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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2016/06/01 - ADMIN - Minutes - Environment & Sustainability Commission - RegularMINUTES ENVIRONMENT AND SUSTAINABILITY COMMISSION: SUSTAINABLE SLP ST. LOUIS PARK, MINNESOTA June 1, 2016 Community Room, City Hall MEMBERS PRESENT: Chair Rachel Harris, Francie Abramson, Chris Anderson, Joe Barten, Terry Gips, Julie Rappaport, Nancy Rose, Judy Voigt EXCUSED ABSENCE: Jayne Stevenson, Ryan Griffin STAFF PRESENT: Shannon Pinc, Environment and Sustainability Coordinator; Jane Adade, Staff Intern; and Recording Secretary (Ms. Pappas). GUESTS: 1. The meeting was called to order at 6:36 p.m. 2. Chair Harris opened the meeting and welcomed the new commissioners. Commissioners and staff introduced themselves. 3. The minutes of the May 4, 2016 meeting were approved with several additions which staff will incorporate. 4. Business a. Welcome new commissioners i. Chair opening remarks – Chair Harris noted the commission’s key goals and primary focus. Information booklets were distributed to the new commissioners which included the annual report, the norms, and additional information. Chair Harris explained the key goals as follows:  Comprehensive Plan – Long range planning document the City produces and the commission wants involvement in the process to ensure sustainability is considered throughout the plan.  Climate Action Plan – Partners in Energy are the champions of this initiative and are currently working to incorporate it into the comprehensive plan, which is the City’s 10 year visioning statement.  Green Step Cities – this growing program is endorsed by the City, and the Commission has worked on the qualifying steps with the help of Shannon, in an effort to build sustainability and become more environmentally friendly. Chair Harris added the Commission’s primary objective is to review topics that the City Council forwards to them and provide feedback and statements. She added the commission has a Facebook page which provides an opportunity to post information and drive the public to that site, which discusses issues about sustainability and the environment. Environment and Sustainability -2- June 1, 2016 Commission Meeting ii. City Attorney Soren Mattick – The City Attorney presented information on the City’s Open Meeting Laws, Conflict of Interest rules and Gift Law. He noted this presentation as recently done for the new City Council as well. He noted the basic premise of the Open Meeting Law states that all decisions made by the City Council or any of the Commissions must be done in a public forum, where the public can attend the meeting and observe. He continued that emails are a concern, and the rule here is to not involve more than one person in the email exchange, so as not to form a quorum, where commission or city business is discussed. This is a violation of the open meeting law, and can expose both commissioners and the city to liability. The rule to remember is that commissioners can communicate by email, but not create a consensus. Do not reply all in an email from staff, so as not to allow a discussion to ensue. This also applies to the forwarding of emails, if a discussion begins related to official business, and consensus is formed. The commissioners asked about the work groups and if these rules also apply to email communication here. Mr. Mattick noted the same rules apply to work groups, and are subject to the open meeting laws. He added that both text messages and social media are subject to the open meeting laws as well. Further, Mr. Mattick pointed out the it does not matter if a commissioner is using a personal computer, or work computer, or personal or work email accounts, everything is still subject to open meeting laws. Conflicts of Interest – Mr. Mattick explained the conflict of interest rule says commissioners may not use their position with the city for financial gain, and they are prohibited from entering into business with the City. Additionally, the city is prohibited from entering into any contract with a business, if the owner is on the City Council or works for City. Mr. Mattick noted these bylaws were approved by the City Council and apply to all city commissions. He detailed the rules here by noting that to avoid the appearance of any impropriety, commissioners cannot enter into any contract between board members and any business venture they may have; they cannot use their position as a commissioner to advance others within the city; and they cannot use their office or act in any manner which gives the appearance of impropriety or conflict of interest. Environment and Sustainability -3- June 1, 2016 Commission Meeting He added the appearance of an impropriety is a concern even though the action may not be an actual impropriety. He added these bylaws apply to city boards and commissions, however they do not impact the city council. The rules are self –imposed by the city council, and issues area on a case by case review basis. There was some confusion by commissioners related to interpretation of the bylaws as it relates to co-sponsorship. Terry noted that typically a commissioner might excuse themselves from a discussion and vote if there is a conflict of interest. However, Mr. Mattick stated if there is a conflict, that is the norm, but there are certain instances where a whole group can be disqualified due to the conflict of interest with one member of that group. Chair Harris noted that the commission has followed the language of the bylaws in the past and has avoided the appearance of conflict of interest. Gift Laws – Mr. Mattick explained as a board member or commissioner, one cannot receive gifts from outsiders, or receive gifts which may influence a commissioner in any way. No gifts, dinners, tickets, trips, etc. may be accepted at any time. iii. Shannon’s role in the City – Shannon noted her title is Environment and Sustainability Coordinator, and explained her role and her job description to the commission. She stated she plans and implements environmental and sustainability resilience programs across departments; serves as staff liaison for this commission; plans and helps with meetings, action items, and works with other staff; as a technical resource to all citizens and commissioners related to environment sustainability. Additionally, she develops reports which are delivered to the city council, that come out of commission meetings, and she also applies for grants. Shannon noted that over the past year, she has spent 50-80% of her time working with the Environment and Sustainability commission. Chair Harris said the commission is very glad Shannon is here to support the group, and thanked her for her explanation of her role. Currently Shannon is working on Green Steps, grant applications, various events, and presentations for other city and outside meetings. She is also working on the final Energy Plan from the Partners