Charlie Smyth for Urbana City Council
Vote Tuesday, April 5th

Responses to Sierra Club, Prairie Chapter, questionaire

1) What are your best environmental achievements so far?

I led the fight to expand recycling during my last term (1989-93), an expansion that took place during the term following mine.   I was also the only member of the Intergovernmental Solid Waste Association to oppose the planned construction of a facility to remove recyclables from garbage, which thankfully, never broke ground.

2) What environmental issues will you publicly support throughout your
campaign?

With respect to recycling in Urbana, we need to continue expanding the fine work done these past years, while ensuring that we have a good solid-waste plan that will reduce our environmental impact at a city level. In general terms, we need to protect open spaces, minimize urban sprawl, and stem the loss of prime farmland. We need to look at incentives to encourage energy efficiencies and planning policies that encourage infill construction without damaging established neighborhoods. I think it is very short sighted to not realize that gasoline prices are going to continue to rise and we need to return to planning communities that include basic shopping needs, green space, and alternative transportation integrated into the design.  Without a financial incentive, we won’t move from the mentality of getting in the car to go to the mega store for our purchases just to save a few bucks.

3) Why are you interested in environmental issues?

I’ve supported environmental issues since High School. As a biostatistician by training, it’s clear to me that many resources are not renewable, that global warming is fact, and continued blind consumption is wreaking havoc on much of the earth with dire, long term consequences that I hope the public is recognizing. Bottom line is that I’d like to avoid these nasty long term consequences such as the loss of biodiversity, green/open space, natural and pristine areas and so on.

4) Any personal environmental work, education, groups, hobbies, or
habits (e.g. energy efficient home/cars/appliances; reduced
consumption/driving; reuse; buy recycled/organic/local; vegetarian)?

Organic gardener with a 15 year old compost pile in my backyard, 20 year member of the Sierra Club and supporter of local groups such as ISEN and Prairie Rivers Network. While on the City Council in 1991 or 92, I challenged folks to match me in reducing waste through recycling and composting. I was able to reduce our family of 4’s garbage from 3 cans (the standard 32 gal type) to one per week which we’ve continued to do to this day. We try to buy efficient appliances (which, regrettably you can’t do in Urbana); we buy from two local farmers as well as at the Food Coop and Farmers Market. As a family we own more bicycles than cars and we know how to use them -- our annual car mileage is around 10,000 miles per year. And if we didn’t have a teenage son with a drivers license and active social calendar, we’d be back to being a one car family.

5) What are the three most pressing environmental concerns in Urbana?

Decay and blight in older, established neighborhoods and business areas, urban sprawl, energy inefficiency, and air quality (I’ve seen our air quality ranked a D in some surveys). I think the first item bears a little explanation – if you don’t protect the core of the community, you just encourage people to move away decreasing efficiency and creating transportation problems that contribute to the other items on my list.

6) What is your opinion about environmental protections in the recently
proposed Urbana Comprehensive Plan?

I’m still reading this plan. There are a lot “good” environmental things said about discouraging sprawl and encouraging infill but it’s the follow through that counts – see question 7 and my comments at the end.

7) Would you publicly oppose the proposed ring road around Urbana?  If
not, what would you do to prevent further sprawl and another slow
flowing, low quality commercial corridor with desolate buildings?

Yes. Windsor Road is completely adequate at this time for east-west access. We have only to look at what happened to Philo Road by moving 130 eastward. We must have compatible, planned growth that takes into account future transportation needs, and encourages walking, biking, and public transit. There is much we can learn from the evolved designs of our older, established neighborhoods. Let’s not repeat the mistakes of other communities. The latest CUATS plan even says that building and expanding roads simply encourages more use yet they keep talking about a ring road!

8) What would you do to encourage more varied shopping in central and
eastern Urbana (e.g., Philo Road) to reduce sprawl and gasoline
consumption?

We have many housing classifications - our business zoning classifications should be just as sophisticated and used to encourage business redevelopment within the city.   If we don’t want to have to drive to the suburbs and strip malls, we need to have real neighborhood business zoning that allows us to control what, when, and how business operates. To this end, we need to look at incentives that would turn this area into a more integrated neighborhood business area as well as attract shoppers from not too distant areas. And I would rather see one of the big empty stores taken down and replaced with affordable housing if no better solution appears.

9) Would you publicly support policies that discourage sprawl by
recovering all infrastructure (roads/utilities) and service costs
(schools/fire/police) of expanding into natural areas and farmland?

I believe that most thinking is that any expenditures made by the city will be recouped by future property taxes so I don’t think this is an approach that would discourage sprawl. If other communities are using this successfully, I’d be willing to consider it.

10) What financial support would you give to create bike/hike trails
that link Urbana together?

