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8.27.2026 Sustainability Committee

Video

Okay, let's check out the minutes.
Any comments on the minutes from the last meeting?
From the July, that's my third meeting.
Just to thank Rianne for doing them.
Okay, there's no changes then.
Can I get a motion to accept the minutes?
Solved.
Second.
All in favor?
Aye.
All opposed?
Very good.
Nice to the end.
And then committee organization, city recruitment.
Sounds like it's been working really well lately.
You've got Marta and Wendy.
Sorry, sorry.
So next meeting, you'll have to answer two checking questions.
Fair.
Is there any more recruitment going on?
Are we at, we still have empty slots in the committee?
We're at a new school year.
So we want to recruit for the Ego Club.
Whatever is the best pathway to do that.
Thank you.
We essentially have a student.
I just have to follow up.
He expressed interest over the summer.
He's a rising freshman coming from the middle school.
Thank you.
And said he would be, thank you, interested once the school year has started.
But I just have not be connected with him since the school year started today or yesterday.
That would be great.
Maybe he'd like to come as a guest just to see him.
I did invite him that over the summer that way, but I will remind him he doesn't have to commit.
right away, too. He can always just.
I just had a conversation with Hannah Dole, who is the, yeah, she's the teacher-sponsor.
Yeah, for the Ego Club.
And she was asking what, asking for information to share with the students to entice them and
it creates them to come to a meeting as well.
And we were talking about some other ways that we could possibly connect and to support one another in our ideas and some projects.
Yes. If you and I want to connect, I've gone before.
I've spoken to her. I've spoken to the Eco Club.
I know the last time I went to the high school was a big transition.
They lost some really strong leadership in the Eco Club.
And so they were kind of finding their feet again.
But, yeah, let's talk about it.
It might be useful to, if you talk to them again, to give them the list of our project priorities for the year
and say they'd be welcome either as a member or as a club or students who aren't members
if they wanted to get involved in any of those projects.
We've got seven or eight very nice projects for the year that are listed on the agenda.
Okay. Is that the only vacancy we have at the moment?
We got two other community members vacancies.
Okay. All right. Then we had the next item is shared documents.
Any updates on that?
Yeah, I don't know. It seems like we've kind of a reasonable grasp of that.
I've covered it.
Yeah. I mean, we're going to be talking about CIP proposals, so I think when we get to that,
we may need to touch on. We have graphs sharing them as I would to submit them.
Oh, I see. Yeah. I think tonight we're thinking of voting tonight.
Yeah.
So hopefully we all need to send it a high dot.
But if we do, then we can do.
Working groups, groups lost them six.
That's probably good enough.
Yeah.
When we get to the CIP proposals for the committee to submit, we can consider whether we can just
authorize the key authors to go ahead and submit it or whether the committee would like to look
at a draft or whether the subcommittee should look at a draft or whether the chairs should look at
a draft or whether just to let it let it rip.
We can talk about that.
So just to reiterate, Kate, you said that groups of five people or less?
So we have, right now we have 12 official members, not counting the two Eco Club students,
those aren't filled.
So a majority is going to be seven people or more.
So actually six people is the maximum amount of people you can have without meaning of a quorum.
And then the quorum is seven?
Quorum is seven, yep.
And that group of, a subgroup of six people.
can communicate via email outside of the meetings.
All right, next one thing we have here is 26 priority projects.
You'll see on the agenda that we've got item four priority projects.
These are the projects that the committee agreed would be the priorities for 20, 26 and
2027.
And I think in the last two meetings, we've gone through some of these, but not all of them,
particularly somewhere.
the leads on the topics were not able to come in meeting.
And then you'll see that the item five proposals for the 2028 SIP capital improvement plan.
So what we'd like to do is combine those.
So rather than going through the list of the projects or a subset of the projects and then coming back
SIP proposals,
we're going to talk about the projects and see which of those are potential SIP proposals from the committee.
Does that sound okay?
We're not sort of chopping it up and circling back.
On the Carfree challenge, these ones with the asterisk in the agenda are the ones that we've not discussed yet.
and then there are one, two, three, four, five that are one, two, three, four, that I know that some of us have been working on CIP proposals on those.
So we'll linger on those.
Those that do not have staff leads will cover in a future meeting.
So the first one is the car free challenge, and the lead on that is counselor,
Hopkins, and I think, Fred, you were going to get involved in that as well.
Is there anything to update on that, or should we leave that for the next meeting?
I've reached out to Andy, and she hasn't responded to me.
So we haven't made any progress together.
And the date of the proposed date of that is September 22nd, so it really not much time to get anything organized.
However, we could still just let people know about it.
I, the community climate organization, Seacoast Can, has already, is about to send out a mailing to its mailing list.
And it's going to mention this the Carfree Challenge.
Just have people to voluntarily participate.
And I was going to ask, Kate, is there a way we could get the, yeah, yeah.
So right now it's more of, since there's been no kind of planning of like a bigger event, it's just going to be a month of like,
success action.
Well, it's really just a day, really.
I mean, in the UN environment program, they designate September 16th and 22nd as being kind of a week in which these car-free challenges can occur.
And the 22nd is kind of the marquee date, but it can any time that week.
But so if you say that what our newsletter is going to say is that, you know, just on the 22nd,
you think about ways you can, you know, when using your car.
And just to keep it very simple that way.
So if you want to say something similar in the, say, newsletter.
If you send me the language for that, I can get it into the newsletter.
Okay.
Is that September 22nd?
Did you say September?
Yes.
Okay.
So that might be a good sort of effort to see how that goes and see if there's any interest in doing it the next year as well and expanding it.
any partners. But I think rather than waiting 13 months to do anything, it seems like a good
idea to give it a shot for the first time, get it on people's radar.
I'm going to tell you the weakest that.
I'm really if we could ask the schools to.
Yeah.
The schools would be a great.
And our news letter we say, one of the things you say is, you know,
and try to encourage your teenager to walk to school.
The blue ribbon bike pedestrian committee,
meets the first Monday, first Thursday of the month, so that's coming up.
Tyler and I and Councilor Hopkins are on the committee, so we could raise it with that committee
because that seems like along with the sustainability committee would be a really important
partner, particularly, let's say Sabre, SABR, particularly the co-chair of that is Matt
Glenn, the president of Saber, and they have a pretty wide distribution.
So maybe that would be a way of doing it.
And if we're able to connect with the schools, then I think Saber would be a good partner
for helping connect with the schools since the kids that would be walking and biking.
Okay.
I think that the ones that we know have SIP proposals coming are B,
electrification of city fleet, F, city solar plan, and G.
multimodal city. So why don't we do those? We'll do those last. And it looks like
when you have a nice write-up on the C, the stakeholder engagement strategy. So why don't we
do that? And then I think it can give up an update on the greenhouse gas inventory. And I think
we've covered the heat resilience study problems pretty well. Sorry. Did you skip over
electrification of city flea? We're going to go back to that because that has a
CIP. So we'll linger over B, electrification, C, zero waste, F, solar plan, and G,
multimodal city. Okay. Cool. Okay. So you want to talk about the stakeholder engagement?
Stakeholder engagement? All right. Yes. So you bring it up in the screen. Awesome. So I made reference to how I was
structuring this in our last meeting, but there's basically two tracks. One is a continuous
stakeholder engagement strategy. The other is project-based. These are not mutually exclusive.
In fact, they're best done together. But if we could only choose one, the project-based engagement would
be my preference because it means that each time we are doing a project, we are engaging with
relevant stakeholders for that particular project. If you scroll down a bit,
Um, the idea, the way that I'm proposing this is that we would have some sort of small working group, minimum two people that would focus on stakeholder engagement. This could also be collaborative with other committees. So the working group could be like two people from sustainability, two people from planning, two people from energy advisory. Just like, if we already know that multiple committees would benefit from having this kind of information, we can get them in the room. Um, and essentially, it's like we've got a list of mechanisms.
We have a list of stakeholder types.
These should all be on the printout.
