Climate change plans in local communities

By Stacy Gittleman

Sustainability is a broad concept among green thinking circles. At the individual level, it can be as simple and inexpensive as linking errands while driving to burn less fossil fuels or planting native flowers on a lawn or for apartment dwellers, in a container. At a municipal level, it can be as complex as retrofitting one’s streets and byways with a mixture of infrastructures to prepare for expected increased flooding with climate change and to ensure the economic equity, viability and livability for future generations of residents.

For years, many municipalities have acted on green, environmental initiatives, albeit conducted in a piecemeal fashion. A town will set aside green space, establish a nature preserve, plan an electronics recycling day, or swap out traditional incandescent lightbulbs in its buildings with more energy-efficient ones. A building code may change or a recycling ordinance may pass – but without any apparent connection to one another.

Preserving green spaces or more walkable downtowns may be part of a municipality's long-term master plan, but that does not make it a sustainability plan.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), sustainability is the ability to meet the needs of the present population without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. At a municipal level, a sustainability mindset compels stakeholders in a community to make decisions based on long-term economic, environmental, and social impacts.

Only recently have Michigan’s municipalities attempted to fuse green initiatives into a long-term strategic plan and put it down in writing. Formal sustainability plans need buy-in from all stakeholders in a community, starting at the resident level and leading up to the town supervisor. Long-term strategic sustainability planning bridges every facet of local government with non-profit organizations all taking aim at creating a long-term positive outlook to preserve economic and environmental viability for coming generations.

Fortunately, there are guidelines and recommendations from county and state levels as well as a multitude of funding and grant opportunities to help already-stretched municipalities attain sustainability goals. Often, the creation of the plan, which is distinct from a master plan, is a multi-year collaboration of government, business and laypeople from a spectrum of professional and social backgrounds.

For many municipalities, it all begins with taking up the Michigan Green Communities Challenge.

Established in 2009, Michigan Green Communities is a statewide sustainability benchmarking, networking and technical assistance program created across multiple state government departments and non-profit organizations. They include the Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC), the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE), the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, the Michigan Association of Counties, the Michigan Municipal League (MML) and the Michigan Townships Association (MTA).

In 2023, 63 communities across Michigan took up the challenge to fulfill the bulk of 127 sustainability benchmarks that cover everything from climate adaptation, encouraging energy efficiency in government, commercial and residential buildings, recycling and hazardous waste handling and encouraging a balance between economic growth and preserving open green spaces and local agriculture. In the local area covered by Downtown, only Birmingham has launched a formal process to address this issue and most other neighboring communities, with the exception of Royal Oak, have yet to start the endeavor.

Communities are awarded bronze, silver, gold or platinum seals of achievement. For the 2023 challenge, 36 communities achieved gold seals, including Berkley, Birmingham, Ferndale, Royal Oak, Oakland County and West Bloomfield; 20 achieved silver seals, including Troy; and seven achieved bronze seals.

The Michigan Green Communities challenge also provides tools and templates for municipalities to craft formal sustainability plans.

Leading the way in the creation of formal municipal sustainability plans are communities such as Birmingham and Royal Oak.

For decades, Royal Oak has pioneered green practices. As a recognized Tree City USA municipality by the National Arbor Day Foundation, the city has enough trees in its urban forest canopy to positively impact the quality of life and enhance economic viability, as the presence of growing and mature trees increases property values.

Royal Oak has deployed monies from multiple grants for energy waste and greenhouse gas emissions reduction projects and several green stormwater infrastructure installations. Recently, the city was designated a certified healthy building city by the U.S. Green Building Council.

Though it was not officially categorized as a sustainability plan, Woodward Avenue communities such as Royal Oak, Ferndale, Pleasant Ridge, Huntington Woods and Berkley have collaborated on short and long-term sustainability initiatives and grant programs since 2012.

A 2020 survey of Royal Oak residents revealed that 75 percent of respondents wanted the city to urgently act on climate change to “set an example for sustainability and resilience in the region.” Royal Oak residents in the survey said what motivated them the most were concerns about climate change for the health and well-being of future generations, managing waste, and water quality and flood management.

At the same time, survey respondents identified three barriers to achieving city sustainability goals: cost, community support and government buy-in when it comes to balancing population and economic growth with green space preservation.

