Climate Emergency Proposed Ordinances by the Elgin Climate Initiative
Here are some ordinances that could be passed in a city or other jurisdiction that would go a long way towards increasing consciousness of environmental matters and start to begin the process of mitigation of global warming (note: the following below is a work-in-progress and is not yet fully finalized and peer-reviewed):
The following would require very little expenditure of money and can be implemented immediately:
1. Aggressive, continuing efforts to educate both the city staff and the public at large on the latest climate science; direct mailers to all city dwellers, sign posts and billboards throughout the city explaining the seriousness of the climate crisis and the need for concrete action by each and every person and details about what each person needs to start to do such as using less meat, plastics, and gasoline, getting on clean energy electricity plans, and so forth; local schools and colleges, city hall, and the libraries should have dedicated bulletin boards with information about the climate crisis;
2. Frequent and regular meetings for all people concerned about the climate hosted by the city or designated organizations with ability to affect the decision-making process in the committees and councils;
3. Purchasing renewable energy as whole municipalities/organizations (“municipal aggregation”);
4. Divestment of all city retirement funds from fossil fuels; and from all banks, insurance companies etc. that fund fossil fuel development;
5. Increase the pace of change through the committees and councils. We cannot afford to go through the normal process for each and every change that we need because of time constraints and the urgency of this crisis. We could work on a separate effort to invoke some sort of emergency process based on the fact that this is an emergency that would streamline the changes. That is after all one of the main reasons to declare that this is an emergency. Perhaps this would be an ordinance change that would affect the normal rules and procedures of how new ordinances are passed in the jurisdiction?
6. No natural gas connections to new developments. Heat pump requirements (changes to building codes, city ordinances, and permitting processes so as to prevent the construction of new local fossil fuel infrastructure; and improvement to energy efficiency);
7. Taking effective measures to protect existing acres and bodies of water that are still in a natural state (banning development that would destroy wetlands, streams, and rivers) (restricting development to already built-upon land);
8. Banning of plastic bags; and bottles, takeout food containers, plastic cutlery, straws (except for those with bad teeth); or increased taxes on such;
9. Replacement of existing modes of public transportation (or mandates on new vehicles) with electric vehicles and aggressive promotion of the use of public transportation; no charge public transit, EV chargers where ever possible and provisions for EV chargers in all new buildings;
10. Mandating that every restaurant would have to have at least 3 vegan complete meal dishes that are fully advertised on all of their menus (demand more vegan choices in restaurants);
11. Mandating the placement of recycling bins where ever there is also a garbage can in businesses; composting bins for households and commercial food establishments;
12. Banning use of pesticides and herbicides on public property and properties owned by municipalities and public organizations;
13. Increasing taxes on meat;
14. Increasing taxes on oil for factories;
15. No more lights outdoors that waste energy or in indoor spaces that nobody is using such as hallways; motion activated lights;
16. All public officials and city workers could be mandated to give monthly reports on what they are doing to reduce their carbon footprint;
17. Mandated classes or educational programs in public schools educating school children about the climate crisis;
18. Banning of BPA's;
19. Banning the use of paper labels on plastic packaging (which makes recycling more difficult or impossible).
The following items require a little more money:
20. Promoting the establishment of “green roofs” on large, flat-roofed buildings; or solar cells;
21. “rewild” acreage that has been developed but has fallen out of use;
22. Starting aggressive, large tree-planting projects;
23. Replacing lawns with natural prairies and pollinator gardens;
24. Aggressive promotion of the use of renewable energy coupled with phasing out of fossil fuel use and drastic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by the city itself and promulgation of ordinances that require the same sorts of efforts from both private businesses and residences. To implement such a policy, the jurisdiction would have to investigate ways to raise funds to assist companies and individuals to make the necessary changes; however, changes made today will pay for themselves tomorrow in energy cost savings, as well as avoidance of an inevitable 11th hour crunch which could easily require spending more money in way less time; this resolution and its education components would greatly help with this process;
25. Continuing the improvement of roads for use by bicyclists;
26. Implementation of climate-adaptive land use planning;
27. Requiring greenhouse gas and co-pollutant impact, reduction and drawdown statements in all relevant jurisdiction motions (as is required for fiscal impact--assuming so required) and permitting processes;
28. Establishing a climate emergency department to oversee the citywide mobilization effort;
29. Fountains should be put on timers to prevent the wasting of our most prized and needed resource water. We all see this: too much fountains on in the rain and being ran at night;
30. All fast food businesses should be held responsible for having separate paper, plastic, and food waste bins.
This page last updated on 10/15/2020