February/March 2009
Executive Director's Corner
C O N T E N T S
Executive Director's Corner: Crossing The Potomoc
LEED: Fort Carson Building Awarded First Army LEED Gold
Neighborhood Development: LEED Neighborhood Development in Colorado
Recyling News: Some Thoughts on Recycling Old Office Furnishings
Sustainable Development: Creating a Sustainable Future
Getting Green Done: Forgive Me Father, I Don't Have the Money
Sustainable Strategy: Creating Effective Collaboration and Leadership Tactics
Executive Director's Corner: Major Speaker Announced for May Conference
Metro Branch Update: Denver Metro Branch is Looking for Volunteers
VISION
Promote responsibility for Colorado's environmental legacy.
MISSION
Advance and promote sustainable planning, design, construction and operation of the built environment through education, improving industry guidelines, policy advocacy, and information and resource sharing.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Dana Kose, Chair
Universal Development Company
Jim Bradburn, Vice Chair, Chair Elect
RMH Group
Megan Christensen, Secretary
US LendLease Communities
Sebastian De Atucha, Treasurer
3BY
Clay Benson, Director at Large
Mortenson Construction
Mike Lowell, Director, Advocacy
US GSA
Bobby Molinary, Director, Membership
Julie Edwards, Director, Education
Oz Architecture
Matt Arabasz, Director,Northern Colorado Branch
RB+B Architects, Inc.
Joshua Radoff, Director, Resource Development, and Communications
YRG Sustainability Consultants
Bethany Trumble, Director, Southern Colorado Branch
Farnsworth Group, Inc.
Liz Sharrer, Director, Metro Branch
Holland & Hart
Mike Kolesar, Director, Emerging Green Builders
Facilities Engineering Associates
Deb Kleinman
Executive Director,
USGBC Colorado Chapter
Colorado Building Green is the official newsletter of the U.S. Green Building Council – Colorado Chapter, and is published bi-monthly. If you are interested in submiting a story, ideas or other information for publication, please contact the editor at dgloffreda@msn.com
Green Economic Development
Crossing the Potomac: USGBC Colorado Executive Director Goes to Washington
By Deb Kleinman, Executive Director, USGBC Colorado Chapter
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Growing Good Green Local Jobs
In between sessions at the conference, I had the opportunity to meet and talk with people engaged in innovative work from across the country to share best practices, ideas, and emerging strategies for green economic development. Here are just a few highlights:
The Long Island Green Home Program, Babylon, NY: This innovative self-financing residential retrofit program allows citizens to pay for residential energy efficiency upgrades at little to no cost and without assuming new debt. The Town does this not through a loan program, but by expanding the definition of solid waste to include energy waste, based on its carbon content. This allows Babylon to provide energy efficient upgrades to residential homes from its solid waste fund, a measure known as a “benefit assessment.” The homeowner then pays a monthly benefit assessment fee, structured to be less than the monthly savings on a resident’s energy bills. I have had the opportunity to meet Town Supervisor Steve Bellone and Babylon Energy Director Dorian Dale several times now, and look forward to seeing this innovative program replicated in Colorado.
Green Jobs/Green Homes NY, Center for Working Families. This statewide program is an ambitious statewide program to retrofit one million homes in New York over a five-year period. The goal is to pay for the program’s upfront retrofit costs through massive third-party investment (i.e. pension funds and/or private investments) and paid back through residential energy savings without any impact to the state’s budget. Here, the program would be paid back through a monthly line item on homeowner’s utility bills.
East Bay Green Corridor Partnership (EBGCP), Berkeley, CA. Northern California has long been known for its role in emerging green technology. Many of the start-up companies focused on emerging environmental technologies have spun off from the University of California Berkeley and at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, only to relocate to the South Bay area in and around Silicon Valley. A number of partners in the East Bay have joined together to form the EBGCP. The partnership is a model of subregional cooperation and leadership in sustainable economic development and addressing climate change. While in its early stages, this collaboration of 37 jurisdictions and 2 counties has already attracted a million dollars in grant funding and significant press.
Colorado Green Jobs Working Group (GJWG)
The GJWG is a partnership of New Energy Economy stakeholders who represent industry, education, and workforce development interests. Launched in January 2008, I have been representing USGBC Colorado on the GJWG since early last summer and am available through this collaborative effort to the green building community as a speaker on Colorado Green Jobs. The first major accomplishment of this group has been the commissioning and publication of a major green jobs study, which forecasts the potential impact of the renewable energy and energy efficiency sectors on the Colorado economy over the next twenty-five years. The take-home lesson: both sectors have enormous potential to generate good, local, sustainable jobs here in Colorado.