LFP Council Corner – Update on the Climate Action Committee

The Climate Action Committee will release the city’s preliminary Climate Action Plan in January. The committee, comprising a group of ten residents (including a couple of Shorecrest High seniors) and guided by the city’s Environmental and Sustainability Specialist Cory Roche, has been working for 20 months on putting the plan together. 

The plan will have recommendations on cutting greenhouse gas emissions in city operations and suggestions for homeowners, renters, and businesses to become more resilient in the face of climate change.

Reasoning that Lake Forest Park residents have much personal, business, and academic background and experience in understanding the Pacific Northwest climate and its changes, committee chair Sarah Phillips and vice-chair Anne Udaloy steered the committee away from hiring outside consultants. 

The result is a report that is literally tailored for Lake Forest Park and our unique geography, canopy, and community.

The main recommendation of the report is the recognition that climate mitigation (reducing greenhouse gases) and resilience (adapting to climate change) cross multiple city operations (as well as many aspects of our personal lives). 

Designating a single person as a Climate Action manager will help implement the other recommendations of the report and assess, over time, how the city and its residents are meeting our climate goals.

What effect will a climate action plan have on multiple 100-degree days, weeks of smoke-laden air and deluges of rain? 

We do what we can! The city’s leaf-blowers and other maintenance equipment are all now battery-powered. This year there have been 90 permits for residential heat pumps and 12 for solar-power systems. 

This past month, dozens of LFP residents participated in the Miyawaki forest planting (with native and non-invasive non-native species) at the Shoreline Historical Museum, a radical approach to increasing urban canopy cover.

“The environment” was cited by the majority of respondents to our survey as to why they moved to LFP. The Climate Action Plan is a roadmap to preserving the environment we all cherish. 

With the discovery of several salmon fry in Lyon and McAleer Creeks, we are seeing the fruits of working on our climate actions.

And the committee would love to talk to you about the report and any aspect of the climate that concerns you! 

Find us at the LFP Farmers Market (where we’ve been at the sponsor table the past two summers), or at Picnic in the Park or other city-sponsored events. 

Or, you’ll find us inviting you to take part in a survey, as we did in November 2022, to find out your concerns and your aspirations in mitigating climate change and building climate resilience (nearly 500 of you responded – thank you!). 

Or, you’ll come to one of our series of climate talks that we set up with the cities of Shoreline and Kenmore; we covered induction cooking, home and business solar power and heat pumps this past year. You can always get ahold of us at climate@cityoflfp.com.

--Councilmember Tracy Furutani