And the idea is how do we either on a project basis or a continuous basis have relationships
with these people, with the best practices of closing a feedback loop, two weeks after contact.
So if you get coffee with someone within two weeks, email them back and be like, hey,
great.
and then also keeping a stakeholder engagement log of all activities.
Because what we are sort of fighting against is the more like,
Whisper Network style of like people who know people who know things who know other people.
And that is how sort of communities exist naturally.
But if we're able to get it documented, then it'll be slightly easier to track it project-to-project,
project, connect different people who might be interested.
If you scroll down a bit more, I have my barriers.
Oh, impact metrics. Those are important. I have decided totally on what they're going to be.
But how do we know that we are, that our process is good, that we're achieving the outcome,
that we're getting outcomes, and that we're achieving the impacts that we want?
That takes a little more work.
But if anyone loves metrics and wants to work on that part with me, let me know.
Otherwise, I'll just be doing it the way that it is now.
Anticipated challenges are very limited infrastructure, by which I mean having a stakeholder
relationship management system basically can't happen for this group in the way that a lot of, like,
we can't have a hub spot. We can't have a giant shared spreadsheet. The way that I'm planning
to get around that is to have the working group own it, because that'll only be two committee
members. And then when you are starting a new project or when you want to engage with a stakeholder
group, you simply go to the working group and you say, hey, I'm working on electrification of
the city fleet. Can you tell me which stakeholders I need to reach out?
to and how. Limited time, volunteer committee, you're also largely interacting with people
who are going to be doing with other volunteers, community residents, and then also the natural
fluidity of community, people moving in and out, people's, you know, being on vacation or their kids
are in school and suddenly like, it's soccer season, so you're not going to talk to them for three months,
or they're, you know, just busy. That is something that we can.
account for, but because we are working across a very large group of stakeholders, this isn't
like working in a business where you know everybody's going to be there nine to five and you can
find time on their calendars. I've broad groups, and I have a spreadsheet, collecting, like, some basic
contact info and trying to get that going, but my expectation is once it's handed off to the working
group, even if that working group is me. But, like, that knowledge will,
come in time. It's more that there is a centralized place to have that knowledge documented.
So my questions for the group, number one, I will take any open feedback. Number two, if there are
people who are interested in either working on the metrics, helping me work around any of the barriers
that I listed, or who a particular track appeals to, let me know. And then also,
Number three, working group interests or working group ideas.
That's what I'm looking for.
To avoid this being too expansive, is it possible to start with a focus on priorities of the Sustainability Committee?
So this is this engagement, for example, might as a top level, address the list of our priority projects?
Yeah, highlighting it with the priorities.
makes no sense. And if we wanted to solely limit this to project-based engagement
where we're not doing, be like, meeting every month with a different member of the city staff
is like what continuous engagement would look like. It would be much more reasonable for us to just say
we're only going to do project-based engagement and start with the projects that we have currently listed.
I would say making that a start and then being flexible if other things come up.
Like, for example, we had a speaker a couple of meetings ago who talked about this window project.
So you might put your mechanism and tools into effect for that, even though it's not one of the listed priorities.
So that flexibility, I think, would be great.
I would also offer, and this sort of goes in line with what Phil said, but things that are already
in the works, meaning, like, the health department is trying to work on skip the stuff
stuff with Kate. That's already an active project. If we could somehow get that represented and
included, okay, kind of engaged to help support that effort more and get it better out to the
community. That seems like it would be an effective. I think as long as it fits into the broad
heading as we've defined our role in sustainability committee,
So the health department, you mentioned the energy department.
If there are projects there, that you could fold into your mechanism.
Yeah.
Okay.
Cool.
Any other feedback, interest?
I can definitely start, like, piloting it with the Wendy and I are meeting in September to go over the heat.
I can kind of get that started again.
at least trying to bring this up to guide us for last.
Awesome.
Yeah.
We see if they can get better.
Thank you all.
That's great.
Thanks, Colleen.
Let's see.
Just as a reminder, when we're combining our
combining our updates on these projects,
we're, as applicable,
looking for updates, goals, outcomes, and next steps.
And for the,
four projects that we flagged next steps include SIPIP project proposals.
So stakeholder engagement.
Kate, did you want to say anything about the greenhouse gas inventory?
We had the briefing last month.
It's quickly.
It looks like someone trying to enter.
Thanks.
Yeah, Kristen.
Yeah, for greenhouse gas inventory.
So that is complete.
We're just waiting.
It's in a couple different departments for, like, final review of the language.
But hopefully I can put a presentation together for next month for our meeting.
But it's, unfortunately, it does not compare well with the 2021 results because we noticed that there
were some inconsistencies in 2021 that we didn't quite capture.
So, but it compares well with 2012 and 2018.
So we can at least, like, see how we've slightly.
I think one of the things to consider on that is what the implications are if you're
consistent prior years, current year, but not the cap year.
What impacts does that have on the analysis of the consulting?
Luckily, the cap used the 2018 emissions as the baseline because they also were like,
wow, 2021.
Well, that's not too, but like, just didn't fully wait.
But, yeah, the.
The cap holds some numbers from the 2021, so we can update the cap and say, with our new numbers.
Actually, that's a good point, because the cap is supposed to be updated.
So I should update the CAF language this fall with that before.
But it was interesting me, because some numbers really did shift in terms of like school buses.
We're not quite calculated right in 2021, so that's a smaller percentage down.
But the city and community vehicle fleet is still like.
one of the biggest, obviously.
But, yeah, we can pull up some charge and stuff next month to talk about.
So you might end up doing in a, like, a technical appendix or something like that?
Yeah, there's a couple of dependencies and a lot of disclaimants, but less disclaimers.
Because I think what's really important is a solid baseline, even if you have to kind of tweet that
and then enough consistency to look at change over time.
Yeah, we got different data over time from different sources.
But what was nice is that Ella, who wrote it, she compared the sectors to the past years.
So, like, 2012 and 2025, she calculated, like, certain sectors very similarly where the 2018 fellow did not.
So she compares sectors to what they were doing the same methodology in.
So there's some of that breakdown in comparison, which is helpful.
Yeah, that sounds good.
Yeah.
Because it's not so finely grain that you could have the sub elements of the sector.
Right.
There's like a city that's a lot more fine grain because you can separate out by buildings and by like departments and vehicle types and all that.
But for the community, it's really broad in terms of, you know, the county gave us a vehicle miles travel number for like the whole boundary of Portsmouth for travel and vehicles.
Then we got Unitills data for everybody's natural.
gas used, but we also estimated propane and heating oil because that data is not publicly
available for every user.
And then, yeah, things like Eversource.
EverSource was being, they have very strict rules about sharing data now that is new.
They weren't able to give us a full dataset.
So some of it's estimated based on six months of data instead of four year.
So there's some caveats with the community stuff, but it's not really drill talent.
the municipal side is.
Sounds like a lot of work.
Yeah.
Ella was, wow.
She was a rock star.
Yeah.
The report's like 60 pages long.
So, yeah, once it comes out, it'll be great to read through.
I don't know if maybe Ella can, she's got time to zoom in for the finale.
Yeah.
Okay, great.
Well, we'll put that on the agenda and let's she tell us to shift it.
Should be good for September.
That's what I'm shooting for.
Okay.
So let's jump to the heat resilience study.
You already mentioned that you and Wendy were up on that and we've got Kristen.
Right.
So not a CIP item necessarily, but not yet at least.
But Wendy, Kristen and I are going to meet along with someone else from the planning department
to just kind of kickstart it again because I kind of let it sit for a couple months this summer,
talk about kind of what we need to do for more outreach and we'll use.
Colleen's stakeholder engagement toolkit to kind of figure out who we haven't interviewed yet
and who we need to reach out to.
That's the update for that.
Okay.
Now, to the B, C, F, and G.
And I know that, I think that Effie, who's not here, and Colleen and Kate and Peter Brits met yesterday or the day before.
Yesterday.
...day before.
