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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCFE minutes 061118Attachment 1 Orange County Commission for the Environment Meeting Summary June 11, 2018 Richard Whitted Building, 300 West Tryon Street, Hillsborough Present: Bradley Saul (Chair), Jim Eichel, Carrie Fletcher, Will Stanley, Lynne Gronback, Laura Doherty, Emily Mixon Absent: Bill Kaiser (Vice Chair), Kim Piracci, Matt Crook, Jeremy Marzuola, Bill Newby, Bill Ward, Alan Parry, Jody Eimers, Staff: Brennan Bouma, Kim Livingston I. Call to Order – Saul called the meeting to order at 7:30. II. Additions or Changes to Agenda –The approval of Draft Minutes from May14th and The Roadside Wildflower item were both postponed due to the lack of a quorum. Also a group discussion on State of the Environment (SOE) Indicators took the place of Committee Meetings. III. Approval of Draft Minutes from May 14th, 2018 - Postponed due to no quorum IV. Roadside Wildflower Conservation - Postponed due to lack of quorum V. Committee Meetings Following a presentation on the 2019 State of the Environment (SOE) update process, new CFE members chose the Committee’s they would join. Staff encouraged new members to consider committees with fewer members. Laura Doherty and Jim Eichel selected the Air and Energy Committee. Emily Mixon selected the Water Committee. CFE members discussed planning for the 2019 SOE. Saul shared the guidance from the BOCC that he received on behalf of the CFE that the CFE create something brief and clear and easy to update more regularly. Saul also interpreted a request by the BOCC for the State of the Environment report to illustrate “local signs of climate change.” Saul said that they were looking for changes our local environment that you can point to as impacts of climate change. An example of this would be an eruption of certain kinds of bugs more common in warmer climate zones. Several CFE members also expressed a desire to settle on a good set of indicators that would be relevant in the future so that we could track changes over time. Stanley commented that the choice of a format for the SOE will have a bearing on the selection of indicators. Saul suggested that the CFE could have a larger report and/or a larger set of screening indicators and then summarize further to a condensed product that focuses on the most salient or actionable findings. Gronback reminded everyone Attachment 1 that the Commissioners are interested in something brief , and that websites may be helpful and reduce paper waste, but they still need to be created and maintained. The discussion then focused on reviewing the list of possible indicators generated by the UNC students the CFE worked with in the Spring. Each committee had met or emailed in the interim between regular CFE meetings to select a few priority indicators, and they reported on their discussions to be entered into the public record: Water Committee: Stanley reported that he had emailed with Kaiser to discuss indicators. They may be interested in replacing groundwater level data with groundwater use if the data is available. Fletcher mentioned that a well permit database is available. They also said that Acid Deposition and Proximity to Waste Treatment facilities are not top priorities in this County. Other indicators not yet considered are stream flow, change in provision of water and sewer service, the temperature of the water and air, amount of precipitation, and potentially soil moisture. Land Committee: The members discussed their interest in removing the biosolids indicator and made a comment that a portion of their indicators such as population change could be moved into a general indicators section, and that there is some overlap with solid waste. Air and Energy Committee: Due to the minimal attendance of committee members, Saul led a review of the email that this committee sent with their priority indicators. This committee had a specific interest in removing the lead paint indicator and at least changing the energy prices indicator and limiting to just a few that could be updated more frequently. Surveys could be used to get a representative sample of some of the indicators they selected. They also mentioned that there will also be a tool rollout in the Fall where the basic information to input into the ICLEI ClearPath tool will be available across the Country. [Additional detailed comments were added to the indicator spreadsheet attached to these minutes.] VI. Updates and Information Items  CFE Idle Reduction Memo (Attachment 11) Bouma gave an update on the No Idling Campaign Petition. Bouma said that the CFE’s recommendations had been passed back to David Stancil and he intends to get Manager input as well before making a response to the Board of Orange County Commissioners (BOCC). VII. Adjournment – Saul adjourned the meeting at 9:44.