The survey revealed to city officials that the time was ripe to create an overarching sustainability plan that focused on six key areas: energy and buildings, waste, water, green space, quality of life and mobility.

In 2021, Amanda Herzog, now city commissioner, was chair of the Royal Oak Environmental Advisory Board which penned the city’s Sustainability and Climate Action Plan (S-CAP). City sustainability officials said it has helped them function more efficiently and level set on goals across local government departments.

“Royal Oak always prioritized sustainability, but it was happening in a siloed way,” Herzog explained. “There would be an engineer working on a green stormwater project, the parks department would be doing a tree planting or giveaway, but there was no big strategy around it.

“Then came the 2016 Paris Climate Accords, which we signed. That was a big impetus for us to talk about sustainability in a coordinated way, especially because that was the same time we were experiencing some large flooding events.”

Elected to her position in November 2023, Herzog said the city’s plan aims for carbon neutrality and includes strategies like green stormwater infrastructure, and walkable and bikeable neighborhoods.

Planning accelerated in the depths of the pandemic, Herzog noted. Looking for the silver lining, she said residents were shut in and had time to think long-term about the quality of life they wanted for the city’s future.

“Residents were readily available and wanted to participate,” Herzog said. “Now, residents and visitors to Royal Oak will start to see the beginnings of that plan being put into motion because of effective outreach and education to the community. This is starting with our focus on increasing composting efforts. Our residents want to install rain gardens and plant more native species. And they keep coming to us saying they want more, so the next long-term strategies will include implementing our plan to install more charging areas for EVs, incentivizing ways for residents to install solar panels for electricity and improving the overall walkability of the city.”

Each focus area of the S-CAP comes with many tangible action items for the municipality while encouraging residents to rethink their habits. They include improving energy efficiency in city streetlights and municipal buildings, converting the city’s fleet of vehicles from gas to electricity and expanding a network of EV charging stations, promoting walking or biking to school, telecommuting and carpooling, and public transit, education and resources for conserving water, increasing native plantings, and increasing the diversity of housing options to fit a range of income levels.

Another hallmark of Royal Oak’s sustainability plan is the ability to hire Angela Fox, the city’s dedicated sustainability manager.

On the job since October 2023, Fox has prioritized waste reduction, specifically wrangling in food waste. According to a 2019 EGLE study of the municipal waste sent to landfills in Michigan, 38 percent was organic, including food, yard waste and compostable paper and packaging which could be diverted for composting.

Therefore, Fox first prioritized expanding the city's composting program. Royal Oak now offers a weekly food scrap collection service at the Royal Oak Farmers Market, open to all residents regardless of where they live. This supplements the city's existing curbside yard waste program, which allows the addition of raw fruits and vegetable scraps to the leaf and grass pile.

“Sustainability can be as simple as not putting (produce scraps, coffee grinds, eggshells) in the garbage,” Fox said. “We understand this takes some thought and planning, but there are an array of options to do this. Setting up an enclosed backyard compost heap reduces a carbon footprint because there is no need to haul that compost elsewhere. But we know not everyone has this ability, especially if you live in an apartment. That’s why people can bring their compost to the farmer’s market on Saturdays. We're trying to make it as easy as possible for residents to participate."

Under Fox’s direction, the city in June 2024 unanimously passed a revision to its composing ordinance to make backyard composting more attainable. Royal Oak is under contract with its current waste hauler, Southeastern Oakland County Resource Recovery Authority, (SOCRRA) until 2027. Fox said everything the town is doing now is to prepare to renegotiate its contract to include municipal composting, which will be paid for in part through grant funding.

Fox said another green initiative that Royal Oak residents quickly caught onto is the “Rain Smart” program.

Aside from warmer summers, most residents have experienced climate change up close and personal if they have had a flooded property. Rain Smart helps homeowners plant trees and install rain gardens and rain barrels to reduce the deluge of stormwater runoff that overburdens sewers and causes flooding.

According to the S-CAP, during the summer of 2014, Royal Oak experienced historic flooding, resulting in an estimated $120 million in damages affecting about 40 percent of the city’s homes. The city has a moderate risk of flooding over the next 30 years.

