In light of Earth Day coming up at the end of the month, you may be reevaluating your carbon footprint or giving your green thumb another try. One organization comprised of Lehigh Valley environmental advocates has made it their mission since 2005 to promote for and work towards an overall environmentally sustainable foundation for the Valley’s future growth.
After speaking with environmental advocate and sustainability expert Joyce Marin, Executive Director of Renew Lehigh Valley, she shared with us insights about the advocacy organization’s principal objectives, sustainability projects and goals for the future of the Valley. Here are her thoughts and a direct, inside look at how RenewLV has been fighting for what they call “smart growth” in the Lehigh Valley.
Q: What is Smart Growth in the Lehigh Valley? What are RenewLV’s “smart growth” objectives?
A: In a nutshell, “smart growth” (to borrow the name of Tom Hylton’s book) is Save Our Land, Save Our Towns. There are ten principles of smart growth, as Wikipedia says:
- Mix land uses
- Take advantage of compact building design
- Create a range of housing opportunities and choices
- Create walkable neighborhoods
- Foster distinctive, attractive communities with a strong sense of place
- Preserve open space, farmland, natural beauty and critical environmental areas
- Strengthen and direct development towards existing communities
- Provide a variety of transportation choices
- Make development decisions predictable, fair and cost effective
- Encourage community and stakeholder collaboration in development decisions
RenewLV’s Board of Directors represents a variety of sectors and provides strategic “smart growth” guidance for the organization based on these goals. They also represent different perspectives and backgrounds that include local and state government, businesses and non-profit. They are very engaged in our initiative work and bring their education and expertise to the work of the organization through the “smart growth” committees on which they are actively engaged.
Farmland Preservation
RenewLV’s objective is for the region to meet the farmland preservation goals as stated in the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission’s regional comprehensive plan—25 percent of the land in Lehigh and Northampton Counties for agricultural use. Meeting farmland preservation goals in the Lehigh Valley will prevent urban sprawl, preserve air and water quality, support a sustainable food supply, mitigate increases in traffic congestion and ensure vibrant urban areas through higher levels of investment and planned, contiguous development in the urban cores.
In order to preserve farmland while preserving the region’s quality of life, RenewLV encourages citizens to advocate for farmland preservation and farmland preservation funding at the local, county and state levels of government.
Smart Transportation
With Andrew Twiggar serving as chair and the membership help from Ron Beitler, William Erdman, Erich Hornung, Don Miles and Julie Thomases, this initiative aims to expand multi-modal transportation throughout the region, including walking, biking, transit, light rail and passenger rail. This will lead to more efficient development, better land use planning, improved air quality, less congestion and fewer negative environmental impacts.
As part of an effort to reduce traffic congestion and attract investment to the region consistent with “smart growth” principles, a group of community leaders and stakeholders in collaboration with RenewLV and Amtrak is revisiting the viability of restoring passenger rail to the Lehigh Valley. Going forward, RenewLV will advocate for passenger rail by informing and engaging citizens about opportunities and benefits of the Amtrak service in our region and identifying supporters with whom we can form lasting partnerships.
Food Sustainability
Understanding the information published in the 2013 Local Food Economy Assessment Report generated by the Greater Lehigh Valley: Buy Fresh, Buy Local group, RenewLV—headed by Julie Thomases—works to grow our local food economy by addressing the gaps in the food system, preserving open space, improving our citizens’ nutritional health and developing jobs and an economic base in the region. We helped jump-start the Lehigh Valley food revolution by gathering hundreds of community leaders, entrepreneurs, employers and farmers to discuss opportunities for growing the local food economy.
Q: What would you say is the status of the alleged “hollowing out” of Lehigh Valley's core communities?
A: Much progress has been made in attracting investment to the urban core. This has come through the good work of the Lehigh Valley’s Greater Chamber of Commerce and Community Action Group and their Main Street initiatives with good work at the neighborhood level.
Q: How is the Lehigh Valley attempting to reverse a declining urban core and disappearing open space/farmland?
A: Our community has a highly fragmented system of municipal governance that severely impedes planning for growth because we have 2,566 units of local government; it’s the way we were organized from the beginning, and it’s somewhat challenging to change it.
Yet, each of the cities and their mayors over several administrations has accomplished a great deal in attracting investment to the urban core. The Neighborhood Improvement Zone in Allentown and the City Revitalization and Improvement Zone in Bethlehem utilize tax increment financing to attract real estate investment. All three cities are utilizing the Main Street approach to downtown revitalization. All of the cities, but especially Easton, have attracted investment over several decades through good planning, supporting the arts and attracting businesses and visitors to events and museums.
Both counties have farmland preservation professionals, farmland preservation boards and work with local municipalities and property owners to put easements on farmland in order to preserve it forever. Many additional ideas were explored in the development of a farmland preservation toolbox at RenewLV’s Save It or Pave It event on this past February 26. The toolbox, which is presently “under construction,” can be viewed by the public at renewlv.org/farmland-preservation-toolbox.
