Have been working on the STAR Community Index, a national monitoring and tracking system for communities. This was developed in conjunction with USGBC and is somewhat similar to LEED in that it is point based program with five possible ‘Star’ levels. It has seven categories that profile a city’s or county’s sustainability status such as, Built Environment, Natural Systems, Health & Safety, etc…all emanating from three pillars of economic, environmental and social equity.
Have gone through various phases of thought about it. At first excited, then overwhelmed by the mass of detail – it has about 300 individual data entry portals wherein one must upload maps, documents and tables. Then underwhelm, wondering was it worth it. Excited again, as yesterday attended the Green Cabinet meeting, a sustainability leadership committee of all City Dept Directors and headed by the City Administrator. Progress on STAR was presented and received an enthusiastic response from City Administrator. He wants DC to be the first city to receive a five star rating and made this imperative clear to the Directors. the sense of competition will help as we have to call upon staff many times to supply us with their internal data for verification of programs and progress.
It has the same shortcomings as early LEED in that it is a bit of “sustainability by numbers”, but if effort is made in providing the best input it can provide an excellent baseline and tool with which to measure progress over time.
The program is in Pilot stage right now and the STAR staff is actively seeking feedback re: the parameters set and measures asked for. Like LEED it will evolve and become better with greater use.
We are somewhat over a third complete and submission date is next March, but as most of the items require showing progress over time it will give more time to complete some achievement steps. The most important first step is identifying the point of contact persons in each department or outside agency that will have the needed information or know how we can get it. Certainly helps one learn the organizational logistics of a complex city government.
DC was also invited to be a member of an international sustainability organization of cities, called C 40. Although it is a relatively small city in population it GDP and international impact is such that it was invited to join in ‘megacity’ status.
Ann Pierce