Metro came through in a big way for Los Angeles by releasing a report yesterday that advances implementation of an integrated sustainability policy and commits the agency to work towards making best management practices its standard way of doing business.
When Climate Resolve began talking to other organizations about forming the EnviroMetro coalition last year, our focus was on finding better ways for people to get around LA. Naturally, our focus was on reducing greenhouse gases, preparing for the impacts of climate change, and improving the quality of life for Angelenos. Making it a coalition effort, bringing in the broad-base knowledge of the 68-organization-strong coalition, and creating a constructive space for diverse stakeholders to contribute to the advancement of agency policy at Metro has really paid off and set the tone for further progress going forward.
The Metro policy lays out a process for setting sustainability goals and performance metrics and further establishes a sustainability council that includes external expert stakeholders who will have an advisory function to ensure that Metro’s various sustainability strategies add up to meet the agency’s targets.
It was great to hear Metro Board Directors Sheila Kuehl and Eric Garcetti speak about the importance of integrating sustainability goals into everything that Metro does. Also exciting to hear them urge staff to look into creating a Chief Sustainability Officer position so that Metro can have a more unified approach of recognizing the interplay of sustainability and the agency’s many functions.
Strong, progressive leadership is needed.
Having the foresight to integrate sustainability features into all of Metro’s projects now will pay off for many years to come.
