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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCAC_Minutes_Draft_08-28-19 Jefferson County/City of Port Townsend Climate Action Committee Meeting Minutes Wednesday, August 28, 2019, 3:30 - 5:30 PM Jefferson County Public Health - Pacific Room 615 Sheridan Street, Port Townsend, WA Members Present: Kate Dean (BoCC), David Wilkinson, John Bender (Jefferson Transit), Cindy Jayne, Deb Stinson (City of PT), Laura Tucker (Jefferson County Public Health), Jeff Randall (PUD No. 1), Kate Chadwick, Chris O’Higgins (Jefferson Healthcare), Sam Jones (Port Townsend Paper Corp.), Diane McDade, Cara Loriz, Dave Seabrook, Shelley Jaye. Absent: Eric Toews (Port of PT), Staff: Judy Surber (City of PT), Laura Tucker (Jefferson County) Guests: Rick Jahnke, Cameron Rowland Scribe: Jeff Randall Topic Recommendation/Action Follow Up Items Call to order Approval of Agenda & Minutes Motion to approve agenda by Deborah Stinson, second by Kate Dean, approved. Motion to approve June 26, 2019 minutes with modifications from Diane McDade regarding her comments, and by Dave Wilkinson regarding changing king tide 1-2’ from distance to elevation, by Deb Stinson, second Dave Seabrook. Approved Unanimously. Public Comment No public comments. Old Business Climate on Tap Sessions: Laura Tucker gave an update of upcoming sessions in October and November. Welcome New Members Diane McDade hoping to get more word out to the community of the work and opportunities regarding the Climate Action Committee. Cameron Rowland is interested in having guest speakers to talk at the High School about climate change who are inspiring speakers. Decision Support Tool Kate Chadwick gave overview of Decision Support Tool. Comprehending best available science is overwhelming for most people. Kate has created a checklist that helps local decision makers consider climate impacts when considering adoption of local policies/programs or capital projects. Climate impacts are in current and future timeframes. Proposed action today to approve and recommend use of the tool. Checklist uses color codes (green to red) to indicate risk and effectiveness of adaptation alternatives. Mentioned Bainbridge Island’s draft Climate Change Assessment Certification Tool , which is similar, but more complex. May be useful for larger projects. Cindy Jayne clarified that it would be up to each organization to decide how to use it. Jeff Randall indicated some education and training of staff with organizations to understand tools would be necessary to get organizations to use it. Deb Stinson suggested possibly adopting the tool as a pilot project so that the Climate Action Committee is clear about the expectations for the tool. Kate Chadwick suggested adding links in the screening tool to online carbon emission calculators. Jeff Randall asked how the checklist treats options for different decisions. Kate Chadwick indicated that it will be up to each organization to know the alternatives that can be considered with each action. Motion to adopt the Climate Risk Screening Tool and encourage CAC member organizations to use the tool and provide feedback on their experience and recommendations for improvement. Deb Stinson made the motion and Chris O’Higgins seconded. Motion passed unanimously. Cindy asked the group how to communicate the tool to the organizations. Deb Stinson suggested the chair draft the memo and circulate to the member organizations of the CAC. Kate Chadwick suggested after some time using the tool the CAC could consider potential outreach Chair to draft a memo re the tool and circulate to the member organizations of the CAC Kate C to Finalize tool as discussed at meeting (Include best practice examples (GHG emission calculators, resiliency assessment frameworks- CAKE tool, resources for mitigation options/alternatives), consider incorporating questions (from draft certification tool). opportunities (beyond committee member organizations), as well as updates to the tool itself, based on experience in application, new science, the emergence of other tools. Discuss 2019 CAC Goals and Next Steps Organizational Goals - status and opportunities for collaboration Group discussed putting together an info sheet on Electric Vehicles for organizations to share with the public. Deborah mentioned the Climate Mayors EV Buying program that is open to many organizations. Group talked about monitoring what membership organizations are doing and how that information would be shared. It might be in the form of a table top display that could be utilized at public events. The goal is tracking and celebrating achievements. Kate Dean noted that the county will look at developing an adaptation goal as well. Laura Tucker will draft up an info sheet on EVs Diane McDade agreed to help develop a plan to highlight what is happening on a periodic basis at CAC member