Climate and Sustainability Communications: Elevate Your Community’s Story
Does your community have a climate and sustainability communications plan? Communities working on climate and sustainability communications need to 1) identify communication goals, 2) identify audiences, 3) select communications channels, 4) measure success, and 5) use storytelling. Remember to keep your community’s overall goal in mind whenever creating a communications plan and content! Identifying Your […]
Orlando and the Sustainable Development Goals: Orlando Releases Voluntary Local Review of the UN Sustainable Development Goals in Partnership with ICLEI USA
To mark the occasion of the United Nations’ annual General Assembly meetings in 2021, Mayor Buddy Dyer and the City of Orlando announced the release of the City’s first Voluntary Local Review of the UNs’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Orlando and the Sustainable Development Goals: A Voluntary Local Review of Progress. Developed in partnership with […]
How Local Governments Support Community-Led Food Systems Transformation
In May 2021, ICLEI and the City of New Haven, CT’s Food System Policy Division hosted the North American Local Food Dialogue on Inclusive Food Systems to inform and contribute to the cities and counties proceedings of the UN Food Systems Summit in September. More than 40 local government stakeholders, including local government staff and […]
4 Ways Google EIE Transformed Transportation Data Collection
Local governments need high-quality, consistent data to plan and achieve their transportation goals. To help meet this need, Google’s Environmental Insights Explorer (EIE) makes locally-relevant, regularly-updated data more accessible than ever. EIE provides local governments with a streamlined platform to access transportation and building emissions data and rooftop solar capacity that is powered by Google’s […]
The American Jobs Plan is a Climate Plan and ICLEI Cities and Counties are Ready Partners
On March 31, 2021, President Biden traveled to Pittsburgh to announce, in partnership with Mayor Bill Peduto, the President’s economic vision for building back better with the American Jobs Plan. This plan lays out a path that will not only deliver on jobs but also justice and climate solutions. Local governments will play an important […]
Conversation with Maia Davis: Elements of Regional Climate Planning
Maia Davis is a Senior Environmental Planner at the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG). COG connects leaders across the metropolitan Washington region, representing over 5.7 million people, to develop solutions to the area’s major challenges. Maia is part of the COG team that developed and manages the Metropolitan Washington 2030 Climate and Energy Action […]
Transitioning to a Circular Economy: Measuring Where to Start
How cities can build a circular economy can seem complex and perplexing — but it helps to think of local-level circularity as expanding on the “Three R’s” many of us learned in school: to regenerate, rethink, reuse, reduce, and recover. In this way, regeneration, including of the ecosystems upon which our society depends, and rethinking […]
U.S. Cities are NOT Vastly Undercounting Emissions
City climate accounting standards are consistent methods that capture emissions most policy-relevant to local governments For Immediate Release: 02/05/21 On February 2, 2021, Nature Communications published a study whose results indicate an under-reporting of city-level greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across 48 U.S. cities. The GHG accounting method in the study is atypical in local GHG […]
ICLEI Action Plan for Biden-Harris First 100 Days
When his inauguration as the forty-sixth President of the United States is complete, Joe Biden will reenter the U.S. into the Paris Climate Agreement. This action will help to create positive momentum around the world, aligning some of the world’s biggest economies and political powers around climate action. To strengthen the power of these goals, […]
Local action upholding the Paris Agreement – five-year anniversary review
As we look forward to our national government reengaging in global climate action, let’s look back at how local action supported the Paris Agreement since its ratification. In the last five years, local governments have diligently implemented integrated, science-based, and engaging action – three focuses of the Paris Agreement. Together, these three areas build communities’ […]