So if any of you, not if any of you, any of you want to do the update goal outcomes and next steps
and then move right into your thinking on a CIP, and I think maybe after the first one of these,
and let's, why don't we start with the electrification of the city fleet, we can talk about
the next steps for the CIP, whether the, uh, the, the, the disqualification.
description, the committee is fine with the description, and we can just give the green light to
Colleen, FECA, Kate to go ahead with the CIP.
For the CIP, I should say this is, for those of you aren't familiar with it, that the CIP is the capital
improvement plan, program, plan, and it's updated every year.
The city's fiscal year begins July 1st.
So we're now in the beginnings of preparing a CIP, not for 27, because that's the current CIP, but the next year's CIP, which would be 2028.
The CIP process goes on for several months.
So the final CIP for 2027 was approved in December 2025.
The budget for that was passed.
So the CIP is really more of a roadmap.
The actual funding for that comes through the city councils and staff's budget process.
So the 2027 CIP is final, took effect July 1st.
The budget was set for that prior to July 1st.
We're now talking about CIP proposals for the city's fiscal year 28, which begins July 1st.
Let's like that.
227.
The city's website, if you search for city of Fort Smith, CIP process, it's got really nice graphics with the timeline and the process,
which has multiple steps to it, and then it also has the final CIPs up for 20,
5, 26, and 27.
Let's see it.
Yeah, so this, I think, similar to last year, they kind of accelerated the CIP process.
So the whole CIP is supposed to be adopted by the city council this December.
So we really only have.
Yeah.
September to submit.
So citizen requests and committee requests are due by September 18th.
Department requests are due by the 25th, so a week later.
And then by October, we should be having some public meetings where citizens are requested
to come and present their ideas and submit public comment for them.
I have the CIP process timeline and the slides that were presented at the last council meeting.
So I'll pass those around and those are up on the website.
So anyway, it's a tight timeline.
September 17th is the deadline for citizen proposals and for committee proposals.
After that, there's a meeting of a SIP advisory committee that is composed of some city council members and some staff.
And they then invite presentations from committees.
We could make presentations to that for our proposals and from citizens.
For that.
This is really slow.
But if you just serve CIP or you go to planning and sustainability, it's in our department.
There's also a link in the agenda.
Oh, perfect.
But I think it goes to the form.
No, I think it's the page.
Oh, yeah, that's the deadline.
Yeah, it takes you to all the graphics.
So if we're going to put the time into doing these proposals,
we want to make sure that they fit into the process and timeline.
So to the electrification of city fleet, Colleen or Kate.
Yeah. Kate, did you, could you open the document?
That last one, the EV one did work because it's like a link.
Okay.
So I can't get it, but I got, I printed the other one.
All right.
I'm going to resend it while I talk.
I'm going to see how this goes.
So essentially, the feedback from planning was that the reason we can't do.
EVs. What I originally heard was that the technology wasn't there, to which everyone on this
committee said, what? That's super weird. And then I went to DC and I saw that like all of their city
vehicles were fully electric and I was like, this is very silly. So Peter clarified it is that like
snow plows, dump trucks, the really larger city vehicles, the technology on the market for cities
really is not sufficient. However, for passenger vehicles and trucks,
It is there. It's pretty good.
And so his recommendation instead of a consultant to plan the electrification of the city fleet would simply be to take that 50K that we requested last year for a consultant and instead just ask for electric vehicles.
Either both charging infrastructure, but then also the vehicles themselves will assume that it's maybe 20K for electric vehicle.
And then maybe 10K.
for the installation depends on which vehicles you choose.
And so that is what the proposal is, if I can find it.
So my questions for the group are number one is that a path that people are interested in pursuing for
electrification of the city fleet. There's other language in there that I, you know, trying to reach 30%
electrification by 2030. So this would be the first 50K and we're hoping for more 50Ks
subsequently as more and more fleet vehicles turn over. Just that every time we're buying something
new, it's electric. The other thing you might include there would be funding sources that can
help, you know, help pay for it. Specifically, there's one called the credit state clean fleet.
grant. This is money that Walswagon had to pay the United States government for the
part of their penalties for the easel gate issue. And New Hampshire gets one and a half million
dollars from that trust fund every year. So and cities are requests from state access to those
funds to help pay for things like school buses or, you know, fleet vehicles like, you know, vans and
pick up trucks, things like that. So I would include that in the proposal is to, you know,
to investigate sources of funding, such as granted state clean fleets grant. Yeah, I would say
one of the things that this, I literally just put this together. One of the things that really
lacks is useful website links and sort of the context. It lacks context. I was trying to keep the
description light, but also, you know, give some more, give it body. I don't know. I've
never written one before, so I'm happy to take feedback. But yeah, if anybody has links or examples of
other cities doing it, grants that we can include, that would all be really helpful.
Question. Is there already a budget established for ongoing buying of vehicles?
You're sort of? That's what we think. Yeah. It's involved like rules.
stock stock per department, like highway department. Separate from the CIG department, the sewer department.
Separate from the CID. But basically, Public Works has their own vehicle budget each department every year.
Because I'm looking for a leverage. Yeah. And so one thing we need to buy individual vehicles.
The other thing, when you talked about connectivity, if these rolling budgets, which are imagined thousands of dollars each year already in the budget,
they already switched over in their minds that we could go to electric feet
after than a combustion engine, which would be, I'm just...
Yeah. No, it's a good question in the meeting yesterday. It was kind of unclear how it works.
Like, I don't know. So there's two pieces, right? There's like directing that when new fleet
purchases are made, they're electric. Is that what you're saying? Is that what you're saying?
Yeah, that could be a leverage point.
You don't need to go to grants.
The money is already in the pocket.
In the budget.
And then there's the installation of charging infrastructure.
And we don't know what I'll look at.
So here's where I think it might be saying that the Sustainability Committee,
one of the major mental and actual blocks is that people say there aren't charging stations.
going to power energy and making sure the charging stations are available so that then
the purchases become easier for them to make that decision.
I think everything you said just makes sense. I am recalling that I feel like we've had this
conversation that you're proposing about the rolling stock before and if we could influence
decisions made about how those monies are spent. And I think part of the factor is that it comes back
to what Colleen initially said is a lot of DPW vehicles don't have,
there aren't effective models for the jobs they need to do, those vehicles to do on the market
yet, such as big trucks or snow plows or more heavy equipment kind of things.
So I remember trying to figure out how you balance the needs of what DPW needs to purchase,
with trying to encourage more electric vehicle purchasing.
Yeah, I think I understood that.
And I'm right where Peter when he says,
yeah, then I understand that.
Yeah, I'm just saying I think we've had,
we've talked about that very idea that you're suggesting.
Maybe what I'm wondering is how many just regular four-wheel drive cars are being bought each year.
That probably, I don't have any idea.
That's where I mainly thinking about.
this.
Right.
Yeah.
You know, pickup trucks and even, you know, sedan and things like that.
You see vehicles like that with Portman's public work stickers on the doors.
Yeah, I see them all over.
So that's what I mean.
Yeah, I agree with you wholeheartedly.
I think it's just trying to find the balance.
Where there's an electric option, the city should, you know, investigate when a vehicle has
to be replaced, there's an electric option available.
They should look at that at least and potentially access funds to help them make a purchase
to supplement the already ongoing budget for vehicle replacement.
And to kind of kickstart it by putting in the charging infrastructure at the DTPW lots, for example.
So that.
Yeah.
So what I'm hearing, like, to summarize, is we could change this SIP proposal to specifically refer to
charging infrastructure, the DPW lots or elsewhere, whatever is best for the city.
And then separately, we could either ask individual departments or the city council
to direct departments that when they are replacing vehicles, they look first for electric ones.
Within that, it might be, you know, it would be good on us to provide some sort of parameters,
what is reasonable, how, if it's going to be crazy expensive, well, what is crazy expensive?
That means very different things to different people.
If it's a range issue, is.
that, okay, well, how often does this car really go out of the city?
But that would be removing the 50K for the vehicles and saying, we're going to instead ask that
the existing budget for vehicle replacements be used for vehicles, and we're instead going to
ask 50K maybe is our ceiling.
