Sustainable CT

Stoddard: “Of 169 municipalities in Connecti- cut, we have 63 registered.We involved over 200 stakeholders in creating the program, and once we launched, many of the co-creators were ready to adopt it.We have a small staff, but helping towns understand the program is a priority. So, if they ask us to come to a town council meeting or a sustainability team meeting, we go out directly and help them, one on one. “When it comes to communication, obvious- ly, there are a lot of emails and phone calls. The website is a major source of information, besides peer sharing and seeing what other towns are doing. The website has an interactive platform – once towns register, they create an account and have a municipal dashboard plat- form to log in what they’ve done. “In May, we launched an exciting support ef- fort called the Sustainable CT Fellowship Pro- gram and had a dozen students from colleges all over the state provide hands-on support to towns throughout the summer. They worked in our partners’ regional planning offices across Connecticut. That’s another way we communi- cate – interface and provide assistance through these young college students. We also have Yale University representation on our Board of Directors. And we’ve partnered with a group at the University of Connecticut that does training with municipal land use commissions. SUSTAINABLE CT They have lots of great tools and we’ve been funneling their support through the Sustainable CT platform. In addition to universities, we have strong partnerships with the Connecticut Green Bank, the Partnership for Strong Communities, The Nature Conservancy, and others that provide assistance to towns that aligns with their mission and goals and with Sustainable CT.” BVM: How do you help towns deal with sus- tainability challenges? Stoddard: “Funding is a big challenge for towns, especially with a drop in state funding. Starting in 2019, we’ll have grants available to support local sustainability projects. For com- munities that want to engage in sustainability efforts and environmental stewardship but don’t know where to start, the roadmap of best practices we’ve created will be a huge help in moving Connecticut towns forward. “Our Sustainable CT platform engages com- munity spirit and involves people in community building when they might not have otherwise. If individuals want to get involved, we’ll match them up with the sustainability team in their community, so they can become active. If their town hasn’t signed up, we give them the tools and resources to reach out to their mayor and others to encourage the town to participate.We’re just getting started and realizing how rich these partnerships with universities and businesses and all the different sectors are, and how important. There are countless untapped opportunities we’ll be digging into as we move forward.”