The city of Vancouver has a moral and economic duty to combat climate change. So do other governments at all levels — city, county, state and federal.
But as city officials approach an ambitious plan for reducing carbon emissions, improving energy efficiency and enhancing clean-energy solutions, it is essential that goals be realistic and achievable.
Efforts must be more than lip service designed only to make elected leaders feel like they have accomplished something. Such virtue signaling long has inhibited opportunities to address climate change.
In 2007, for example, then-Gov. Chris Gregoire signed a law saying that Washington governments had to switch their vehicle fleets to run solely on electricity or biofuel by June 2018.
But in June 2018, media reports indicated that Seattle had 178 electric vehicles in its fleet of 3,410 city-owned buses, cars and trucks. Spokane, the state’s second-largest city, had a fleet of more than 1,000 vehicles and one was electric — a Nissan Leaf.
In other words, talk is cheap. And while talk of climate change and the need to cut carbon emissions has helped raise awareness, municipal governments must focus on action.
Vancouver is moving toward adopting a goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2040. It is an earnest plan, one that officials describe as “leading edge” and one that shortens the timeline adopted by most other cities.
Clark County and other cities in the region also should embrace serious plans for slowing climate change; the issue cannot be ignored.
During a Vancouver City Council workshop last week, city staff detailed the progress toward drafting a multiple-item climate action plan, an initiative approved last year in conjunction with environmental company Cascadia Consulting Group.
Officials said they have advanced 12 of 13 action items, with many expected to be completed by the end of the year. Aaron Lande, the city’s policy and program manager, noted the urgency: “Already, the science is starting to shift and say that 2050 is too late, and we need to be moving faster than that. You’ll see that we’ve laid out a very aggressive pathway to get there.”
For the benefit of the public, details must be clear and attainable. As City Councilor Diana Perez said: “We can talk big-scale macro, but (we need) something that us and the public can wrap their hands (around) to see something tangible.”
Proposals focus on sectors such as buildings and energy, expanding the use of renewable energy in city buildings and operations; transportation, including electric options in the city’s fleet; water and waste; and governance, including staff capacity to implement a climate plan.
To help members of the public wrap their hands around the proposals, city leaders plan community roundtables and outreach, paying particular attention to questions of equity. City Manager Eric Holmes said: “As we pursue that goal, we’ll look to balance the impacts of the economy, how we achieve appropriate and context-sensitive density and how we invest in mobility.”
All of that, however, would be diminished without a robust and effective plan for implementation and for bringing the goals to fruition. As we indicated earlier, empty promises from government are as damaging as no promises.
Last year, for example, Gov. Jay Inslee issued an executive order mandating that the state’s fleet of vehicles be all electric by 2040. We hope it receives more attention than the 2007 law signed by his predecessor.
