's a bold move for the largely pro-growth mayor. But what Crotty does next -- and more critically, how much he's willing to spend doing it -- will be his true test, they say. "That's where you find out when people are really green," said University of Central Florida political-science professor Aubrey Jewett, pointing to higher costs for energy-efficient vehicle fleets and buildings. "And even then, is it a light green or dark green?"

This crush of political actors to the environmental stage flows from an extreme and sudden interest in global warming.Melting polar ice caps, scientists and popular documentaries such as Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth make the argument that people are causing unnatural climate change by burning too many fossil fuels. Some conservative critics say global warming is a hoax. Even so, it largely has been Republican politicians who have been making news lately by battling global warming. For example, GOP California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger joined fellow Republican Crist at July's summit.

There the Florida governor, among other measures, issued a new rule requiring state employees to stay only at eco-friendly lodgings. Crist touted that measure Wednesday at a Hilton near Downtown Disney.Now Crotty is about to make his own headlines."I want to be in a position to lead by example," Crotty said. The specific plans for Crotty's event still are being made, but details on the Sept. 25 local summit should come soon. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg declined to be a keynote speaker, but Roger Ballantine -- former President Clinton's chief negotiator on the Kyoto Protocol agreement on climate change -- might sign on, officials say.

Meanwhile, Crotty's environmental team is deciding whether the mayor should pledge to reduce Orange County government's greenhouse-gas emissions by 15 percent in five years. Crotty said he started down this path in 2005, with his pledge to reduce the county's consumption of gasoline and diesel by 20 percent in five years. County-government fuel use has stayed static since then, at about 2.5 million gallons annually. But the county's car and truck fleet has grown, and it's about to open an ethanol fueling station and use more biodiesel. The goal is still reachable, county staffers said.Other communities such as San Francisco and New York have adopted bolder strategies, such as requiring cabs to switch to alternative fuels. Crotty said he's not considering a push to do that locally.

For now, Crotty will mostly tout a lineup of conservative goals and proposals, focusing mainly on raising awareness of global warming, officials say. For instance, Crotty recently signed an order requiring county buildings to meet certain eco-friendly standards, but he will not pay to have them independently certified. A summit likely won't change that.Crotty also declined to sign on to the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement or enlist in the Sierra Club's "Cool Counties" program, both of which require signatories to aim for dramatic pollution reductions. Instead, Crotty is focusing his early efforts on working with ICLEI -- Local Governments for Sustainability, a group that walks leaders through the basics of pollution reduction.

For starters, the group is helping Orange measure the greenhouse gases its government operations produce and hire staff to monitor the issue. The next step is to help Orange develop a plan to reach its pollution-reduction goal, possibly by 15 percent within five years. Environmental lobbyist Susan Glickman said she and other advocates will watch "for concrete action and commitment." For now, she agrees, just talking about climate change is good. Crotty said he plans to make pledges at the summit, but he will mostly be there to learn. "I've got a real focus on this," said Crotty, who plans to attend a global-warming round table in Washington next week. "This is about our next generation."