I think that all new growth needs to include this as well as green and open space in the development costs. I’m not sure that it would be cost effective to add separate bike/hike trails in older, established areas and instead, the approach suggested by the next question may be more appropriate and a better use of funds.

11) Would you support sharing residential streets (walk/bike/drive) that
slow traffic in Europe and traffic calming devices for smoother flow?

I’d like to study this and see how well it works. Frankly, if traffic could move smoother on our arterial roads, then maybe the push for more roads at the edge of town would diminish. Though I get out and about by bike all over town, we need to do more to encourage others to walk or bike.

12) Would you publicly support ending utility tax discounts for higher
consumption and use the revenues as energy efficiency matching funds?

Yes, if this can be done so that there is a clear tradeoff in efficiencies gained versus costs. Whatever is done needs to be competitive with surrounding areas so I’d prefer to see it as an incentive program with a clear quid pro quo.

13) Would you publicly oppose another nuclear reactor in Clinton?

Yes. We need to look at local wind farms instead.

14) Would you publicly support shifting street maintenance funding from
property taxes on everyone to gas taxes on actual users?

It’s a great idea but unless you can get a wide geographical range established, people will simply drive across the city line to fill up. People need to understand the subsidies that go to roads before they start complaining about tax dollars going for mass transit systems and so on. A better way to ask this would be to question whether non automobile-centric transportation gets a fair allocation of tax dollars.

15) How much will you increase Urbana's fleet of hybrid cars?

I’d like to see as many vehicles as possible as hybrid, electric, hydrogen (from renewable resources), or bio-diesel. We do need to think long term here – we need to encourage and take advantage of new technologies it appears.

16) How will you increase Urbana's purchase of environmental products?

I don’t know when Urbana’s purchasing policies with respect to buying green were last reviewed but if not done so in the last 4 or 5 years, it’s time. I’d like to see how we compare to other progressive cities around the country and put into place similar, successful practices.

17) Would you publicly support adopting LEED building codes for energy
efficiency in all future city government construction and remodeling?

In principle, yes.  In practice, we’ve missed a major opportunity with the remodeling and expansion of the library though a lot of effort was put in to gain efficiencies and keep utility costs down. I don’t know when there will be another city building project of this magnitude. Better would be to try to incorporate this thinking into incentives for remodeling of other buildings and homes around town.

18) Would you support shifting to sales taxes (slowing consumption of
imports) from property taxes to keep housing affordable?

 No. Not only is this a regressive approach, then even more folks would go shop in Champaign further subsidizing that community at Urbana’s loss. We need to work with other local and state officials to develop progressive tax policies that are environmentally friendly long term.

19) Would you support increasing parking fees for SUVs and pickups?

No, this would have no real impact as there are too few purchased parking permits and only one City parking garage. Further, some small pickups and SUV’s get as good or better gas mileage than a mid-sized car. This is a state and national issue where penalties or incentives should be based on gasoline consumption and the safety ratings of the various vehicles

20) Would you support requiring the equivalent of storm doors and
windows on rental units to reduce fossil fuel imports?

What I would like to see is a push to encourage home ownership and redevelopment of many older structures, or at least encourage high quality maintenance of rentals. Upgrading energy efficiency should be part of an overall remodeling and rehabilitation program with marketing and incentives similar to those of the “Build Urbana” program.

21) Would you enable residents to use the city's webpage to sign up for
emailed newsletters and announcements, saving postage and paper?

Yes, I would support as much electronic access in as clear a manner possible. In this day and age, it’s ridiculous that we can’t get a downloadable, compressed file of all meeting agendas and packet information with the click of a mouse button. (note that since I answered this, and spoke with the City’s IT manager, zip files of council packets are now available – I expect to see more of this in the future).

22) What would you do to protect the environment in Drainage Districts?

Yes, I’d like to know how other progressive communities deal with those darn lawn care products and the street runoff that ends up downstream. We can at a minimum encourage alternative and natural ground covers, riparian buffers and other vegetative approaches where possible and in new construction/remodelling. I’d also like to know about alternatives to salting the hell out of every street at the slightest sign of ice and snow.

23) Is there anything else you would like to add?

What do we want this city to look like 20 years from now? We clearly need to be doing more to improve energy efficiency in older homes, in new home construction, and in building remodels and construction. Are there ways that we can use wind, solar, or fuel cell technology in this community? Should we be working with someone like Ion America, a fuel cell technology company that is currently testing in Chatanooga and coincidentally founded by a UofI alum?  Rather than think about catching up with or being like Champaign, we need to think about what we can do to recapture our tax base in new and progressive ways putting the words of the Comprehensive Plan into real action.

I’d welcome comments and suggestions at csmyth@charliesmyth.org