I don't think it will take that much money to get charging infrastructure.
There's already 50K in the current CIP for a plan, though, right?
For a plan, yeah.
We could be asking that that be repurposed for vehicles.
And the SIP proposals can be multi-year.
I mean, they're not funding commitments.
It's sort of like recommendations on a roadmap that then gets fine-tuned and funded or not funded through the budget.
But if we're talking about something that's multi-year, we could propose multi-year installments,
if it's 50K for the next.
Next, the IP, we could ask for 50K for the next three CIPs if we wanted to.
And I'm not opposed to the 50K or the two vehicles because I think the other function is to make it visible.
So if we wanted to make this year getting two electric vehicles for the city and we say electric vehicles, so forth,
I think either way, I'm just thinking for the greatest.
Yeah, one, I think that you're, I wouldn't want to limit them if we already, if they
already think that that that is going to be a good showcase.
Mm-hmm.
So that, we're not really doing fine pointed financial recommendations as much as a
gent, supporting a general direction.
And when the staff does the review of the SIP proposals, they can come back and say this is already
being, this is already being funded through.
operating budget or this is being funded through non-zip process, which is fine,
but we put our idea on the table.
Yeah, I like that idea, because then city council can pick that up.
And if, you know, they don't, a staff doesn't fully support funding or the council doesn't,
they can say, hey, maybe we can explore making this a city policy.
Like a purchasing policy.
A city policy or setting a specific policy to spend X per year.
on vehicles as it makes sense to replace them.
So we're not getting down into the weeds, but we're really communicating sustainability priority.
And I think you heard from both Peter Rice and Peter Brits that's made sense.
So, and I know that we haven't had a time to look at this budget, but, or at the proposal.
Would I change?
So you're saying don't change it to only refer.
for charging infrastructure?
I didn't say anything on that.
Yeah, I think it'd be good to prioritize that as, as, say, primarily for use as for charging
infrastructure.
But the other dynamic is that if you're going to, so if there's a money in the capital budget
to replace, you know, vehicles and you want to replace a pickup truck that's, you know,
10 years old and worn out, it's going to be a little more expensive to replace it with
electric vehicle, then just to buy another gasoline vehicle.
So if you have to take a little extra money here, that might help make up the difference.
Okay.
That makes sense.
My feeling is that this needs more work, and September 18th is rapidly approaching.
So we can either have, like, a working group or...
I think that I don't know.
Could you, I guess for the committee to decide is if there's a working group, and I think adding Fred is great,
and maybe through Kate getting input, as you think is useful from Peter Brits and Peter Bryce.
But then, Colleen, if you're comfortable, being the author of that with the input from the working group,
are we as a committee comfortable,
with just sending that ahead because the alternative to that is having a special meeting before September 17th
because this full committee doesn't meet again until, what, the 24th or something.
I'll make a motion that the subgroup works together to draft a CIP proposal on, we call this item electrification of
city fleet and submitted on behalf of the committee, the second.
All in favor?
All in favor. All right. Hi. Hi. Okay. So maybe that can be a model for the other three.
Okay, good. Then we really appreciate the heavy lifting done by Effie, who's not here,
and Kate and Colleen on these three ones. The Zero Waste Plan.
Colleen or Kate, do you want to give the update on that and the next update on the status?
And then we can talk about next steps, which can include a CIP proposal.
Yeah. So, Effie had a really great proposal that I slimmed down just for fitting it into the form purposes.
And so my concern is I want to make sure that the most important messages remain.
in this.
This is
to hire a consultant to develop
a citywide zero
waste plan.
It's got
a couple different links, both
or references to links that will be actual links
in the form, both Portsmouth
plans, New Hampshire statewide plans,
some examples of
the composting facilities
changed the last time
curbside composting was like really explored by
planning department.
Also like Cambridge and some
other cities that have done
comparable plans that we
could like look at, okay, this is how other cities
are approaching it. So
what do
folks think? This looks
solid to me. Yeah. Awesome.
I think the other
very valuable thing is that
I think F. Effie and working with
Jess has put
together several of the committee's
CIP proposals over
the years. So I think particularly if
if Fafi is in the middle of these
three, that'll really help with
our experience on those.
Okay.
Any discussion?
Where is zero waste underlined?
It misspelled.
It wants a hyphen.
Oh, okay. You don't have to.
Do you be watching this to consultant?
Yeah. Again, I was
doing this at like five.
It's a B.
Okay.
So another
repeat motion
that the subgroup is
Colleen, what the subgroup is
this is you and Kate
and FFE. Yeah. I mean, there's more in the
zero-waite subgroup, but the
actual SIP writing
has mostly been FE.
Does anyone want to join
Effie and
Kille and Kate on
the subgroup? It has to be, what,
six?
six or less, which
involves giving maybe feedback
on a draft and
getting it in, I haven't been, I
missed the meeting, but I
have been included in emails and stuff
and been giving feedback. So
So the motion is
similar to the other one, that the subgroup
work together
to draft
a proposal on
a zero waste plan
and submit
to the city
through the process
by September 17th.
Great.
Second?
Second thought.
All in favor? All in favor? All right.
Hi.
Good.
So as we're going through these, Kate,
maybe you guys talk about this at the meeting.
When we did these last year,
I submitted them all as
a Portsmouth resident on behalf of the
Sustainability Committee. Are we operating?
that same way this year as well, or
is planning board kind of taking
I mean, planning department, taking
the lead and saying
this is on behalf of the sustainability committee?
Have we decided on that piece yet?
I think it's still the same format where
we have to either write in like the body
that it's a
sustainability committee
CIP item
voted on by the sustainability committee.
I don't know if you can like type in
where you input your name as a resident
and where you live.
like sustainability committee
or you do
just
Glasgow on behalf of. So it's the same
as last. So, okay. So
who's ever on these subcommittees? Someone
will need to submit it
on behalf of us. Yeah.
It's a sustainability committee.
In the zero waste one, the specific
language that Peter Rice gave
was expressing interest, not
support.
Was that the public works?
Yeah, is expressing interest but not support.
So that is what is in this
particular description, the very last sentence.
And all the subgroups
compare it with planning and DPW for the others.
Okay. So we passed that one. And I think
for the subgroup or the
committee member submitting it on behalf of the committee
then has the option of
appearing between the, before the CIP working group, which
comes up probably on the
whatever the timeline is
that I passed around has the date
on that or
what is that? Thursday, October 8th.
So Thursday, October 8th
to speak at that. I know I spoke at that
last year for a couple of the projects.
And then also at later stages
when the council is
reviewing CIPs after they've had
the input from the advisory committee
to speak at the public meeting
again on behalf of the CIP,
I think that Fred and Colleen
and I, and I think Effie did that
did that last year
for our various committee
projects.
Effie and I also did our
presentation to them last fall,
which wound up incorporating
the CIP stuff.
Remember when that that was?
that was probably in the midst of
Yeah, I think it was at one of those
meetings. I was just looking at the dates
and my hunch is maybe it was the
November public hearing one, but I'm not
sure, but I don't know if that's something
we want and we kind of did it
as a committee
report as well as an
advocating for
CIP that's
I think we have the option if we wanted to do
an annual report
from the committee. You and Effie did that
is the co-chairs
Fred and I might do that, or
maybe Councilor Hopkins
might do that on our
behalf. I think maybe we had that the year before.
I think last year we had guidance from
Councillor Denton, but when it would be best time to show up
and they say that. So maybe we can get guidance from
Councilor Hopkins. Yeah, and I remember that
because the CAP climate action plan
was new, they gave our committee a couple of extra
weeks to come up with two of the proposals
last, the last two proposals
and Councilor Denton then presented
those on our behalf and we got
unanimous vote for those.
Okay, so that's two of the three, and let's see, so that's
electrification, zero waste, and city solar plan.
Did we have a...
Yeah, if we sent a draft.
So the feedback, so we had originally, last year we asked
for a study done of where to put solar in the city,
and that money kind of got put into as a sub-
funding for the Jones Ave solar array.