in Energy program. There will be an 18-month implementation phase and the goals will be laid for the 4 focus areas: Energy Efficiency, Renewables, Climate Action Planning, and Youth Involvement. Environment and Sustainability -4- June 1, 2016 Commission Meeting Joe asked what the commissions role is related to the Energy Plan. Shannon stated the commission’s role will be to sanction the plan, however, currently more data is needed, along with more discussion, before the final report will be moved to the city council. She noted this has not been passed on to the city council as yet. However, the Climate Action Plan (as part of the larger Energy Plan) was presented and approved by Council and she is working on an outline to procure consulting services to help develop the plan. iv. Discussion/Vote to change July 6 meeting to July 13 – The commission discussed this and decided to keep the meeting scheduled for July 6th on the calendar at this time. b. Overarching Goals i. Comprehensive Plan – Chair Harris noted this is a multi-year planning document, and currently the city is in the early stages of planning. She added that city staff is leading this process and there will be a series of community visioning and input sessions scheduled. The plan itself will have 8- 10 chapters, and public meetings will be held in order to engage citizens and city staff in sharing. She added the city council is aware that the Environment and Sustainability Commission is interested in this process and in participating in it. The Comprehensive Plan takes about 1.5 years to write and is strategic and long- range. Chair Harris added it must be completed by December of 2018. ii. Green Step Cities – Chair Harris noted that this is both a work group and a key goal of the commission. She added it is a framework for the environment, water, and other areas. The current work group is Nancy, Renee, and Shannon and others are encouraged to join, especially the new commissioners. Shannon showed the commission the Green Step Cities website, noting there are 29 best practice categories, and specific items within the sustainability process. She added the website shows what other cities have done with this program, and noted it is a resource also for networking and sharing resources and best practices; and not only about the award process. She added the city council supports it and city staff understands it, and the Green Steps goals are aligned within all of the work groups. Joe commented this is an opportune time to be working on the Green Steps program, as the city also begins its work on the Comprehensive Plan. iii. Climate Action Plan – Chair Harris noted that Commissioner Ryan Griffin is key on this initiative and has worked diligently on this plan. Shannon recapped that it is still a concept at this time, however a resolution has recently been Environment and Sustainability -5- June 1, 2016 Commission Meeting passed by the city council to begin the process 30 days after it’s passing. The scope of the work is not fully formed yet, however youth will be involved. She added the city staff hopes to have the plan completed by the end of 2016, and this will also involve a focus on greenhouse gas data and meeting the goals of the larger energy plan. City staff is also interviewing others who have been involved in similar efforts in the past, as they work on the plan. Shannon noted she will be working with Larry Kraft to learn how the youth would like to stay involved. c. Policy Conversation i. Bring Your Own Bag Ordinance Statement – Chair Harris noted the commission has been working on a statement to send to the city council about this ordinance. Comments were sent to Shannon by commissioners, for integration into the final statement, which is presented to the commission for review this evening. Chair Harris stated she incorporated all comments into the statement, keeping in mind that the city council has asked for brevity from the commission. She added that three different voices were integrated into this statement. Motion was made by Nancy Rose to accept the proposed statement related to the ordinance and seconded by Terry Gips. Terry expressed appreciation for all the work Rachel had done combining the three different sets of comments. He also acknowledged the work Rachel and Judy had done in in preparing their original one page draft which he incorporated in his draft. And he thanks Judy for the research she did on LCAs. He had two overall comments. First there were a number of important, specific policy recommendations that were made in Rachel and Judy’s original one page document that he incorporated along with several others in his full draft proposal. He feels these are important to share with city staff and council in order to guide their implementations. Second, he emphasized that the overall zero waste and sustainability framing language he included in his draft was important to share with the staff so it could be included at the beginning of the ordinance so it would contextualize the ordinance as only one step of a much larger zero waste and sustainability effort by the city. Terry made a friendly amendment to the original motion to include framing language as part of closing statement. Chris developed the following statement to be included in the last paragraph of the report to be sent to the city council: If approved by council, the commission plans to make additional recommendations regarding implementation. Environment and Sustainability -6- June 1, 2016 Commission Meeting The friendly amendment motion was accepted by Nancy, and passed unanimously by the commission. d. Work Groups – i. Existing Work Groups- Shannon will send out a grid to all commissioners related to work groups. Chair Harris encouraged all new and returning commissioners to reach out to Shannon for contact information of those in charge of the work groups. She asked each commissioner to decide which work group they would like to be on by the July meeting. ii. Education & Action – this work group now only consists of Julie and Terry, and they welcomed the new and returning commissioners to join this work group. Julie commented on the upcoming Parktacular event scheduled for June 18. She and Terry encourage commissioners to be involved in the Saturday parade. Last year Terry and Ryan and their families rode their bikes in the parade and handed out ESC informational flyers. Please contact Shannon, Terry or Julie to participate. Additionally, Julie promoted an upcoming tour of the St Louis Park organics collection waste area and suggested August 11th from 11-1:30 p.m. Hennepin County will provide a donated bus, and she encouraged all to attend. Other upcoming events information should be sent to Shannon for distribution to the commission. Please provide as much lead time as possible for Shannon. iii. Green Step Cities – Shannon shared information on this work group earlier in the meeting. The meeting was adjourned at 8:38 p.m.