Green Future Summit Closes With Clean Energy Commitments
September 15, 2008
By Keith Schneider
Apollo News Service
“If we think of this green movement as distinct from what we do as Americans we aren’t going to succeed,” said Newark Mayor Cory A. Booker. “The American dream is a green dream. If we do not do this we risk everything we claim to be as Americans.”
Newark opens new era of green-collar jobs, environmental economics
NEWARK, New Jersey – Mayor Cory A. Booker, in an impassioned address that concluded Newark’s Green Future Summit this weekend, committed to use the remaining two years of his first term to pursue a green economic development strategy so aggressively that it will “fully saturate the consciousness of so many Newark leaders.”
Booker announced his commitment in a 15-minute address that included discussion of Frederick Douglas, Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address, the Pledge of Allegiance, and his own 95-year-old grandmother’s recollections of World War Two-era victory gardens. Booker explained that his administration builds on what he called “sacrifices of those who preceded us,” and the reform initiatives he’s undertaken to lower the crime rate, improve housing, build parks, develop businesses and new jobs share a “purely American foundation” in the economics of clean energy, and good jobs.
“It’s not just a matter of it being nice to be green,” Booker said, “It’s a mater of urgency and necessity. And I am not looking at this as a great fear. I’m looking at it as a greater hope.”
“If we think of this green movement as distinct from what we do as Americans we aren’t going to succeed,” he added. “The American dream is a green dream. If we do not do this we risk everything we claim to be as Americans.”
A Transformative Two Days
Booker’s speech, delivered before about 100 participants, followed two days of intensive public sessions and smaller break out meetings during which city leaders, residents, and a number of nationally known experts in clean energy and sustainable economic strategy described the various steps Newark could take to build prosperity.
Newark’s Green Future Summit, which Newark planned and organized in collaboration with the Apollo Alliance, is the first time a predominantly African American city has comprehensively pursued a new economic strategy based on clean energy development and creating green-collar jobs. The idea that defined much of what occurred this weekend is that if a city of 280,000 residents confronted by some of the nation’s highest rates of unemployment, childhood poverty, asthma, and air pollution can transform itself into a clean energy, good jobs showcase, then any community anywhere can do the same.
The Alliance’s work in helping Newark achieve its clean energy goals is part of The New Apollo Program, a five-step national economic development strategy made public last month. “The Apollo Alliance is very excited to be part of this summit and very excited to help build Newark’s green future,” said Phil Angelides, the organization’s chairman. “With Mayor Booker’s great leadership I have every confidence that Newark will be the example that the rest of the country can look to.”
Chelsea Albucher, a 37-year-old environmental scientist and planner, who became Newark’s sustainability officer a month ago, said in an interview with the Apollo News Service that Newark was devoted to enacting many of the recommendations summit participants made this weekend. Among the top priorities described here, she said, was scaling up the city’s program to weatherize homes “for those most in need” to reduce energy bills this winter.
She said it was possible to integrate the energy efficiency and weatherization programs with existing city programs to prevent home foreclosures and support business development. The ability to leverage clean energy programs to tie seemingly unconnected city programs together would be a hallmark of her work for Newark, she said.
Sustainability Officer Lists Priorities
Later, in a brief speech to the summit, Albucher took note of other sustainable steps discussed over two days that she believed made sense for Newark. She said the city would likely develop a sustainability plan and would accelerate and enhance its existing programs to encourage more environmentally-sensitive green buildings. She said another summit recommendation Newark would pursue is to improve coordination between workforce training and business development programs in order to build green businesses and supply qualified workers for green-collar jobs.
Albucher said Newark embraced the summit’s strong recommendation to make the city’s port greener in order to reduce air pollution from trucks, and to improve the port’s competitiveness.
She noted that summit experts had concluded that 70 percent of Newark had little or no tree canopy, and that would be addressed, likely with a tree planting program. She said she agreed with the summit’s call to fix the many storm water management problems in Newark that are harming the city’s ability to use its river front as an economic asset. She called for new waterfront planning. And she said much of the work involved in all of these programs would be helpful in employing the more than 1,500 people who return each year to Newark from the state’s prisons.
“The prison re-entry initiative is a component of all this,” she said. “Clean and green is a first step to link re-entry and green jobs.”
Booker Says American Dream Is Green
Mayor Booker, who is halfway through his first four-year term, will need to win his second in 2010 to gain real traction on the green economic agenda he embraced over the weekend. But Booker said he sensed a turning point not only in the role cities are playing in advancing many of the country’s most important clean energy and environmental programs, but also in the role Newark and its developing green economy can play to address poverty.
“The green economy is not just about breathing easier. It’s not just about saving money, though it can do both of those things,” he said. “It’s about the hope, the opportunities that exist to have the American dream. A dream that is not distant and far away and embodied by the favored few, but deeply involved in the very fabric of everything we do as Americans.”
He concluded by describing his vision for Newark. “For 26 months, I have felt Newark is the chosen place to do this work. We’re not Chicago or New York, so big that it might take years to change.“
“Newark at its best can be the community that demonstrates what is possible,” he continued. “None of what we’ve done so far is as powerfully important as the seeds of what we are talking about right here and right now. I call on everybody here. Let’s show the globe what a city can do in a short period of time. We can be the number one city in radically transforming the environment. We, in our lifetimes, should be able to do things that others say are impossible.”
Keith Schneider, a journalist, editor, and producer, is the communications director at the Apollo Alliance. Reach him at keith@apolloalliance.org
For More Information
Newark’s Green Future Summit Joint News Release
Newark’s Green Future Summit Convenors and Sponsors
Lincoln Park Coast Cultural District
Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
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