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Sustainable committee would strengthen green components of plan

JANESVILLE — The Sustainable Janesville Committee will forward six recommendations to the city council, one of which urges a stronger stance on farmland preservation.

It also will ask the council to delay adoption of the comprehensive plan so the committee can suggest ways make it more eco-friendly.

The city has been working on the comprehensive plan for two years. The sustainability committee, however, was formed this summer.

The committee recommends the city:

-- Strengthen language to require the city to work with towns and other municipalities to preserve farmland.

The committee at one point had talked about drawing lines and allowing no development past those lines, said Tom McDonald, committee chairman and councilman.

But members realized the city could control only what falls within the city's 3-mile jurisdiction. Rural development still could occur in the next township over, for instance.

To be effective, the city must work with townships and other entities, and the committee is asking for language that requires that cooperation, McDonald said.

-- Ask the city's comprehensive plan consultant to review the population, housing and employment projections in the comprehensive plan in light of recent job losses and the worsening economy.

"Perhaps those numbers are higher than they need to be at this point, and rather than amending the plan (later), we could revisit those numbers," McDonald said.

Different numbers could change forecasts in the plan, he said.

-- Insert into the plan the four guiding principles of an eco-municipality: eliminating the community's contribution to fossil fuel dependence and to wasteful use of scarce metals and minerals, eliminating the community's contribution to dependence upon persistent chemicals and wasteful use of synthetic substances, eliminating the community's contribution to encroachment upon nature, meeting human needs fairly and efficiently.

"Since the city has declared itself an eco-municipality, we ought to have those four guiding principals in there as the city goes forward," McDonald said.

As the city makes decisions, it should consider how they conform to the four principals.

-- Include in the comprehensive plan a three-page document on sustainability drafted by committee member Matt Mills.

-- Ask the consultant why the 20-year plan projects into the future more than 20 years, slating more land for future development than needed.

-- Ask the consultant for clarification on institutional and commercial land-use allocations.

The committee in upcoming meetings also will consider the best way to keep electronics out of the landfill, McDonald said. That includes televisions, radios and computers.

A ban would be one option, but public education would come first, McDonald said.

"There already are a lot of places right now that recycle those items, but people just don't know where they are," McDonald said.