metro
05-18-2009, 09:39 AM
The Journal Record - Article (http://www.journalrecord.com/article.cfm?recid=98730)
Roth: Is Oklahoma City a city in transition?
by Jim Roth
Guest Columnist May 18, 2009
Kudos seems in order for the city of Oklahoma City’s recent push to focus on issues of sustainability and smarter urban planning.
Jim Couch, city manager, and Russell Claus, planning director, have demonstrated an interest and focus that deserve our thanks. Couch is pushing for the creation of an Office of Sustainability that will focus on smarter energy analysis of public buildings, which will in turn lower costs of operation for these taxpayer-funded facilities. We should like these savings. Claus is deeply engaged in planning, zoning and code issues that prove we are all better off with a development that appreciates appropriate density, instead of urban sprawl, which would cost us all too much to build, maintain and sustain. We should like this idea too.
This progressive thinking hasn’t always been the case for Oklahoma’s largest city. In fact, legend has it that former Planning Director Garner Stoll was run out of town in recent years because of his professional opinions about smarter growth and efforts to stop the sprawl.
More recently, some of the city’s elected leadership has even questioned the existence of climate change and seemed obstinate about taking steps to safeguard taxpayer costs in this $1 billion public enterprise.
Politics aside, good public stewards take steps to limit costs and risks for those they serve.
Changing won’t be easy and it won’t happen overnight, but steps to create a sustainable city could methodically and permanently undo the harm caused by a past century of unbridled expansion.
As a former county commissioner, I can tell you that the last mile of any road is always the most expensive, because it serves the least amount of citizens. Public improvements and investments should be precipitated by need and greatest impact, not merely outward growth for the sake of growth.
Couch and Claus are working to transition Oklahoma City to this higher ideal, and taxpayers will be better served because of it.
Along their way, we should engage with them, and I hope they will continue to seek public engagement to achieve lasting change.
The city has a strong ally in a community-based group called Transition Town OKC, an initiative launched by Sustainable OKC.
These well-intended citizens are working to create a localized, community approach to meeting the energy challenges of our time and beyond.
Transition Town OKC is the 27th such “transition” community in America. These efforts are spreading across the country as citizens begin to realize we have the power to collaborate and cooperatively plan for the future with less energy.
According to Transition Town’s principles, there are two overriding characteristics for success:
• Transition initiatives are nonpartisan, seeking to include all members of society in the collaborative development of community resilience.
• Transition is not a spiritual movement. It is a grass-roots, community-led response to peak oil, climate change and the economic crisis. It is interested in unleashing our collective genius in whatever ways that emerge within the community.
To learn more, please check out Transition Town OKC (http://www.goinglocalokc.com).
Oklahomans should like the “local” control that such an initiative contemplates. These aren’t ideas forced upon us by outsiders. Instead, it’s about localized solutions to improve and enhance the cost and quality of life for our local communities.
These re-localization efforts (food supply, energy options, transit opportunities, etc.) are designed to result in a life that is more fulfilling, more socially connected and more equitable than the one we have today.
It’s not the sole responsibility of City Hall or of citizens alone. It takes both to bring about real lasting, common-sense change.
It’s great to know that citizen groups like Transition Town OKC and Sustainable OKC, along with public leaders like Couch and Claus, are all working to build smarter, sustainable, more affordable communities for tomorrow and beyond.
The future requires all of us to do what we can, collectively and individually.
Jim Roth, a former Oklahoma corporation commissioner, is an attorney with Phillips Murrah P.C. in Oklahoma City, where his practice focuses on clean, green energy for Oklahoma.
Roth: Is Oklahoma City a city in transition?
by Jim Roth
Guest Columnist May 18, 2009
Kudos seems in order for the city of Oklahoma City’s recent push to focus on issues of sustainability and smarter urban planning.
Jim Couch, city manager, and Russell Claus, planning director, have demonstrated an interest and focus that deserve our thanks. Couch is pushing for the creation of an Office of Sustainability that will focus on smarter energy analysis of public buildings, which will in turn lower costs of operation for these taxpayer-funded facilities. We should like these savings. Claus is deeply engaged in planning, zoning and code issues that prove we are all better off with a development that appreciates appropriate density, instead of urban sprawl, which would cost us all too much to build, maintain and sustain. We should like this idea too.
This progressive thinking hasn’t always been the case for Oklahoma’s largest city. In fact, legend has it that former Planning Director Garner Stoll was run out of town in recent years because of his professional opinions about smarter growth and efforts to stop the sprawl.
More recently, some of the city’s elected leadership has even questioned the existence of climate change and seemed obstinate about taking steps to safeguard taxpayer costs in this $1 billion public enterprise.
Politics aside, good public stewards take steps to limit costs and risks for those they serve.
Changing won’t be easy and it won’t happen overnight, but steps to create a sustainable city could methodically and permanently undo the harm caused by a past century of unbridled expansion.
As a former county commissioner, I can tell you that the last mile of any road is always the most expensive, because it serves the least amount of citizens. Public improvements and investments should be precipitated by need and greatest impact, not merely outward growth for the sake of growth.
Couch and Claus are working to transition Oklahoma City to this higher ideal, and taxpayers will be better served because of it.
Along their way, we should engage with them, and I hope they will continue to seek public engagement to achieve lasting change.
The city has a strong ally in a community-based group called Transition Town OKC, an initiative launched by Sustainable OKC.
These well-intended citizens are working to create a localized, community approach to meeting the energy challenges of our time and beyond.
Transition Town OKC is the 27th such “transition” community in America. These efforts are spreading across the country as citizens begin to realize we have the power to collaborate and cooperatively plan for the future with less energy.
According to Transition Town’s principles, there are two overriding characteristics for success:
• Transition initiatives are nonpartisan, seeking to include all members of society in the collaborative development of community resilience.
• Transition is not a spiritual movement. It is a grass-roots, community-led response to peak oil, climate change and the economic crisis. It is interested in unleashing our collective genius in whatever ways that emerge within the community.
To learn more, please check out Transition Town OKC (http://www.goinglocalokc.com).
Oklahomans should like the “local” control that such an initiative contemplates. These aren’t ideas forced upon us by outsiders. Instead, it’s about localized solutions to improve and enhance the cost and quality of life for our local communities.
These re-localization efforts (food supply, energy options, transit opportunities, etc.) are designed to result in a life that is more fulfilling, more socially connected and more equitable than the one we have today.
It’s not the sole responsibility of City Hall or of citizens alone. It takes both to bring about real lasting, common-sense change.
It’s great to know that citizen groups like Transition Town OKC and Sustainable OKC, along with public leaders like Couch and Claus, are all working to build smarter, sustainable, more affordable communities for tomorrow and beyond.
The future requires all of us to do what we can, collectively and individually.
Jim Roth, a former Oklahoma corporation commissioner, is an attorney with Phillips Murrah P.C. in Oklahoma City, where his practice focuses on clean, green energy for Oklahoma.