The 2014 flood was followed by a damaging windstorm in March of 2017, and more widespread flooding in August 2021, leaving residents without power for five days.

“Like backyard composting, another small step people can do on an individual basis to prevent street flooding is to install a rain garden or adapt a neighborhood storm drain,” Fox said. “It’s something I learned when I lived in Grand Rapids. Check the catch basins on your streets ahead of a big rain event. Clearing them from debris does a lot for drainage during a storm. The more we can do to prevent that water from running off of our properties and pooling in the streets, the better. Everyone can do their part.”

Fox said Royal Oak has been fortunate enough to have on staff a sustainability manager to work on education, implementation,and outreach and a grants manager fully dedicated to applying for financial resources to push sustainability efforts forward. These staffing positions are funded mostly through grants, not local taxes, Fox said.

“There are lots of amazing grant opportunities from EGLE, the Department of Energy and the US Food and Drug Administration, for example,” Fox said. “It seems like every (federal) government agency is out there with funds available for local governments for the right projects. We haven't really spent much, if any, of taxpayer dollars for any of the initiatives we have been able to bring forward.”

Like Royal Oak, Birmingham has been classified as a Tree City USA community for decades. According to SEMCOG’s Southeast Michigan Green Dashboard, Birmingham features 1,195 acres of tree canopy coverage (39 percent of its total footprint), 37.4 acres of wetlands, 238 acres of parks and conservation land, and 33 acres of riparian corridors, or lands that border surface water tributaries.

The city in the summer of 2024 unveiled the draft of its Green Healthy Climate sustainability plan with benchmarks to be hit by 2035 and longer-term goals of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050.

The plan’s draft states that it is meant to: “educate and empower businesses, institutions, and residents to examine their own energy use, habitat, waste, recycling, and mobility habits and to consider what changes are possible within their realm of control. While many actions focus on the role local government can plan in creating a sustainable, resilient community, the objectives and actions apply to both the public and private sectors.”

Although the time horizon of the broader goals within this plan is 10 years, Birmingham continues to look forward.

Birmingham Planning Director Nicholas Dupuis, who has worked for the city for seven years, explained that the plan was brought to fruition by Katie Schafer, Birmingham’s City Commissioner who was elected to her position in 2021.

Dupuis began working for the city straight out of college with an urban planning degree and enthusiasm for all things sustainable. Like Royal Oak, Birmingham had a lot of ad hoc and fragmented environmental projects that had yet to be crystallized into one long-term strategic plan, he said.

“Political leadership across the board is really what lit the fire (to create a sustainability strategy), although there had always been a want for such a plan. I feel like I spent seven years laying the kindling, so when the fire was lit, it went right up. In the beginning (in the spring of 2023) we had a lot of public engagement, outreach, and surveys going out, to hear what the public wanted in a sustainability plan. And that helped the sustainability advisory board create a solid framework.”

The plan’s shorter-term goals include: Energy – helping the transition to renewables and decarbonization; Equity – addressing environmental injustice; Biodiversity – restoring natural areas and increasing native biodiversity; Nature-based solutions as a standard practice; Extreme weather mitigation, Sustainable Nature-based Solutions as a standard practice; mitigating the impacts of extreme weather events; and prioritizing sustainable practices in all municipal and private projects and materials management enhancements to reduce waste.

As Dupuis explained, all goals needed to be SMART, which stands for smart, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-oriented.

Birmingham then set its sights on quantifiable goals it would like to reach by 2035. They include: increasing stormwater retention capacity for the infiltration or capture of an additional 500,000 gallons of stormwater per rain event; reducing greenhouse gas emissions from buildings and facilities by 57,500 metric tons – 50 percent of current emissions; institutionalizing carbon reduction and climate resilience in city government operations; reducing greenhouse gas emissions from passenger vehicles by 10,000 metric tons (a 15 percent reduction).

At the time of Dupuis’s interview with Downtown, there was an open public comment process during which he was collecting comments on the drafted plan. Throughout the public input process, he said that water and stormwater management percolated to the top of resident concerns.

"Overwhelmingly feedback pointed towards water and stormwater as the number one issue, and this is why it is listed first in the plan," Dupuis noted. “When it comes to costs or skepticism about broader climate change, we are aware that some of our residents do not believe in wider climate change or global warming, but when we couch it in a way that asks, what kinds of local damage have you seen or experienced because of flooding in the last several years, everyone can relate.”

