Discuss Potential Topics for 2021-2022 Work Plan

In May, the City Council will participating in their annual strategic planning to outline the City's objectives for the year.  Per City Code, the Environmental Policy Board (EPB) must develop a work plan consistent with the City Council's Strategic Plan.  Thus, now is an ideal time for the EPB to begin discussing potential items and/or topics to include on a 2021-2022 Work Plan.  The 2020 Work Plan is attached for reference. 

The EPB has already specified an interest in exploring ways to increase accessibility of EV charging stations within Ramsey and more specifically, within The COR.  Since a new Work Plan is needed, Staff felt it more prudent to include this topic as part of a draft Work Plan rather than forwarding an individual topic on to City Council for consideration.  Thus, this item has been added to the draft Work Plan.  

Staff has received some suggestions from Board Members for discussion purposes, including:

• Identify opportunities to work collaboratively with the Parks and Recreation Commission
• Public engagement through implementation of a demonstration project(s)
• Revitalizing the Focus on Environment column in the Ramsey Resident
  • Identify topics for inclusion
  • Create a calendar to ensure seasonally appropriate topics
• Develop meaningful Earth Day and/or Arbor Day programming for the public
• Public engagement with elementary and middle school students with potential topics including:
  • Recycling
  • Beneficial (and problematic) insects
  • Composting
  • Others?

Additionally, attached to this case are some of the final reports from the City's participation in the Resilient Communities Project through the University of Minnesota.  These reports may help prompt additional ideas for discussion/inclusion in the Work Plan.  There are ideas ranging from potential demonstration projects to strategies related to public engagement (with both the general public and developers).  These serve as good background information for the Work Plan discussion.  Staff acknowledges the vast amount of information in these reports and wants to reiterate that these are for background information only.  Furthermore, the Work Plan does not need to be finalized in a single meeting (e.g. there is more time to review the attached information and then circle back at a subsequent meeting to continue and finalize a draft Work Plan). 

This case is being handled as part of Staff's regular duties.

Based on discussion.  The desired outcome is identification of topics and/or specific items for inclusion in a draft Work Plan.