Briefly, RenewLV’s recommendation to solve this issue is to fully fund the county conservation easement programs—with restoring contributions by each county to the previous $2 million level. However, by our estimations, even that is not adequate; a multi-pronged approach is needed.
Q: So far, how have RenewLV's public engagements, regional education outreaches and committee events succeeded or made progress in your initiatives?
A: We’ve made progress in all of our initiatives. In terms of farmland preservation, we supported the amendment to the Lehigh County budget adding $500,000 to the farmland preservation effort for a local matching program. It passed and is being implemented today, motivating local municipalities to raise funds for farmland preservation, which is about $200,000 to date.
Through the work of the committee, we are developing a farmland preservation toolbox as previously mentioned. Various tools in the toolbox were explored at the Save It or Pave It event, and many of the 125 attendees are local elected and appointed officials who will hopefully take what they learned back to their municipality and will implement.
When the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission’s Livable Landscapes plan for Northampton County came before the county’s council on January 7, we encouraged our followers to attend that meeting and reach out to their elected officials on council and in the administration. People responded with support and filled the council’s chambers. During that meeting, council members articulated their support for farmland preservation.
Our efforts towards our food sustainability initiative came out of EnvisionLV, a three-year process for sustainability planning that would engage 14 consortium partners. From December 2014 to the present, we held seven public engagement events to grow the local food economy consistent with the Greater Lehigh Valley’s Buy Fresh, Buy Local Assessment Report. Our intent is to create a broad-based local food revolution. As a result of our efforts, the Lehigh Valley Food Policy Council was formally launched in September of 2015 with the Valley’s Community Action Committee identified as the backbone organization, and RenewLV is currently doing communications and outreach. The Council includes 14 consortium partners utilizing a collective impact model of working together to effectuate change. They have developed an organizational chart with nine working groups meeting monthly. The goals are to improve food security and grow the local food economy.
RenewLV’s public engagement events have attracted between 90 to 125 stakeholders to become informed, share information and collaborate. The events include a locally-sourced lunch, a panel discussion of experts and small group table discussions that allow participants to help to network and craft solutions for food sustainability. Our events support the projects and programs of the participants.
Concerning our smart transportation initiative, RenewLV formally responded to MoveLV, the region’s transportation plan, highlighting the need for interconnecting multi-modal transportation systems in the region. I was asked to give a TED talk in September of 2015 on multi-modal transportation planning, and we have formed a Smart Transportation Committee that is exploring multi-modal transportation planning utilizing Complete Streets in the region and restoring passenger rail to the greater Lehigh Valley.
In December 2015 at RenewLV’s Summit for Smart Growth and Sustainable Communities, Joe McHugh, Senior Vice President of Government Affairs and Communications at Amtrak, stated that Amtrak would like to offer an inspection train to Allentown to the New York area (probably Newark or Jersey City) in order to create enthusiasm for the restoration of passenger rail to the region.
Lastly, our “smart growth” education and outreach continually expands with the annual RenewLV’s Summit for Smart Growth and Sustainable Communities that attracts approximately 200 leaders from across the region to become informed on issues regarding growth and development.
In 2015, we learned five things: passenger rail from the Lehigh Valley to the New York City area is possible by 2020; “smart growth” can generate more income for a municipality than conventional suburban development; farming is business and supporting and preserving it promotes economic development and preserves farmland; the New Urbanist/Smart Growth developments are being built in the Lehigh Valley; and sustaining our local food economy requires creation of one or more local food hubs.
Q: Can you relay some examples of how RenewLV has encouraged the expansion of local, organic food? How do you think the Valley can better grow a vibrant local food economy?
A: The work of the Lehigh Valley Food Policy Council supports reducing food insecurity and growing the local food economy. It presently includes nine working groups and 14 collaborative partners. RenewLV conducts the communications and public engagement for the Lehigh Valley Food Policy Council. Our partners in the food policy council include Buy Fresh, Buy Local of the Greater Lehigh Valley and Rodale Institute. The first promotes local food, and the second promotes organic farming practices. We have put the spotlight on these organizations by including their staff in our panel discussions and as table hosts in our small group table discussions at our public engagement events. We promote their perspective and working group’s work on social media. Additionally, at our public engagement events, we have sourced the lunches from local and, when available, organic producers.
Q: How can someone take small steps toward supporting their local economy and "smart growth" in the Valley?
A: There are many ways. Live close to where you work and walk, bike or take the bus to goods and services. Support local Main Street businesses. Shop at a local farmers’ market or participate in a share of CSA—Community Supported Agriculture—so that you have a box of vegetables from a local farm every week during the growing season. Eat at restaurants that source food locally. Perhaps the most important thing is getting in touch with your elected and appointed officials and communicating your “smart growth” sensibilities. It is critically important to attend public meetings of your local municipality, your county and the planning commissions in order to speak out for “smart growth” principles. Public engagement is extremely important in exercising our democratic rights. By showing up and speaking up, regular citizens can make a difference in our communities.
