Climate Action Plan Standing Committee

DRAFT 10-27-2021 Climate Action Plan Standing Committee Regular Meeting October 20, 2021 The regular meeting of the Climate Action Plan Standing Committee held on Wednesday, October 20, 2021 at 5:30 p.m. in the City Council Chambers Conference Room at City Hall, 415 East 2nd Street. Board Members Present: Lydia Fahrenkrug, Karin Hilding, Casey Lewis, Kate McMahon, Robin Paone, Liz Records Board Members Absent: Ben Davis, Joe Page Guests: • Maria Butts, Director of Parks & Recreation, City of Whitefish • Dave Laing, Sure Water Systems, Kalispell A. Call to Order 5:33pm by Kate B. Approval of Minutes from Aug. 18, 2021 Meeting Robin moved, Casey second C. Communications/Outreach/Education (30 minutes) • Meet with Dept. Head/Boards & Commissions - Park & Rec Dept. City of Whitefish Irrigation & Landscape Master Plan Dave of Sure Water led discussion: Evaluation Process Sure Water evaluated approximately 20 sites around the city. Found some sites outdated and many with potential. Found water waste due to aging systems and inability to manage and monitor the systems. Opportunity to implement new technology with Wi-Fi-based controllers including weather shut-off devices. Recommendation for Parks Sites: Put together list of retrofits and new technologies that are easy to implement. Principle recommendations are: a master shut-off, Wi-Fi management, and weather shut-off. Most stressed was the implementation of Wi-fi-controlled automation with controls and alerts. Estimates of water saved 25-30% accomplished by scheduling and other simple techniques. Future thoughts are some of these recommendations could be applied to other city departments and commercial services, not just parks and recreation. Also a future enhancement would be “master valving” which monitors flow meters and can automatically shut off if there is unscheduled flow. Implementation Plans: 1 DRAFT 10-27-2021 The budget is in place. Using components from Hunter Industries. Purchased Wi-Fi controllers, flow meters and weather shut-off devices. Hope to get as many in place before next spring’s operating season. Other Recommendation: Switch to Lake Water Irrigation Another Recommendation is to switch over to using lake water irrigation along the northern part of highway 93. Golf course city water line crosses with a lake water line so it could potentially be an easy upgrade saving ~ 406K gallons of treated water. Water rights for river are the same as for the lake and the city does have water right allotments. Dave says energy savings on making this change could be huge. We could put this on our “to do” list as a committee to see how it translates to reducing carbon emissions. Other Recommendation: City Code Updates Some simple water saving design guidelines which include a small handful of recommended components could be incorporated into our city codes. Karin has question for HWY 93 south – are there any plans for this area? Dave says definitely are area of interest to make improvements. However, it is currently difficult because of ongoing commercial development. Landscape Plan by Forestoration Discussion led by Maria Their recommendations for the use of drought-tolerant plants. Not all recommended plants are native. Useful plant identification guide has been developed. It also includes recommended mulches, turf grasses, etc. This guide is then provided to any consultants who are working on city landscaping projects. This guide has been approved for Parks and Recreation. Kate mentioned ideas for leveraging this guide for other properties in the city for new building or for landscape renovations on existing properties. City pollinator gardens will have signs listing the plants used. Parks and Rec budget planning starts in January. • Other Communications Scheduling for next meeting Brian Schott who worked on Sustainable Tourism Plan if available. Karin will contact him. D. Coordination with Climate Action Plan (30 Minutes) • Board Vacancy - Section 2-17 of Municipal Joe wishes to be part time because fire department is short-staffed. And, we have a vacant seat for a planning department representative. Considering a change to the committee to have one committee seat to be flexibly filled by either a staff member or a citizen member. And, if filled by a staff member, they could be from any department; not required to be fire 2 DRAFT 10-27-2021 department. A move to forward request to city council was made by Karin. Liz seconded. The committee voted in favor of the motion. • Council Goal Setting (See attached) The purpose of this review is to try to coordinate better with various city departments by what’s in in the Climate Action Plan. And, to help departments with annual goal setting keeping the Climate Action Plan in mind. Fiscal year goes from July 2021-June 2022. Decided a review of council goals is needed. CAP committee members agreed review City Resolution 21-18, which lists the annual goals for the city, to see where the goals fit into the Climate Action Plan and what could be added in the future. Goal section assignment: • Robin - Administration • Karin and Casey – Public Works • Liz – Parks & Rec • Lydia – Police & Fire department • Kate - Planning • Budget Proposals (To be determined) No discussion at this time. E. Project Updates • Existing Projects (10 minutes) o Recycling (Karin) The curbside recycling proposal received much feedback with strong opposition. The main complaint is the need to deal with the bear problem by getting bear-proof city containers. An additional complaint was the incurring of additional fees for residents. It is felt the bear- proof containers should be done first before curbside recycling is implemented. The curbside recycling proposal will be voted on Dec. 6th. The committee feels strongly that a recycling solution is needed. The committee feels it might be time to reevaluate recycling options and they want to be part of the discussion. • Other Karin is in talks with FEC on a community solar project. FEC would install the system and be responsible for maintenance. It would be located on City property by the wastewater treatment plant. It’s a financially more viable option than previous project proposals. Karin will send out to the committee an agreement template used by FEC for solar projects. The committee can then talk about it at the next meeting. • Proposed Projects (10 minutes) o Guidelines & Best Practices for buildings, subdivisions, site design (Robin) Topic postponed to next meeting – ran out of time. o Montana Facility Finance Authority – Commercial Building Energy Efficiency Financing (Kate) 3 DRAFT 10-27-2021 Topic postponed to next meeting – ran out of time. F. Other Committee Status Updates (5 minutes) Climate Smart Glacier Country has their last event of the season coming up on Wednesday, October 27th: “Beyond Recycling: Making Zero Waste Work” G. Public Comment (5 minutes) None. H. Adjournment 7pm 4