CitiesGoGreen - November 2008 - (Page 25)

back period of between two and three years; sometimes it’s five, depending on how the company operates. If they are operating 24/7, their payback is going to be really quick. They also eliminate quite a few greenhouse gas emissions. At the Platinum level they also have to continually challenge their employees to help the organization achieve its goals, advisory committee approved all the actions that partners have to accomplish at each level, and felt it was very do-able and appropriate to have those levels. credible for the level they’ve achieved. So there’s this great feedback loop always going on. Would you have any advice for other local officials considering a similar program? What I would say is that this didn’t take a lot of start-up money, and once our businesses saw that the program really helped them, they were willing to step in and volunteer. We even have some folks sponsor us. We’ve leveraged $24,000 in sponsorships this year, which has helped us a lot. What I would say to other officials is, start with the business community. Go through your Chamber of Commerce or some of your business groups and get some feedback. I think if you open up the relationship with your business community right from the getgo and ask them, ‘What are your needs?’, ‘What are you looking for?’, it will definitely grow into a successful program. You can also use ClimateWise as a model, and start from there to develop your own customized program. Further information about ClimateWise is available at http://fcgov.com/climatewise/. Kathy Collier is willing to be a resource person for cities interested in starting their own versions of the program. She can be contacted at KCOLLIER@ fcgov.com. So it’s not just the city saying, “Here is the program, this is what you should do.” You’re actually going to the business community and saying, “Help us create this program.” Exactly, because we are “People sometimes think it’s okay to leave partners in this. We continually check in with our adviyour lights on all the time when you’re out sory committee. Recently, we of the office, when really the rule of thumb conducted a visioning session where we sat down and talked is 15 minutes.” with both the original advisory to make sure employees are doing things committee members and brand-new like recycling and being energy concommittee members, a good mix of both scious with the lights. People sometimes original people who’ve been seasoned think it’s okay to leave your lights on all and then the newer folks too, just to see the time when you’re out of the office, that we’re on track. And we’re always when really the rule of thumb is checking in and conducting a litmus 15 minutes. test with participating partners. We have What’s also really important about about 120 businesses involved now, and the program is that we have an advisory we’re always putting it out to them to committee. Right now our advisory com- give us feedback any time. mittee is made up of 15 diverse busiBusinesses are also required to give us nesses, from a small two-person coffee their carbon emissions data once a year shop all the way up to Colorado State (and we help them with that) to make evUniversity. The advisory committee is erybody accountable and credible. That involved in overseeing and giving input idea came from our advisory committee, about ClimateWise operations. Our 2006 to make everybody accountable and November 2008 25 http://fcgov.com/climatewise/pdf/climate_wise_annual_report_2007_final.pdf http://fcgov.com/climatewise/ http://citiesgogreen.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of CitiesGoGreen - November 2008

CitiesGoGreen - November 2008 Contents In Motion Disaster Housing for $200: The Hexayurt Coming Soon: A Code-Ready Green Building Standard from ASHRAE ICMA Embraces Sustainability Fort Collins, Colorado Interview: ClimateWise, Business Smart 12-for-1 Parking: Bike Corrals Fresno County More Biking and Walking for Better Communities

CitiesGoGreen - November 2008

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