Perhaps one of the places where flooding is most evident is in Booth Park and its trailhead to the Rogue River. Enter the park after a rainy day or a big storm, and you might be stepping into a muddy mess.

To remedy this, Birmingham in its parks and recreation plan – which is separate from its sustainability plan – will install a bioswale to the entry of Booth Park.

A bioswale is a shallow, vegetated trench or channel that manages stormwater runoff by slowing it down, removing pollution, and allowing precipitation to soak into the ground. Native plants in a bioswale filter out contaminants through their roots, allowing cleaner water to then run back into the Rouge.

Commonly used in urban areas to catch rainwater, a project like installing a bioswale can cost on average between $2,000-$4,000 thousand. More bioswales and green infrastructure such as rain gardens, green roof technology that covers a percentage of flat roofing on commercial property with plants can also alleviate flooding.

But as the plan points out, Birmingham’s zoning ordinance does not require the installation of green infrastructure on commercial properties. Landscaping is only required in rare instances on commercial property. In order to meet these goals, the plan indicates that ordinances will need to be rewritten to require commercial properties to install green infrastructure in the form of trees, green roofs, bioswales, or rain gardens.

Funding the ambitious sustainability initiatives is a key challenge, but Dupuis said the city is exploring the many grant funding opportunities available to municipalities.

"We will not be proposing anything like a sustainability millage at this point as residents are paying in Ann Arbor,” Dupuis said. “What we are proposing is the creation of a modest general fund allotment that will get some of these projects off the ground. Also, taking a strategy from Royal Oak, we plan to capture the money we save over the long term from sustainability practices and put it into other projects.”

Dupuis pointed to one example highlighted in the drafted sustainability plan that deals with streetlights.

In June 2024, DTE charged Birmingham a little over $51,000 for the electricity consumed by its streetlights. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, LED bulbs use at least 75 percent less energy. Birmingham has 988 conventional and 712 LED streetlights. If all of its streetlights were converted to LED, it would save the city $84,000 per year, according to 2023 data. This savings could be rolled into the general fund to bolster more sustainability projects.

Stormwater remediation proposals include the least expensive, such as encouraging residents to adopt catch drains, rain gardens, and bioswales; developing a tracking system for green stormwater infrastructure, or forming alliances with other communities along the Rouge River. More long-term and costly proposals from $50,000 up include conducting a feasibility study for the strategic use of public easements to manage stormwater and create naturalized areas.

A challenge posed to the city to live up to its sustainability plan is the growth of newly constructed single-family homes built on teardown parcels. In Birmingham, smaller homes are being torn down and replaced by larger ones at the rate of 100 teardown permits per year since 2015.

According to the sustainability plan, teardowns present the city with an opportunity to install new efficient stormwater systems as new homes are constructed. The problem is that the city’s stormwater ordinances have not been updated since 1963. Due to the limited number of parcels over one acre, the plan recommended that Birmingham should exceed the requirement to include parcels half an acre or larger.

To advance its plan, Dupuis said Birmingham will need to hire more staff. Like Royal Oak, Dupuis said Birmingham will look to hire a sustainability manager as well as a stormwater remediation manager.

“It is plain as day that we need to hire someone dedicated to handle the day-to-day operations to execute and manage our sustainability plan and also handle community education and outreach if we want to see any progress,” Dupuis said. “We are also looking into a stormwater specialist because it is such a problematic issue.”

There are in-state resources to help municipalities craft sustainability plans without the need to reinvent the wheel.

Once a municipality achieves a rated certification level in the Michigan Green Communities Challenge, it can receive support and guidance from the Catalyst Communities initiative. Run by EGLE and facilitated by the Graham Institute for Sustainability at the University of Michigan, Catalyst Communities runs monthly informational webinars, provides templates for sustainability plans, and complies newsletters that list the latest sustainability grant opportunities.

Catalyst Communiaties also provides municipalities with graduate student fellows each summer. The Catalyst Leadership Circle (CLC) Fellowship is designed to help communities reach their sustainability goals with graduate students seeking a career in sustainability management. For example, Dupuis said this summer, a fellow worked as an intern for Birmingham and drafted a residential rain garden program to be integrated into the sustainability plan.

