ECOS Climate Committee Presenting City of Sac Draft Climate Action 5/18

Thursday, May 18 – 6:00 pm start

LINK to join: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/6656164155 or call: 1 669 900 6833, Mtg ID: 665 616 4155

Agenda (revised May 15, 2023)

6:00 Welcome and Introductions

6:10 Sacramento City’s new Climate Action & Adaptation Plan
The City’s Climate & Sustainability team will share information on the release, timeline for review, and how to provide input on their new Climate Action & Adaptation Plan (CAAP), along with some key General Plan policies with strong CAAP relationship; and update us on their Existing Building Electrification Strategy.

On May 10, the City hosted an orienting webinar for their CAAP and their General Plan Update: https://www.cityofsacramento.org/Community-Development/Planning/Major-Projects/General-Plan).
The City’s General Plan team will begin presenting key policies in early June. Additional webinars are scheduled.

6:40 Discussion/Q&A (CAAP & GPU)

7:05 Updates and Announcements

  • Sacramento County’s Climate Emergency Mobilization Task Force – status update
  • Measure A redux – 2024 ballot measure to fund transit, etc.
  • SACOG Blueprint
  • I-80 lanes to be added between Davis and Sacramento – draft EIR expected soon
  • Sacramento City’s proposed Community Benefits Ordinance
  • SMUD/Calpine plans for carbon sequestration and storage (Board hearing May 17, 6 PM start)
  • Others

Click here for the agenda in PDF.

This meeting is open to everyone interested in addressing some of our region’s most pressing challenges.

The EV Transition in Sacramento – Obstacles and Opportunities 5/31

Image source: https://www.cityofsacramento.org/Public-Works/Electric-Vehicle-Initiatives/EV-Charging-Locations

ECOS MTG / BOARD, May 31, 2023, 6:00 pm

LINK to join: ECOS ZOOM 6656164155 or call: 1 669 900 6833, Mtg ID: 665 616 4155

Featuring: The EV Transition in Sacramento – Obstacles and Opportunities

How do EVs fit into overall climate action to reduce carbon emissions? Is there a build-out plan for EV charging infrastructure? Who sets the price of electricity at the charger? How will people with lower incomes transition to EVs?

Presented by Sacramento Electric Vehicle Association

  • Thomas Hall, executive director of CleanStart, a regional non-profit, accelerating the energy transition. He is also an analyst at Clean Edge, curating clean tech indexes.
  • Cynthia Shallit, urban planner trained at UC Berkeley; recently retired from SHRA redevelopment and affordable housing projects group. She is involved in state and local politics related to global warming and gun control, and is working with a number of non-profit organizations in Sacramento on local climate action plans and state climate legislation.
  • Dwight MacCurdy, recently retired from SMUD Electric Transportation R&D group. He works with SacEV Association, Sacramento Clean Cities Coalition and EV Charging for All Coalition.

Click here for the agenda in PDF.

Elemental: Reimagine Wildfire 5/31

The UC Davis Institute of the Environment, Environmental and Climate Justice Hub, Climate Adaptation Research Center, and Manetti Shrem Museum invite you to a very special presentation of a groundbreaking documentary urging us to rethink our relationship with wildfire.

Elemental: Reimagine Wildfire screening will start at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 31, at the Manetti Shrem Museum in the Community Education Room on the UC Davis campus. A panel discussion will follow the screening.

This event is free and everyone is welcome to attend. Light refreshments will be served.

With fire seasons growing more destructive and more deadly, we see that our approach to reducing wildfire risk is failing. The way we respond to this risk will have long-term effects on our communities and our forests.

Don’t miss a special screening of Elemental: Reimagine Wildfire, a film that invites you to reimagine your relationship with wildfire through the eyes of top scientists and indigenous fire managers who are leading the way toward living with this essential element.

The film starts at 4:30pm in Community Room at the Manetti Shrem Museum, and after the screening the filmmakers will be available for a Q&A discussion.

About Elemental: Reimagine Wildfire

In the wake of recent fires, Portland filmmakers Trip Jennings, Sara Quinn, and Ralph Bloemers took to the air and the ground to help communities make sense of wildfires in a hotter, drier, more crowded world. Elemental is the product of their journey across the United States and into fire affected communities.

Chief of the United States Forest Service Mike Dombeck (Ret.) remarks that “Elemental is an outstanding film that deserves the widest possible viewing. In a visually stunning manner, it distills what we’ve learned about wildland fire over the decades and provides a road-map for badly needed changes that will benefit thousands of people, particularly in fire prone communities.”

Produced and edited in Oregon, Narrated by David Oyelowo (Emmy & Golden Globe Nominee), supported by National Geographic and Patagonia.

Click here to register!

Opposing development on land that was planned to support threatened species, by Brad Branan, May 1, 2023

Photo by Brad Branan: Osprey nest in the Natomas Basin

By Brad Branan is an ECOS Board member and representative of Sierra Club Sacramento

ECOS members are leading efforts to protect the Natomas Basin from several large-scale developments proposed for the environmentally sensitive area.

Developers are proposing three major projects in the basin, including the Airport South Industrial Project (ASIP) on 450 acres of farmland outside the city of Sacramento and the County’s Urban Services Boundary line. Together the projects total 8,191 acres, larger than the entire North Natomas area.

The basin is subject to environmental protection through the Natomas Basin Habitat Conservation Plan (NBHCP), which was a federal and state requirement in 1997 to mitigate planned development in the City. The NBHCP was later approved by a federal court. The basin, which includes 54,000 acres in Sacramento and Sutter County, from the Garden Highway to the Cross Canal in Sutter County, provides habitat for the protected Swainson’s Hawk and Giant Garter Snake, among other animals.

The developers of the ASIP need approval from the Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCo) so the land can become part of the City of Sacramento.

Habitat 2020, an ECOS committee, opposed the first step taken by the City and LAFCo staff in that process – to make the city and the commission co-lead agencies on the environmental review of the annexation and the project. A law firm hired by Habitat 2020 and Friends of the Swainson’s Hawk sent the commission a letter saying that having co-lead agencies is a violation of state environmental law. They are waiting for a response.

ECOS member and former Sacramento Mayor Heather Fargo, along with the ECOS Climate Committee’s Natomas Team, has been meeting with officials to explain why environmentalists oppose the project. Fargo and other project opponents are meeting with LAFCo members and Sacramento council members and are asking that the proposed annexation be brought to the Council for a public hearing and decision by the city council.