organizations. Greenhouse Gas Inventory Update We now have data from the City of Port Townsend, Jefferson PUD Jefferson Transit, Jefferson Healthcare, the Port of Port Townsend, Port Townsend Paper Co., Mason and Grays Harbor PUDs. Waiting for data from Jefferson County. Group discussed commute survey responses. Cindy Jayne indicated she met the Fort Worden PDA sustainability manager. The PDA may be interested in putting together a baseline climate emission inventory. It was agreed that including the PDA in the inventory, if they would like, would be appropriate. Cindy will follow up with them. Judy Surber suggested the Fort Worden PDA sustainability manager be a guest speaker to the CAC and possibly the High School. Guest Rick Jahnke talked about conducting emission inventories not based upon sectors and their carbon emissions but rather including all items purchased and consumed in your community (consumption based). For example, if you buy a piece of furniture, you are responsible for all the emissions involved in making the item. The same with food. Oregon is pursuing this model. This would be in addition to the sector based approach, and is not added to it, just a different way to roll up an inventory. Cindy will follow up with Fort Worden re speaker and inventory. Rick is willing to work with inventory team to add a discussion of consumption inventory. Deborah noted we will need to be cautious to make it clear that this part is new, and was not done in 2005. Roll out of the data tabled until October meeting, how info can be distributed. Greenhouse Gas Reduction - What are the top opportunities that leverage this committee? Judy mentioned encouraging take out restaurants to offer discounts or incentives to use permanent containers for customers who pick up food. Cindy noted that there have been previous preliminary discussions with Port Townsend Paper about the concept of utilizing waste heat to heat local buildings (district heating). WSU Extension does have an expert on district heating who is available to come here to offer us more information. Port Townsend Paper representative (Sam Jones) provided an update on how PTPC has switched several its fuel sources and processes to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Diane McDade mentioned the building boom currently going on and has there been any discussion on reducing greenhouse gas emissions or building more efficient buildings. Chris O’Higgins provided an example of how Jefferson Healthcare sells reusable containers for $1 and when folks bring it back, they get a new one and old one gets washed and reused. Kate Chadwick asked about land use designations and how land is used. Kate asked if our County is a net carbon sink or a net carbon source. Cindy indicated that the current inventory software has a limited ability to incorporate specific types of land use, for example types of forestry, but the inventory team is collecting up the data available, such as acres in different types of agriculture, and forestry acreage. Judy suggested having electric bikes or scooters available at the ferry terminal as a way to encourage people to walk over and leave their cars. Upcoming Organizational Judy indicated there was a meeting today regarding update of the Shoreline Master Program and the opportunity to Plans and Documents for Climate Review? include sea level rise in new plan. Revised plan must be completed by June 30, 2021. Jeff Randall gave an update that the PUD Commission will have a meeting on strategic planning on September 10th. Dave Wilkinson asked about the CAC formally making a comment at the PUD meeting. Judy pointed out that the CAC reports to the Port Townsend City Council and BOCC, so recommendations would have to go through them. Public Comment Cameron Rowland commented that the high school has a fair amount of repetition of climate change information, but feels we need to focus on the urgency of climate change and what students can do about it. Laura indicated there is a Climate Strike scheduled for Sept. 20th. Other Updates Next Steps and Agenda Planning Next meeting – October 23, 3:30 – 5:30. Possible agenda items include: Possible guest speaker from Fort Worden PDA sustainability manager. Possible guest speaker on choosing better landscaping for carbon sequestration and reducing stormwater runoff. Diane McDade indicated there is a local person (Eileen Quigley) who worked with Climate Solutions on multi-state strategy of reducing greenhouse gases at the city/county level, could be a future speaker. There is a meeting of the Peninsula Planners Forum on 10/17, from 9 am – 3pm, at the Cotton Building, where Andy Haub, who did the planning for sea level rise in the city of Olympia, will speak about Olympia’s Sea Level Rise Response plan. Contact Judy for specific timing and let her know if you plan to attend. Adjourn The meeting was adjourned at 5:35 p.m.