When thinking of progressive cities in America, Dubuque, Iowa is hardly the first place that comes to mind. But if Mayor Roy Buol has his way, Dubuque will soon be a leader in combating climate change at the local level.
In 2006, Buol, along with over 140 other Mayors, supported the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement - an agreement among mayors to meet the Kyoto Protocol emissions targets, despite President Bush's refusal to do the same. Now Buol's the driving force behind the recently unveiled Blueprint for Local Climate Action.
Following an invitation from long-time environmental activist Robert Redford to attend the second annual Sundance Summit, which was billed as a "Mayor's Gathering on Climate Protection," Buol began developing the Sustainable Dubuque Initiative. He dubbed the initiative a "holistic approach" to sustainable development and energy in his 57,000-person town.
With the help of Assistant City Manager Teri Goodmann, Buol developed a mission statement they eventually called the "Blueprint for Local Climate Action." This Blueprint encourages federal support for local climate protection initiatives and will delivered to the next President.
"There are a lot of opportunities out there and I hope the federal government gets on board and puts incentives in place," Buol told the Telegraph Herald.
But is it possible for global climate change to be combated at the local level? Buol thinks so, as do over 600 mayors who adopted the Climate Protection Agreement at a two-day conference in November 2007.
Mayor Greg Nickels of Seattle coordinated the November summit and agreement as a means of meeting the standards set by the Kyoto Protocol on a local level. According to Nickels' website, the agreement requires participating cities to do three things. First, they must meet or beat the Kyoto Protocol global warming emissions targets in their own communities by promulgating a variety of policies ranging from anti-sprawl to urban forest restoration to public awareness campaigns. Second, they must urge their respective state governments, as well as the federal government, to meet or beat the greenhouse gas emission reduction target suggested for the United States in the Kyoto Protocol (7% reduction from 1990 levels by 2012). The final step requires the mayors to lobby Congress to pass bipartisan greenhouse gas reduction legislation, which would establish a national carbon emission trading system.
Still not convinced all politics is local? Consider the fact that today, 884 cities have signed onto the Climate Protection Agreement. Mayors across the country, from Buol to New York City's Bloomberg, have made climate change mitigation a top legislative priority.
The efforts of these mayors represent a major grassroots movement, and if history is any indicator, what began as a small snowball will eventually roll onto the floor of Congress as an avalanche of support for national climate change legislation.
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