Sarah Lee, a clean energy engagement specialist with the Graham Sustainability Institute at the University of Michigan, works with sustainability experts at EGLE as a coordinator for Catalyst Communities and fellowship programs.

Lee said once a community checks off enough Green Challenge benchmarks to reach the silver level, they are eligible to join the Catalyst Leadership Communities.

“It is not expected that any one local government can hit all 127 benchmarks on their own,” Lee said. “If a local government is trying to reach a benchmark, they can reach out to Catalyst Communities at the state level where there are free resources. The Graham Sustainability Institute is also here to open the door to additional assistance.”

According to Lee, the demand for these sustainability services and resources has been growing steadily, with more local governments participating in the Michigan Green Communities Challenge each year.

A large component of municipal sustainability plans involve healthy buildings that are energy efficient, use sustainable building materials, and feature interiors and exteriors that promote well-being. Many builders with sustainability in mind strive to attain LEED Certification (which stands for Leadership and Energy Environmental Design). It is a certification system established by the U.S. Green Building Council that provides standards and criteria for sustainable building design, construction, and operation. LEED Certification is recognized at silver, gold and platinum levels and comes with additional costs for the builder client.

The challenge of attaining LEED certification is to find the right architects and builders.

For years, award-winning Birmingham-based Design Team Plus has taken a complete approach while keeping sustainability in mind for every project. Clients range from restaurants to microbreweries, commercial spaces and houses of worship.

By embracing sustainability as a core principle, the Design Team Plus is shaping the built environment to be more eco-friendly, resilient, and aligned with the needs of the communities they serve. Buildings can also be fitted with green roof technology or even using lighter colors to paint a flat building roof can reduce painting a roof white instead of black can reduce the heat island effect that plagues many urban areas.

Design Team Plus Owner/Founder Shari Stein said examples of their work can be found around Birmingham and Royal Oak and include a LEED-certified commercial building they designed with features such as bicycle racks, EV charging stations and energy efficiency throughout the structure.

Stein said sustainable features in interiors include plants, greenery or other natural materials. A concept known as Biophilic design, it nurtures the relationship between people and nature by introducing various natural features into the built environment, such as including large windows to provide a connection to the outside world.

"We take a holistic approach to sustainability,” Harold Remlinger, Design Team Plus owner and sustainable architect said "We incorporate that in every one of our buildings. Building a sustainable structure means that it is not only durable, but we look for locally-sourced building materials and at times recycled materials. But if those materials have to be driven in from over 500 miles away and increase the carbon footprint, we will not use it.”

One example of their sustainable design is the Stumblebaum Beer Company in Troy. For this project, the architects used reclaimed wood resembling old railroad ties throughout the bar’s interior. Design Team Plus also reused the granite countertops already on the premises and procured furniture from another brewery.

In 2020, the city of Warren consulted with Design Team Plus to draft its parks and recreation master plan to determine what elements and features its parks and other green spaces need to encourage residents to make greater use of them and deepen community connections. Much of these initiatives can be supported with grant funding, Remlinger said.

“There are many improvements grants available to municipalities to put in features in parks and green spaces that encourage residents to get out and connect with natural settings and other members of the community,” Remlinger said. “All of these elements lend themselves to the sustainability of a town.”

Stein acknowledged that each municipality creates their own standards which can sometimes present challenges.

“Ann Arbor has a lot of requirements that we need to work within that are sometimes not cost-effective or practical, as is the case for the city’s standards for multifamily structures,” Stein explained. “In many cases, these multifamily structures are in areas that are not zoned for parking structures, and the parking structures are further downtown, so there are fewer options for residents of multifamily units or apartments to park their cars.”

Remlinger added: “Ann Arbor is also migrating away from using natural gas in its structures and opting for all-electric. Sometimes, the infrastructure does not exist to support this. Eventually, it becomes cost ineffective for the developer as well as the resident, because electric heating and cooking is more expensive than gas.”

Oakland County in 2023 rolled out its sustainability plan which focuses on how it can first incorporate greener and more energy-efficient practices within its offices, facilities, and campus in Pontiac. The county’s website also includes sustainability resources and tips for municipalities and residents.