In the meeting yesterday, the feedback from
Peter Brits was we have a number of buildings that were built
to be solar ready. And so we kind of already know
if we were to do rooftop solar where that solar would go.
And his recommendation was that it would be a better use of
the city's time to just start putting solar panels on
things instead of doing a study to see where the solar panels should go.
So the proposal for this year, well, for fiscal year 27, would be $840,000 for the Department of Public
Works edition, which is solar ready.
And these are all from an energy audit that was done for the city a few years ago.
Then the following year, $450,000 for the community campus building.
The following year, $400,000 for the Foundry Place garage.
And that's an estimate for that last one.
It's not clear what the number's from.
So this is instead of requesting,
bringing in a consultant and doing a citywide look,
and it's focusing specifically on rooftop solar as our starting point.
So those numbers you mentioned are,
are already in the mix?
So the 840 for DPW edition and $450 for the community campus building are recommend analysis from an energy
efficiency audit from a few years ago.
Yeah, so we hired someone to do a municipal building audit for energy efficiency,
but they did it pro bono, so they only did a handful of municipal buildings.
And that came out in June.
I don't think it's a public document.
document, but it's something that we just
got last
week from the facilities guy.
But in it, there's recommendations
for like
heating system replacements,
HVAC replacements, all the stuff that'll,
and it has like a spreadsheet of how
he metric tons of carbon.
It'll reduce our greenhouse gas
emissions by how much it'll cost
approximately what different grant options
are. But a couple of the
buildings did have opportunities for solar
and they had
estimates based, this was done in June, so relatively recently, based for DPW, community
campus, there was some fire station two and fire station three estimates, estimates for the library
and the middle school and things like that.
So I think we decided to start with DPW just because it was one of the more expensive ones,
but also it's the newest edition.
Is the DPW or other city staff working on CIP?
proposals for these annual amounts? Because I think our role probably is to encourage that and support it and not
come up with, you know, one and a half million dollars worth of solar. But if this is something that
the staff or DPW or planning sustainability departments are working on, then we can really work hard
to support it. That's the thing. I'm not entirely sure. I'll have to reach out and ask if they are. I have a
feeling they may not be right away just because they just got this document. But if it turns out that,
you know, we submit dual CIP items that kind of only strengthens. Well, could we submit a CIP
because I think it's sort of getting out over our skis to, to be recommending implementation of the plan
when the city staff and the DPW haven't decided how they want to approach that. But maybe we could do a
CIP proposal that encourages and supports whatever direction the staff and city takes without
getting down into the specific numbers on it.
Well, the CIP has to have a financial number attached to it. So I think that's where we're
in trying to apply steady funding to solar installations across the city.
Yeah. So do we have to submit a CIP to get that $840,000 activated?
Right, unless, and I can reach out to the city, the public work staff and see if they're already planning to do one of these buildings or if they have money that they're putting towards solar.
But if they aren't, then we have that opportunity as well.
But if they are, and we submit as well, I don't see why.
I mean, I suspect that probably to be putting in that kind of money for the first year is probably not that likely for the next CIP.
it may be the one before, but we don't really know that.
You mean like, you'd rather see a smaller institution go first?
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, it's really really up to the DPW and the city staff,
how they want to move ahead on that relative to the city's budget.
I suppose we could make the recommendation and support progress progress on the recommendations,
subject to the city's priorities, and they put a placeholder number in if that's...
Yeah, I mean, if we should have the number, we should ask for it, and it's...
It doesn't make it happen.
Could it be appropriate to just state what we've just talked about?
Yeah.
The Sustainability Committee, having become aware recently of those recommendations by these
studies of these figures, the committee is in support of bringing this amount of money
to the CIP recommendation consistent with whatever the staff is either considering or if they're
they want to, but somehow just state what we just said.
Can we leave that open-ended without a dollar amount?
That's what care. No, I'm saying we could say these amounts, we understand and recommend them
and support this direction. Subject to. Subject to what? The planning department and grants and so
forth. Yeah, the Energy Advisory Committee is likely to weigh in also. So if both we and the Energy
Advisory Committee recommend spending this money for the DPW building, then that'll give an extra,
extra support.
Yeah. And if they, yeah.
And this past year, the city was willing to consider spending $1.8 million for the Jones Avenue project.
So, you know, if they're willing to look at that kind of numbers for solar implementations, then, you know, they could just as easy to consider what we're opposing for the DPW building.
So we could reference that study and the numbers there.
Yeah, you can always, in the way that you input the CIP requests, you can always, you know, put a huge number, like a million dollars.
and say in the text, we would recommend spending up to a million dollars in the next two years on this, on one of these.
Chip, Jeff, you had a comment.
I was just curious. I think Colleen you had said it, or maybe I'm mixing them up.
But who suggested that schedule? Was that something that leader and the state? Yeah.
So the staff is already kind of. We just threw it out there.
Okay.
And these are all random, like, it doesn't really matter the order, I don't think, necessarily.
But what, yeah, what Peter Hood said was that the council was more open to, like, some big ticket items than lots of $50,000 requests that they, I mean, none of these are $50,000.
They're all hundreds of thousands, but that was the clarification on pricing or amounts that we got.
but I hadn't gotten the impression in that single conversation I had, so not a ton of information,
that there is an active, like, happening utilization of that report just yet, and so we could be the ones to get the ball rolling.
That makes sense.
Could the subgroup through Kate get input on this from Peter Brits and Peter Rice to make sure that what we're doing is helpful
and not way off track.
I think it would be great to get at least Peter Rice saying that that is at least one of these installs would be doable in the next couple years so that we kind of have some backing and it's now totally.
So you could say, well, we'd like to do half of it this year and half the next year or all of it the year after, and then we can support that.
But, Colleen, when you write the text, it can reference.
the study and that that our recommendations are, you know, subject to discussion and review.
We should take a big swing.
I mean, if we can.
Yeah, might as well.
And then it'll be on their minds.
If they exit this year, they'll think about it next year and we can bring it up maybe with a smaller amount.
I think of consideration is that, you know, the DPW building probably uses a lot of electricity.
So if they have, so they can take advantage of this.
So if they spend a $800,000, they're using all that electricity.
It lowers electric bills.
which probably are enormous right now.
So that's probably why they prioritize that building is because it's a known high electrical user.
Awesome.
So I will follow up with you and Effie.
Does anyone else want to be on that email?
Sure.
I'll be on the chest, please.
And we'll start just with getting input from staff and we'll see where it goes.
Is the committee okay with having a working group, or do you guys want to discuss this one more
and have a special meeting about it.
Well, we are, I'm okay with it.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think so.
I mean, especially if you get the input from through Kate, city staff.
Should we take a vote on that, or how does everybody else feel?
Yeah, we can take a vote to deputize them.
Another, another motion for the working group on the, the, um,
Solar solar.
So moved.
All in favor?
All in favor? All right. Hi.
Okay.
I'm guessing nobody's opposed because there's a couple hands in work based.
Any way of them.
I don't know if you can put your hands on the recommendations that we gave to the city
for some on this.
I'll pass that around.
I'll send you an electronic one.
Oh.
Show up on the screen.
Oh, did you send it to me?
Way back.
So we've done three.
The last one is the now called the multimodal city, which is the name of our priority.
But it references a project that's been in the CIP the last three years.
And before the current CIP was finalized in December, the city council asked the sustainability
committee to make recommendations for fine-tuning that CIP project.
And I'll pass around the recommendations that the committee sent to the council.
So this is not a new project.
This is a way of recommending our original recommendations, which I think have been lost a bit
in the process.
So this is, let's see, Kate, if you can't find that, you could probably
find the current CIP and the project.
Yeah, when did you send it to you know?
That would have been in November.
Oh, we sent it.
Yeah, we sent it to the city council as our recommendations.
You may remember that we had a meeting here with Red Nichols from the Coast director
and Sean Clancy, who's the EDC, EDC director to talk about this CIPP
project, which is basically to implement three of the strategies in the Climate Action Plan
to expand the use of public transportation.
