Lopez: We need a Local Green New Deal
by Special to San José Spotlight
Photo courtesy of the Youth Climate Strike.
This week, as thousands of people marched in youth-led climate strikes, a movement is well underway.
With our state hit by natural disasters exacerbated by climate change, it's increasingly untenable to deny its impact on our daily lives. Yet current projections have us getting nowhere near the action needed to keep warming below two degrees Celsius, the point of catastrophic climate impact. It's time to call on our local governments to enact a Local Green New Deal.
There's five steps we can take in the South Bay. First, our local government bodies must declare a climate emergency. Lawmakers in San Jose and Santa Clara County have already done so. As a councilmember, I would lead the way in Campbell. Our other local boards, such as school boards tasked with safeguarding our children's future, and water and transportation boards that can implement green policies, ought to do the same. Practically, climate emergency resolutions will make it more difficult for the same elected officials to disregard the impact of future policy proposals to the environment.
Our local cities should also commit to planting trees and preserving our existing natural beauty. Campbell is known as the Orchard City — talk to any resident, and we'll tell you how much we love our trees. They beautify the environment, provide shade for young and old alike, and have been shown to improve mental and physical health. Just as critically, trees trap carbon from the environment in a process known as biosequestration, actually reducing the warming effects of greenhouse gases.
We also need a commitment from local leaders to create walkable, bikeable and livable communities. These improve our health and overall happiness and quality of life. Often, these will require cities to work together, such as the creation of the Los Gatos Creek trail, which was a collaboration between Campbell, Los Gatos, San Jose and Santa Clara County, as well as the Stevens Creek Trail, which required a commitment from Cupertino, Los Altos, Mountain View and Sunnyvale. And an essential part of creating livable communities is planning for mixed-use developments with increased density, with coordination between city councils and our regional transportation bodies.
I grew up taking the bus — that was my connection to the community. That's why I was proud to be the first local leader in the South Bay to call for free public transit. With Kansas City recently moving to free transit, and leaders in cities like Boston calling for the same, elected leaders in San Francisco and Santa Clara County are now jumping onboard the movement to invest in our transit systems to create stronger communities. It's not just a win for working families, but also an important piece of an overall local climate strategy.
Finally, we need a commitment to making the transition to clean energy for our local grid.
Many cities, most recently Campbell and Milpitas, have adopted reach codes that ban the use of natural gas for new construction. This is an important part of transitioning the electric grid to clean energy. Bay Area cities must form regional agreements, both between government bodies and with the private sector, with a plan to move toward clean energy. San Jose's plan currently calls for 100% renewable energy by 2050; other cities must build and improve on this. Unlike San Francisco to the North, which is heavily relying on hydroelectric power from the Hetch Hetchy system to get to 100% renewable energy by 2030, South Bay leaders will need to work together to come up with innovative solutions or risk seriously lagging other metro areas.
As a Campbell city councilmember, I'll be committed to the fight against climate change. It's one that affects all of us, and we can't wait any longer. The good news is, we can take action at the local level. It just takes leaders willing to step up and meet this historical moment.
Sergio Lopez is a nonprofit leader and candidate for Campbell City Council. He serves as director of development for the Junior State of America Foundation, a national civic education nonprofit, and sits on the Board of Directors of the Campbell Historical Museum Foundation. He graduated from Yale University. You can reach him at sergio@lopezforcampbell.com, or find
more information at LopezForCampbell.com.
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Transparency and Accountability are Needed in San Jose Dec 08, 2019 at 8:54PM
Lets' focus on solving the homeless crisis, then talk about "grids." Development entities all over the Bay and CA are already talking about most of these issues — these ideas are already in motion. So, lets' stop just saying things that sound go, and make some real change in this region.
Wayne Prescott Dec 09, 2019 at 7:00AM
Editorial Board: Is this piece truly an editorial, or a campaign speech?
Comes off as an unproductive campaign speech to me, that tries to tie a national "hot topic" to a local election. What confuses me about this is California, and the Bay Area are already focused on this issue as a region, and making efforts to be "green." So, the guy is preaching to the choir. What he does in this piece is completely miss an opportunity to discuss pressing local issues, and present solutions, which leads me to believe he isn't in tune with the actual issues in Campbell, and the County generally.
John Doe Dec 10, 2019 at 2:21PM
LOL well that was a thinly veiled campaign rag piece.
So quick question – as someone who was on a board of directors for a museum, how exactly does that qualify you to make sweeping statements about the state of the climate being related to fires, make grand and skeptical assumptions about our power grid being able to transition to an unsustainable and non-existent power source, and then attempt to wrap it all up by making hasty promises of welfare like free bus trips and expanded rail lines, without even taking into consideration how these are going to get paid?
I enjoyed the trope about being the 'poor' kid who had to take a bus (once), but outside of that, your election plans are too grand, and the idea of expanding jurisdiction of mayors beyond their city borders in order to shake down other cities is just that – a shake down, especially since you're from campbell, so you're basically a yuppy. Also, denying houses natural gas lines for heating and cooking should be considered criminal, as anyone with a background in engineering can tell you that nat gas is a hell of a lot more cheaper and efficient at heating and cooking compared to electricity, but you probably don't know anything about that, do you?