The Austin City Council received a memo on May 21 from the city’s Office of Sustainability outlining plans to invest in projects that will help Austin meet its climate and sustainability goals.
The Office of Sustainability prepared the memo in response to a February City Council resolution directing the mayor to review the city’s current sustainability plans and goals. The mayor has tasked the Office of Sustainability with the responsibility of putting together sustainability projects, including high-level cost estimates and timelines for achieving those goals, said Rohan Lilawala, climate project manager for the Office of Sustainability.
Councilman Ryan Alter said actionable change is necessary for a city like Austin to thrive, and he’s tired of the city’s cycle of setting goals but not taking action.
“Rather than continue this cycle, we thought why not stop and ask ourselves, ‘What does it actually take to achieve some of the goals that we’ve set?’ and ask our staff to prepare,” Alter said.
Caroline Gamble, a fourth-year student studying economics and sustainability, said taking more time to plan the projects would help people better understand how each project could improve the community.
“Taking the time to really plan things out will help you see how all the dots connect and understand how different things affect different people and why things might cause problems you never thought of,” Gamble said.
One of the categories outlined in the memo is water quality, water quantity and land. Alter said water conservation should be one of Austin’s main priorities. Of sustainability.
“We can’t make any more water, and it’s going to become more and more precious, especially as we grow as a city,” Alter said. “So we need to not only protect our water supply, but we need to invest in getting everyone to use less water. That’s a very high priority for me.”
Gamble said the city should prioritize making sure everyone has the essential needs they need to survive.
“It’s the same as making sure everyone has access to clean water and making sure everyone has access to a grocery store where they might not have a car,” Gamble said.
Alter said he wasn’t surprised that the total cost of the various sustainability projects, which will also address carbon emissions, city operations and community resiliency, is estimated at about $1.8 billion, especially in a large city like Austin.
“Making such a significant and large investment is costly, but choosing to do nothing will cost us even more in the future,” Alter said.
Alter said the next step will be to evaluate which projects are ready now and which need further development, and determine what steps need to be taken by the summer before the council adopts a budget in August. Alter said these decisions are just the first step in making Austin more resilient to climate change.
“Anyone who was here last summer knows how hot it was,” Alter said, “and this summer is no different. So if we want to be resilient as a city to heat and extreme weather, we need to make continued investments. This is just the beginning.” the.”