And we've made recommendations, and they haven't always been reflected in the final CIP.
So if you see the recommendations, and I think Kate is going to find, if you do a word
search for micro-transit, you'll get it.
So this project, it was a standalone project in the 25 and 26 CIP, and at the end of the meeting to finalize the CIP for 2027 after the committee had received our recommendations a couple of weeks before, the last minute, at the end of a long meeting, they put it next to the parking project, which is a very major project.
for, I think, $2 million, yeah, $1 million.
And then there was $150,000 revenues, that that was going to go to both a feasibility study
for expanding public transit and also some analysis of parking sites.
So you see that in the fiscal year, 150,000, yeah, feasibility study to identify projects
that would augment or replace fixed route public transit service.
and
To develop it one of our pilot projects.
Yeah.
So there's been a lot of discussion, a lot coming from our committee, about not calling this project,
the micro-transit feasibility study, because from the first CIP proposal, it listed options for public transit.
It listed adapt or expand current coast routes.
A shuttle loop pilot project, a micro-transit project, and micro-transit is flexible routes and flexible schedules.
So it's on demand.
It's like a minibus that's operated like Uber, except it serves the public.
Generally, that is in place of current fixed route service.
When a community decides that it's fixed route service is being underutilized.
and decides to replace the fixed-right service with a flexible microtransit service.
Typically, it's done by a vendor. It's very expensive. The EDC had a presentation from
via the major vendor and provider of micro-transit service and estimated a million dollars or more
to do that. And I think that we as a committee and I have been saying that,
A microtransit is the weakest of all the options being considered.
And there's been a strong support for members of the city council.
Instead of doing a study of micro-transit to do a pilot project of a shuttle loop bus that could be based on an overlay of existing coast routes.
It could be on a major corridor such as the ones identified in the master plan.
For example, Route 1, Lafayette Road to middle to downtown.
instead of terminating and turning around the other direction, combine that with a RAP 41
that could continue down Islington to West End to CNJ and the loop loop back. So that's just one
idea and one proposal. But there's interest in, rather than doing a micro-transit consultant's study
to explore something like a pilot project and to do that quickly with, do that quickly with
coast. And the status of the micro-transit study is not clear.
At different times, it's been described as being developed or not being a micro-transit
consultant study, but maybe being a multimodal transit study.
The city council set out the one of the key goals for the next year is to make Fort Smith a
multimodal, a multimodal city in the future as a top priority.
Different versions of the SIP project, and this is now the fourth.
fourth cycle for this project. It had a task force that would be formed of city staff,
committee members, stakeholders. I think from all the interest in downtown parking could be
downtown workers. And I think there's good interest in that that task force could have started two years
ago, but has not yet, has not yet started. What action do we need to take on this?
I think the action to take is to
recommend for the current SIP project, that one, that it'd be sharpened to focus
on public transit alternatives and that a task force be formed and start and that the task force
include not just consideration of microtransit, but also the other alternatives that were
described in the previous CIP, the shuttle loop adapting current coast,
routes or a hybrid.
Why wouldn't we propose a pilot?
And I think that a part of that would be to say a task force to consider the pilot,
or we could just say we propose a pilot.
Yeah, let's do that.
Yeah, I think that actually would, what do you think, Tyler?
If I can join as a visitor, representing that if I can pass change it.
You're welcome.
I think that the sustainability committee should form a small working group to make that recommendation in concert with bike and pedestrian since we have interested parties in both areas.
Yeah, and it could be replacing that consultant study because there's already 50,000 for the consultant study, just to use that to explore a pilot or to do a pilot.
But I think you have to explore it before.
you do it and you have to talk to Coast to see what they could do with it and whether it makes
sense to get some funding from some of the private sector organizations like developers or
hospitality industry. But that that was always the original intent.
Do that through a CIP? Yeah.
So it's taken, so the CIP proposal is to reallocate the 50K that's in this for
a pilot exploration?
I think the 150 covers
some
thinking about the parking lot.
150K for initial site review of potential
locations and
regional transportation to conduct a micro-transit
must-demand response feasibility study
which I think is a waste of money because the answer for that is going to be
it doesn't make any sense. Also, one of the risks of doing that is you cannibalize coast
because you take the riders away.
So you're, but what you know, from that 150, there's 50,000 left.
That's what I've heard. I haven't seen a final budget, but when we asked Peter Rice about that
at the Bichin Pedestrian Committee, he said he was working on a 50,000 consultant study for
micro-transit, but that's not absolutely
clear. So our proposal
is that the language of this
SIP item
should be sharpened to
focus on, or should be
changed to have a shuttle
loop pilot.
To study,
I mean, I think you have to
study it first.
But I think pilot, why do you need money to
study something? Well, you need, you need to
know whether it would make sense.
We'd use the $50,000 in that scenario.
You wouldn't use the funds. You would have it.
task force that would sit down with
closed and say,
what's possible
for a pilot shuttle.
But don't we need a dollar amount for the SIP?
Yeah, I think we would need the dollar amount, and it could
be the $50,000.
It could be that $50,000 as well.
I guess I'm confused if you want
to explore it, which I think is fine.
You need a dollar amount for the SIP.
What would we say
that $50,000 is where we hire someone
to help us study it?
I think it's, I think it.
could be to either to study it with the task force that would cost zero.
Right.
And to spend the $50,000 either on a pilot or a consultant study of a pilot or alternatives.
Are we assuming that it would be implemented by COST?
No. I mean, it really would be asking them, what could you do and for what budget?
Because Coast has been pushing very hard to increase the frequency of their service
on their most used routes, which, for example, is the Route 41, which goes Lafayette Road,
or the Route 40th that goes to Peace from downtown.
And this idea is to take a look at turning that into a continuous pilot where people could get
on the bus and go to all those destinations without transferring, which is where they lose passengers.
I was going to ask if there's any interest around the table in a separate
this out from the parking garage, which council seems to have some thoughts on and be
actually putting money behind it.
Yes, to both.
Okay.
No, you first.
Just, I would like to see it separated out from the parking garage.
It seems little, I think it'll get swallowed up when the parking garage has greater needs.
And then also, I'd like to have more money behind it.
I don't know what that number would be.
So we could just.
give a number like you were saying or the number in the this is the 2027 CIP in the 26 and the 25 was
100,000 okay so this project has been in the CIP now for this would be the fourth year being in
the CIP the first year it was in saying go find state and federal funds there really aren't any
state and federal funds so the council voted to
move it up to this year.
And I think one of the reasons it was placed by the parking major project is to use the parking
revenue, which you see there where it says 150,000 for parking revenue.
And I think when last week the council was deciding rather to raise the parking rates downtown
from $2 to $3, they did agree to start charging on the pilot, the RAP pilot project.
on Barrett Avenue. So there's more money coming in through that. They did not, I think
there were only three votes to raise the parking from two to three. So I think the thinking was
there would be more parking revenue coming in that would fund this. So that that's why that was put
over there to fund with parking revenue rather than general revenue. So let's see. I think there's
been some really great suggestions on this. Let's see if we can recap them. One is
to separate it from parking.
The other is to begin a task force, and we can recommend that in the CIP because that was in the
prior prior.
In fact, if you look at the city council goals for the next year, it says staff and task force
study a shuttle pilot, shuttle pilot, shuttle pilot,
and report to the council by October. So if you, Kate, if you, if you wanted to browse to the
city council's goals for the next year. Can I just, yeah. Do we need the SIP for the task force?
Can the task force just happen? The task force, what's the hold of? The task force needs,
the task force needs the city to support it as a formal city task force. But
That has not happened. And we have a subgroup that we just formed on the multimodal city.
Yes.
And we as a subgroup, probably in partnership with the Bikin Pedestrian Committee, which has a
subgroup on bike and pedestrian connectivity to the multimodal system, we could bring those two together
and just start working on this while we wait for a task force.
You say the task force hasn't had support from the city.
Has it not been on agendas, or have they said we are not interested in the task?
