West Central Tribune - Group proposes that Willmar Council back program to develop healthier, more livable community

Article: The city of Milan is buying only energy efficient Energy Star-certified equipment. St. Cloud has the nation’s first public bus powered by recycled vegetable oil.

Mankato saves nearly 700 million gallons of water a year by cooling the city’s energy center with 1.5 million to 2 million gallons of treated wastewater.

These are a few of the cost saving and energy reduction efforts undertaken by cities participating in a voluntary statewide recognition program called GreenStep Cities that a citizens’ group hopes the Willmar City Council will support.

“This is a volunteer set of guidelines that can help cities save energy and develop a healthier and more livable community,’’ says Andrew Bjur, one of 23 people on the grassroots committee that’s researching the GreenStep program.

The program grew out of a report to the 2009 Legislature, and has been developed by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, the Minnesota Office of Energy Security, the League of Minnesota Cities, the Clean Energy Resource Teams, the Great Plains Institute, the Izaak Walton League-Minnesota and the Urban Land Institute-Minnesota.

The program is aimed mainly at governmental buildings, facilities and projects. Likely benefits, the committee says, include attracting new jobs and businesses, attracting and keeping young people in the community, keeping dollars local, increasing community health and wellness and personal and public safety, and increased civic participation.

The program recognizes cities that use up to 28 sustainable development best practices. Each best practice can be implemented by completing one or more specific actions. These actions are tailored to all Minnesota cities, focus on cost savings and energy use reduction, and encourage innovation.

The committee says completing the goals would be easy to attain, would not be a financial burden to the city and would increase efficiencies and reduce medium- to long-term costs.

Best practices are organized into five categories: buildings and lighting; land use; transportation; environmental management; and economic and community development.

Based on population, Willmar would need to complete 16 best practices, of which nine are required.

Bjur says the city has already completed seven best practices.

“We’re halfway there to achieving this already,’’ he said. “Why do this? It’s the right thing to do energy-wise. As we’re looking at existing buildings and new buildings the city would own, we’d want to make those more energy efficient as roofing projects occur, any kind of remodeling. These are chances to save dollars in energy cost, which will ultimately save the public tax dollars in heating and cooling buildings.’

“If you have a well-insulated building and you have a tighter building that doesn’t leak as much, you’re going to save probably 40 percent of the energy you’re already losing out the windows and doors,’’ says Bjur. “If you look at the city’s entire energy cost and reduce that by 10 percent, that’s an enormous amount of money every year that you save.’’

Three elective best practices have been completed, Bjur said. Those are: encouraging renewable energy; strengthening local foods with the Becker Market, Farmers Market and possible community-owned grocery store; and clustering businesses to achieve better energy outcomes.

One required best practice is the complete green street concept. The Minnesota Complete Streets Coalition defines a complete street as one that provides safe and accessible use by pedestrians, transit riders, bicyclists and vehicles.

Bjur says it’s a policy guideline to consider and review if appropriate when the City Council discusses new street projects.

The first step toward participating in GreenStep Cities is seeking a resolution of support from the City Council. Bjur and two other committee members presented the program to the City Council’s Community Development Committee last week.

Planning and Development Director Bruce Peterson said the Planning Commission has discussed the matter on several occasions over the last couple of months and determined that participation was beneficial.

Peterson recommended the city move forward and suggested the committee could bring a resolution of support to the council if the committee felt comfortable enough with the program.

Committee member Steve Ahmann said he supports the idea and said it sends a strong message of being more forward thinking and energy efficient.

“Overall I think that’s what we’re trying to do and would be a plus for the community,’’ he said.

Committee Chairman Jim Dokken and committee member Bruce DeBlieck said they wanted to see printed information about the program before making a decision.