Framingham City Council Approves Sustainability Committee

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FRAMINGHAM – The Framingham City Council approved tonight, October 20, a comprised Framingham Sustainability Committee proposal worked out by the Council’s Environment and Sustainability Subcommittee.

Earlier this year, two proposals for a Framingham Sustainability Committee (FSC) were submitted – one by District 8 City Councilor John Stefanini and one by Mayor Yvonne Spicer.

The new Sustainability Committee will have nine members, appointed by the Mayor. “The term of office shall be for three years, with initial appointments of one, two, and three years so that the terms of members shall be staggered,” stated the compromise proposal.

The Stefanini version called for the chair of the Framingham Youth Council to serve on the Committee.

The new comprised proposal calls for an individual between the age of 16 and 25 to be appointed to the Committee.

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There will also be an “Energy Task Force.” It will be an “internal energy working group, a group of city employees, made up of certain department heads and other individuals, or their respective designees, that meet no less than quarterly, to discuss and work together to advance the City’s identified environmental and sustainability priorities.

In addition to the sustainability coordinator, the members of the task force shall represent:

• Capital projects and facilities management department
• Public works department
• Parks, recreation, and cultural affairs department
• Framingham public schools
• “Any other city employee as the Mayor sees fit”

City Council Environmental Subcommittee Chair Cesar Stewart-Morales said earlier this month the way for success is to have “these two committees, the one that’s made up of city employees and the one that is made up of residents, with the common member being the sustainability coordinator.”

With these committees, the resident Framingham Sustainability Committee would be able to generate good creative ideas, while the Energy Task Force would do internal work to develop those creative ideas.

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