In August 2024, the U.S. Green Building Council certified all of Oakland County’s buildings and facilities as LEED® Gold because of its commitment to improving holistic, county-wide sustainability practices. This includes its efforts in preserving green spaces, natural resource conservation, and restoration efforts, in addition to its resilience and emergency planning.

Driving along Old Telegraph Road, one can see a visible example of greener thinking put into action. Instead of using gas-powered mowers to groom six acres of lawns around the County headquarters, the county’s landscape crew established a sunflower field.

These self-sowing flowers provide food and habitat for pollinators and other wildlife and increase aesthetic beauty to the campus, and require only rainwater and sunshine to thrive.

The rollout of Oakland County’s sustainability plan largely focuses on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It is working off the baseline year 2018 when its campus emitted 56,411 metric tons of carbon dioxide. In its plan, Oakland County has set a target to achieve net zero emissions for County government operations by 2050 with an interim target of 50 percent emissions reduction by 2035.

In 2022, the county was pulling 75 percent of its renewable electrical energy supply from solar energy at a fixed rate through a 10-year renewable electric supply agreement.

Starting in 2026, this commitment will help reduce the county’s greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent. The county also recently installed its first solar panels which will help reduce its need to pull energy from the grid.

“Oakland County’s achievement of LEED Gold certification underscores our deep commitment to sustainability and reflects County Executive Dave Coulter’s vision of fostering healthier, more resilient communities,” Chief Sustainability Officer Erin Quetell said. “This recognition is a testament to the county and its communities driving real, measurable change in environmental stewardship and quality of life for our residents.”

Beyond its campus and facilities Oakland County’s three goals for its municipalities are to protect drinking water by replacing the remaining lead service lines by 2040, reduce county government emissions and energy use, and promote cleaner transportation alternatives.

Quetell said the county hopes its plan will serve as a guideline for actions that local governments can take in moving towards sustainable actions such as planning for EV charging networks and converting fleets of municipal vehicles to EVs to wean government operations and residents from fossil fuels.

The county plan does not ignore that if it fails to build this network, the demand for EVs could stagnate and falter. It states: “A priority to Southeast Michigan is deploying a (charging network) equitably to ensure all residents have access to public charging and share the benefits of transportation electrification such as improved air quality, workforce development, and economic growth. Multi-family residents and low-income residents would be penalized the most without adequate (access) as they face the largest barriers to installing at-home charging, causing them to rely on public charging options.”

Quetell explained that the county has taken up some action items to meet its goals of reducing its greenhouse emissions.

"To address this, we have entered into a procurement deal that will source 75 percent of our electricity from solar energy beginning in 2026,” explained Quintell. “That’s expected to reduce our greenhouse emissions by 40 percent.”

Quetell emphasized that sustainability in the county goes beyond reducing GHG emissions. Residents of Oakland County can see that coming to fruition by visiting one of the county’s many parks and recreation areas. Putting sustainability practices into motion can also look like seniors 60 and over boarding a county shuttle bus to visit the Oakland County Farmer’s Market to purchase locally grown produce at the Oakland County farmer’s market while picking up information about resources avservices.

“Being socially, mentally, and physically healthy and having the county provide resources to meet these goals for our residents is a key part of our sustainability plan,” Quetell said. “This includes ensuring accessible public spaces for all residents. At the county level, we are having specific conversations with individual communities who are at different phases of putting together their sustainability plans. We are here to provide them resources and meet them wherever they may be in their planning phases.”

One example is the city of Ferndale, where Quetell previously worked as a sustainability planner. There, she helped advance initiatives like installing a solar carport with EV chargers, an LED streetlight conversion, and hiring a zero-waste program manager.

As Oakland County continues to implement its sustainability plan, Quetell emphasized the importance of a collaborative, community-centered approach.

"Sustainability is a system with many people giving input and then other people working to drive out the deliverables,” Quetelle said. “It is a different and often challenging shift of mindset for governments to wrap their heads around and at times can be very difficult. But ultimately, everybody wants to have safe healthy communities with economic opportunities and open green spaces. How do we at the county level support our communities? How do we advance and at the same time make sure we are not further harming the environment? That’s why it is so important to promote sustainable concepts. In the end, it is a lot more than just planting trees.”