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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2024_10_01 Sustainability Collaborative Minutes o{Mamaro Town of Mamaroneck Sustainability Collaborative 2024.1001 Meeting Notes TOWN OF MAMARONECK SUSTAINABILITY COLLABORATIVE OCTOBER 1,2024 MEETING NOTES SUstainabiW1 Attendees: Mark Kramer, Karin Weisberg, Arlene Novich, Karen Khor, Mitch Green, Kevin Crowe, Sue Odierna, Hugh Collins, Robin Nichinsky, Mark Manley, Denise Dunn, Frank Owens,Abby Katz Approval of the Meeting Notes The Notes of the September Collaborative Meeting were approved. Monarch Festival-Sat.,Sept.21st, Harbor Island Kevin Crowe volunteered and promoted the benefits of planting native plants and planting more friendly pollinator gardens at this family-centered, well-attended event with 2,000+ attendees. Free seeds were distributed to encourage families to start or enlarge their gardens. Drive Electric-Sat.,Sept.28th, Harbor Island 20 EV's were displayed at the harbor event. The weather wasn't terrific but 30-40 people showed and we just need five residents to purchase EVs from the day our scoping document was accepted by NYSERDA. Car dealerships would not commit to Katherine that they would be able to attend the event, but several did, Nissan, Toyota, BMW and others. Website Update Status Sue reported that Jaine needs to review Collab webpage and she has said she will get to it before next Collab meeting. Hugh suggested Sue have IT upload it to the"back end"of the website(not published to the public) so that Jaine could see how it will look online. Posting of Comp Plan Survey Results Karen updated the group that she had FOIL'ed the Town to get the survey results. There were over 700 respondents to the survey. As a steering committee member she was able to see these comments, but unfortunately, these comments were not included in our plan, as they have been in other muni comp plans. Collab had requested the community needs survey results to guide us in the implementation phase. She had emailed the consultant for survey results back in May. The consultant said she needed to go thru the Town. But Town had already said they wouldn't include these survey results so instead Karen spoke with the committee on open government who advised her she could make a foil request to the town clerk which she did in July. The request was denied in August. She appealed the foil and it was approved. The question now is what do we do with this public information. It could be on the Collab webpage without personal retribution to protect privacy, we can ask the TB if it can be added to comp plan on website, it can be emailed from person to person where the comments may be helpful for certain initiatives. The metrics from the survey should be useful to the collab and the Town which are not detailed in the comp plan. Update: Subsequently after the Collab meeting, Mark and Mitch met with Jaine and Meredith on October 10t`'. As a result, Jaine said she would consider what was best to do. As of November 9, no action by or communication has been received from Town Leadership related to next steps. Natural Resources Inventory-Hugh Collins Hugh read the 111-page document on how to create an NRI, needs to talk to someone from Cornell to get more info on creating this report. Some of the info can be gotten from the draft LWRP. 1 Town of Mamaroneck Sustainability Collaborative 2024.1001 Meeting Notes Update:Subsequently after the collab meeting,Mark and Mitch met with Jaine and Meredith on October 10t` As a result, the Collaborative's large CSC action has been put on hold pending the Town's decisions on who is to move CSC forward.As of November 9, no action by or communication from Town Leadership has been received about next steps. As a result, the Collaborative continues to be on hold related to CSC and CEC. Based on previous experience, this delay may make it difficult to submit the needed documentation on time to achieve Town Leadership's goal of achieving CSC Silver status in 2025. A Tree for George-Arlene Novich Arlene reported that she will get together with Liz Aitchison next week by the brook to discuss details for the tree in honor of George Roniger. Repair Café&Upcoming Events-Kevin Crowe Kevin reported that LMC will interview him, a fixer(Arthur Katz)and Suzie Fromer tomorrow at LMC Studios. Kevin reminded the group that the event will be held on Sunday, Oct.20t', 12 noon-4 pm at the Mamaroneck Senior Center. The stations will include repair of jewelry, computers, mechanical, knife sharpener, gluing ceramic/wood/furniture, electronics, electrical items, umbrella repair, and cell phone help. Discussion about how we are getting the word out especially to younger residents as they don't really look at FB, etc. Should we have Linkedln(VoL does)or lnstagram? Update: The Repair Café was held on October 20, with impressive results. Congratulations to all the volunteers from the Collab, LEC, CFTE, MHS and others who made this happen!Details will be included in the November meeting notes. Solar Update on ToM Properties-Frank Owens and Mark Manley Mark spoke to the solar developer,Sunlight General, and looked at various sites,Hmx parking lot, Parking Lot A, Maxwell Avenue Highway Dept building. Carports are more expensive than using a roof. For Maxwell it would be half the size of the panels at Hommocks which is still useful. Roof quality has to be assessed. The developer noted that they typically require a minimum size of 200kW for any single installation but would be interested in pairing larger installations with other smaller ones that the Town also wanted to include such as a part of the Town Center roof combined with Maxwell Ave. building. Mark M. will talk to his contact at NYSERDA who may be interested in carport solar installations. Mark, Mitch and Frank would like to talk to Rob Wasp at some future point. Next steps: Mark M.to meet with a NYSERDA representative from Build-Ready Program. It doesn't have to be all business:Collaborative get-together this Fall-Mitch Green Hoping to plan a social event for all three enviro committees, tentative date of Thursday, November 14' Mitch/Mark to discuss this with VoM Committee for the Environment (CFTE) and the Larchmont Environmental Committee(LEC). Other News Karen felt we should invite Kristin O'Neill, Deputy Director and Counsel of the New York State Committee on Open Government to a meeting,either Collab or maybe the Town Board would like to have her as a guest. Update: At the meeting between Mark & Mitch with Jaine & Meredith on October 10, this subject was discussed. Town Leadership expressed that, if local public discussion of the NYS Committee on Open Government was to be held, the Town Board would initiate this. 2 Town of Mamaroneck Sustainability Collaborative 2024.1001 Meeting Notes Upcoming Event: Sun, Nov 24th 1 pm-2 pm Town of Mamaroneck Fall Tree Walk at Sheld rake 3