Like, is it just a matter?
They haven't said.
They haven't said.
And that's been a question that hasn't been answered.
Okay.
So if you see the recommendations that this committee made in November, right before this
2027, CIP was finalized, we recommended moving ahead with the task force, we recommended
renaming the project, expand public transit, and not micro-transit, and those things weren't done.
I think what I'm trying to get at is let's have a CIP proposal that gets at our recommendations
and maybe asks for a task force on a pilot.
Who's writing the CIP?
Are you going to write that?
Yeah.
Okay.
So I'll write it.
Sorry, but the task force actually implement the pilot?
The task force recommends for the, for the, yeah.
I would love to see some of our.
money actually. These are the city's goals for 20, 26, 27.
Is it not this?
And there, yeah.
Determined feasibility of shuttle loop.
Identify parties for a public-private partnership for developing funding sources by a task force,
consultants and city staff by the end of October.
So, no, there's no task force.
Yeah.
The consultant study looks like it's on micro-transit.
Okay. And you've also said pilot, though.
So.
And they're asking for the report on the pilot.
So I think we send in a CIP referencing this and saying we recommend going ahead with the task force that's referenced here to focus on a shuttle pilot.
And meanwhile, while waiting for that to happen, we can do some work on that.
And what I'd like to do with our subgroup, which can combine the Blue Ribbon Committee and Connectivity Group and our Multimodity Group and our multimodal
city group to do some mapping and just show that a shuttle loop could cover a lot of the city's
goals like for affordable housing and for bringing residents downtown, reducing the mid-demand for
parking.
And that's been the basis for this and implementing the cap.
Okay.
So make sure how this capture correctly, what are you sharing on the screen now?
What is like the goals?
These are the city council's goals that they did in a retreat in February, I think, for 20th.
26, 27.
Can I just clarify on this?
So the money would be going towards, it would be specifically tailored and going just to Coast with restrictions on what they could use with it.
No, we would have to have to have the task force decide that.
Decide that.
And it would decide that working with Coast.
So Coast could say that's a really bad idea.
So why are we asking for money at all right now when we don't know what we need to money?
Well, the money has been there for three CIPs, so we don't want to lose that.
And that money could be there for a consultant study or for a pilot.
But we want to have the task force decide working with Coast to see if that makes sense.
If it decides, there's no point in that and that Coast can't do anything for a budget beyond what the city is going to find that out.
Yeah, then the money could be reallocated.
it'd go into Arkansas.
So who would like to work with me on drafting this?
And I've got to do it because I'm going to be leaving the country from September 6th to 24th.
So I'm going to be working on this, you know, before then.
Next week.
Next week, yeah.
So you're gone.
Right.
Tyler, I know, is up for this, of course.
I'm around.
Okay.
I will respond to your emails.
Okay.
And then.
Tyler and Colleen are on the, uh,
something is invited to the, uh,
Blue Rib and Bike Pedestrian Committee's connectivity group from Tyler and I are on that.
Okay.
So I'll come up with something.
So let's make a motion that we authorized Bill and his entourage of the CIT regarding the
multi-hotal transport and submit it.
And submit it, including, including a possible shuttle and pilot.
Good.
Thank you.
So there's a motion.
I'll second it.
On favor?
Boy, we got through those four.
We've got four ACE CIP projects.
Pretty good work, I think, especially tip of the hat to Colleen and Effie and eight for three of those.
90% Effie.
I was just reporting her efforts.
We'll get her back in the loop.
Okay.
Back to you, Fred.
Okay.
Updates.
It's Blue Ribbon, Bicy, and Pedestrian Committee.
A very short update on that.
Tyler and Counselor Hopkins is the chair of that, and I are on that committee.
It's got three or four subgroups.
The two that are active are ones on complete streets.
Tyler, you want to say something about it?
Did they, because I had connection problems on that,
did they end up with a set of?
Projects to recommend for the CIP from Complete Streets?
We have them for discussion.
And I guess the takeaway was we're talking a little bit about the next meeting,
about whether we focus on the hard work downtown or neighborhood connectivity.
Can't do everything.
Yeah.
And that committee meets in a week.
So they'll finalize that.
And then the other subgroup is the one we were just talking about, which is connecting
bike and pedestrian to the multimodal system called for in the city goal.
And there's a lot of interest in our subgroup, that subgroup, on connecting to public transit,
possibly a shuttle loop.
So I think whatever happens with an official city task force, that subgroup can continue
digging into the project.
Okay.
Thanks, Bill.
Next is the resident parking pilot and parking fee.
Yeah, which we talked about a bit.
I mean, basically, it's Parrot Avenue and some other streets.
What are the other streets?
So just six to ten streets.
And some very happy residents and a coalition of downtown workers from out of out of town who are concerned.
Because they, it turns out, have been parking in those spaces probably early in the morning.
And they had a.
petition of over 1,000, 2,000 people at the two public hearings earlier this month.
And the city council asked for the second public hearing on it.
And the downtown workers turned out in great force.
And the city council members opened up the public hearing to comments on the shuttle
loop as well, because I think they were thinking of the funding that with extra parking
ribbon.
So the pilot is.
is about six weeks or so into process.
So it's considered a pilot.
They're going to look at how that works.
And the increase of downtown parking from $2 to $3 to $3 was not approved.
I think the concern was that if the parking rate in the Hanover lot is higher than the on-street parking rate,
then visitors and others are going to be circling around looking for the cheaper.
for the cheaper parking, which is not a good idea.
Can I ask a question about the parking pilot?
Businesses can purchase, can pay for their employees to park.
Yes, 30 cents an hour.
Has there been any suggestion from the city to those businesses if their workers can't pay for parking on their own?
Well, I think that has come up.
And it's, I think,
Currently parking in Portsmouth seems like about the most sensitive.
Yes, of course it is.
As a transportation planner, I would say that was a very reasonable thing to be suggesting
because a lot of businesses are not required to provide parking for their employees.
So then the question is, is that an obligation of the city to provide free or 30 cents an hour severely discounted
when the market rate is probably more than $2 an hour.
Yeah.
Isn't part of it?
that you can park in the foundry garage for $3 for the entire day if you're a worker?
Ten hours. And I think that one of the proposals from downtown workers was that some people
have a longer day. And they would consider increasing that.
12 hours. So I think the council was open to all of those types of suggestions. And it isn't
clear. Maybe, Tyler, you know, is there a ceiling on the number of parking worker parking permits?
I know it's available.
to wage workers and not to owners of businesses. There were some discussion about that
from some business owners that felt that they should be eligible for the 30 cents an hour as well.
Yeah, there's a lot of discussion about proving whether you're a downtown worker and how that works,
but the limit is the foundry garage is full. This program does not have space to continue.
End of story.
So one of the ideas for the
The shuttle loop is to have some remote parking perhaps down Route 1.
And visitors or workers or residents could park or walk and bike if it's safe to the remote
parking and take a shuttle loop that maybe ideally would run every half an hour.
So.
Okay.
Okay.
Thank you.
Next Energy Advisory Committee, the Energy Advisory Committee does not meet in August.
there's nothing to report from the previous meeting. Of course, the big topic is
community power, and everyone's probably aware already that the difference between Eversource and
community power is now just 910 percent. So it was a few cents in the previous rate change.
So the gap is closing, so it's getting to be less of a differential. And nothing else has
changed. You still opt in or opt out as much as you want.
For some reason, and maybe I can get more answers on this at the next energy meeting,
but one of the reasons why Eversources rates are still lower is because the state is not allowing them to recover their debt.
So they have incurred a bunch of debt, and normally they would want to pay that down and use the rates to help pay it down, but the state is not allowing them to do that.
So if they had a rate that was based on their actual expenses, it would be equal to or higher than community power.
So you can say right now that the difference in rates, the fact that Ebers versus cheaper
is an artificial condition. It's not based on true market forces.
So I think that will change over time. Maybe the next rate change, either, you know, next year,
whatever might further reduce that gap. So, anyway, just in short, the good news is that
community power is looking more on par.
with every source in terms of the actual rate amount, and it still offers the option of opting in for
renewable energy sources, which is something that every source can't do.
And a lot of people still, you know, like it or prefer to have community power because it gives them
the option of getting their electricity sourced by renewable sources. Any questions?
Next then is the master plan.
So I reached out to the consultant because,
Nobody in the committee had, or the group had heard anything from them in a while.
And the response that I got was essentially they are busy working on things.
So they've been working to build a bunch of flash votes that they intend to send out based on
information that they got from the open house just to get some broader input.
And meanwhile, they are also working on an updated draft plan incorporating incorporating
a bunch of the feedback they have received to this point.
And their next steps are that they intend to share the newest draft at a planning board meeting in September,
but date yet to be determined.
And then they'll be looking for feedback from public as well as planning board, as well as the advisory group.
So, you know, with the ultimate patient date of the process, that's planned development?
Like end of the year, start of the new year, sort of the rough timeline.
Yeah.
All right.
So it sounds like they're on track.
Yep.
And from what I've seen, it, it looks pretty good.
Yep.
I mean, every, you know, yes.
Depends on who you ask.
We had the benefit of a very complete presentation from the consultant to this committee.
And one of my takeaways was a very strong emphasis on development along key corridors.
and creation of neighborhood centers that would be potentially like 15-minute neighborhoods where you could walk.
Yeah, I can use transit.
A while ago we talked about this or hopefully when I first sort of talked about when they were getting ready to submit the draft.
One of the things they had said to us was that they recognized the city and various committees and groups
have already done a ton of work like the bike bed and pedestrian plan and the cap and the historical.
district and all these things.
So they were trying to look at gaps and what might be the future of Portsmouth based on where
possible development has yet to happen and how they can kind of think about that more completely
in this master plan.
Great.
Thanks, Jess.
And then we have New Hampshire School Bus Grants.
I will look to follow up on that.
Oh, me?
Oh, okay.
So, again, this thing I mentioned earlier, the New Hampshire Clean Fleets Grants.
The language on it specifically, you know, talks about updating city fleets and school buses using this money from Volkswagen.
And I had brought that up at the Energy Advisory Committee.
I guess it was probably in June or something.
And I haven't got any follow up on that yet.
So I'll try to, I'll try to track that down.
I want to see if any partners have been made.
I'm trying to take advantage of that.
Next on the agenda is new business.
Any new business?
Just a note on the biofuels conversation, which is sort of a mini project.
Counselor Hopkins brought it up at the last city council council council meeting on the 17th.
And I believe the result was, there's going to be a rolling stock work session on October 26th.
So I think it's just going to be part of that.
conversation more generally.
And the request from counselor Hopkins was simply to direct staff to look into biofuels as an option
for school buses and other vehicles because we weren't sure that electric vehicles were going to go ahead.
On October 22nd, we've suggested invited Susan Richmond to come give a
short guest presentation.
Do you want to describe just the topic?
Sure.
Just to review, so Susan Richmond is very involved in the New Hampshire Network,
which is a statewide effort around all kinds of topics.
Specifically, she is very vested in plastic and waste.
And so she and a group of people who are in a plastic subcommittee have developed a
tend to towns toolkit for towns as a way to reduce waste.
And she is also very involved at the state level and more of what the legislative efforts there
and things that are happening.
So that was really her intention was she was going to speak to waste and plastic and kind of
tie in what's happening with the state and where there might be ways that we could make progress
because that does seem to be some of the limiting factors in our ability to make progress
is what it's called is escaping me.
Home rule?
Yeah.
Home rule impacts our ability to create ordinances and things if the state doesn't give us permission to do that.
She is also...
It's very relevant for the zero waste plan, and I think she's very interested in hearing our thoughts on that.
Agreed.
And she's also in the area, so she's interested in trying to talk about.
ways we could collaborate more as a region to make action.
I believe she's in Durham.
And what meeting is she attending?
October 1.
And I get a email feed from the UNH sustainability program in various forms.
And one of the things they highlighted was all the innovative energy and water activities going on
at the Isle of Shoals at the UNH site.
And we have our own expert here, very involved in that.
Tyler, and I think we may be able to convince Tyler to give a short presentation like 10 minutes
with some discussion on the innovations at the Isle of Shoals on energy and water.
I'll send just the UNH description of those activities.
and potential transferability.
Tyler, would you be up for that?
Yeah, and the director of facilities and sustainability on the island, Zach Cherowitz,
was also interested.
Great.
So we'll get some pretty interesting viewpoints from him.
Yeah.
Would you come in person or zoom in?
It would really be his choice to join you?
I think we should offer him both.
Okay.
But you might be willing to come in person, which would be a lot of fun.
So we would not.
make it, say, 10 to 15 minutes with some discussion? Does that sound okay?
That sounds great, what we talked about a month, which in September. It would be September
or November. Yeah, September or November.
I would push it out to November because the island is still in operation.
And we know what the date is in November because it's the third Thursday.
So the third Thursday, a week before Thanksgiving.
Ninth, yeah.
Great.
Yeah. I know from Tyler that he's doing some really interesting stuff out there.
So it would be great to hear you put up listening to us so much, Tyler.
I wanted to just put out there, New Hampshire Businesses for Social Responsibility has an ongoing webinar series.
And the next two, there's going to be, it's once a month.
One's on the 29th of September, the other October 27th.
It's going to be housing and then energy.
So for business and citizens.
sustainability overlap across the state.
Folks might have interest in that.
I'm happy to send links, especially for the energy one.
That might be of interest to folks.
Any other new business?
Okay.
Closing.
So Rianne, our wonderful minutes taker.
Can you summarize the actions for follow-up?
Can I do that?
Let's see.
We have a lot of votes, but the actions I have for Kate to promote car
day in the city newsletter, car free day is September 22nd.
So does that timing work out when the next newsletter would go?
Every Monday so we can get it in at least two or three of them.
The other part of that action is that I'm going to send Kate some information.
Can I, before you keep talking actions, I was thinking while you were talking about that.
I know at least at our elementary school in town, they participate in the national
bike to enroll to school day, which typically is in May.
There's also a national event called Walk-In-Role, I think it was read.
That happens in October, but maybe that might be a way to connect to the schools.
It's like promote a fall bike-to-school day instead of just the springtime one.
Okay.
So the night we're not currently observing the October one here?
I've never noticed anything about, it's called walk-in-roll or something.
So I think the focus is slightly different as compared to the spring one, which is bike-en-roll.
But is it all roller skates then?
Maybe your scooters or I don't, yeah, I'm not really.
Maybe you just literally roll.
Who knows?
What are we calling that September 22nd event?
Carverid challenge.
But for the students, how should we promote it to the school, walk to school day?
A walk-up bike to school day, walk-to-bike, walk-to-bike, walk-bike, walk-up bike, okay.
And one more action I have for you to follow up with the Energy Advisory Committee,
if they're pursuing the New Hampshire Clean Fleet's grant.
And then we had just four votes to allow subgroups to move forward with their CIP proposals
for the electrification of the city fleet, zero waste plan, city solar plan, and multi-modal city.
Awesome.
And Fred and I can send an invitation, Tyler, to you and colleagues to come talk November.
That'd be great.
I need to confirm Zach for sure that he's available on that date, though.
Really do want to have him at this because it's a good for everybody.
You can always push it out another month if he's not.
What's his name?
Zach Cherowitz.
I can try to spell it.
Topics for the next meeting.
include, you know, wrap up of how our CIP proposal went, I suppose.
And any any video follow-ups from that?
Any other topics?
Hey, to report out on the GHG inventory.
Okay, right-huh.
And I think we can continue to have updates from the priority projects of which four of those
have CIPs.
Yeah, we'll have some master plan news.
Cool.
I have a motion to adjourn.
Motion to adjourn.
Second.
All in favor?
The next meeting is September.
24th.
Okay, so we can stop recording and then do a brief checkout, a quick impression of making you learn to our
Thank you.