The Oberlin Review
<< Front page News November 10, 2006

Committee Gives Hope for Sustainable Future

With President Nancy Dye’s imminent departure, the fate of the Environmental Policy Advisory Committee — created by Dye in 2001— became uncertain. The committee’s mission to implement existing policies and generally advance the causes of environmental stewardship had no other institutional advocate. To address this, the General Faculty unanimously passed a motion two weeks ago to create a standing committee to ultimately replace EPAC, called the Committee on Environmental Sustainability.

This motion was put forth by the Environmental Sustainability Working Group, which was formed through the Strategic Plan. Psychology Professor Al Porterfield serves as its chair.

“[Before now] there has been no clear mechanism by which environmental concerns could be guaranteed to play a role in the decision making of Oberlin’s top administrators,” said Porterfield. He was referring to the fact that EPAC had served at the pleasure of the president, meaning at and only at her behest.

“This represents an opportunity to turn Oberlin’s on-again, off-again embrace of sustainability into an ongoing commitment,” he said. “That should result in real progress.”

The CES has not yet been fully staffed. Ex-officio members are to include Provost Al MacKay, Vice President of Finance Ron Watts, the Director of Facilities Operations Mike Will, Director of Facilities Planning and Construction Larry Gibson who replaced Sal Filardi in April, Vice President of Alumni Affairs Ernie Iseminger and the yet-to-be-hired Sustainability Coordinator.

Student Senate will appoint two student representatives. The committee will also include a designate of the Oberlin City Council to serve as a non-voting member.

Gibson said, “I feel we have an opportunity to collaborate on all levels: [on] plant operations and maintenance, energy conservation, capital maintenance, major renovations and new construction, etc. At this point, I don’t see any limits to the value of our participation.”

CES’s primary function will be to make sure the environmental policy, written by EPAC and approved by the Board of Trustees in 2004, is carried through. This is particularly important now, MacKay pointed out, as the College has adopted new building standards, that of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Silver.

The priorities as established by the 34-page EPAC document are, in short: “The College will seek 1) to reduce the rate at which it contributes to the depletion and degradation of natural resources, 2) to increase the use of renewable resources and 3) to consider other measures that can enhance the physical environment in which we live.”

But CES’s other function will be to advocate for the further development of Oberlin’s environmental policy. Its agenda is yet to be determined, but its future membership and others involved in Oberlin’s sustainability have ideas.

“I always think that education is the most important piece [of] any policy,” said former Director of Facilities Planning and Construction Filardi, who will still be very much involved in future policy through his role as Aramak’s Midwest Regional Director for Technical Sevices. “If we can find a way to…create a community that is better informed and more aware of its use of resources [it will be] all the better.”

“The large-scale goal should be climate neutrality,” said Professor John Petersen of the Environmental Studies department. “But this is predicated on many small-scale decisions regarding education, buildings, purchasing, food, transportation and on all other aspects of managing this campus.”

MacKay emphasized overseeing the new building standards and the plans to ultimately replace all of Oberlin’s combustion-engine vehicles with hybrids.

Those present at the General Faculty meeting who passed the motion did so with little debate.

“I was a bit disappointed that the proposal came up during that last few minutes of the faculty meeting when folks were anxious to leave,” said Petersen. “What could have been a great teaching moment for the faculty was instead a hurried attempt to get the proposal passed.”

“Our motion was at the bottom of a packed agenda and there wasn’t much time for discussion,” said Porterfield. “I genuinely regret that, as I believe that the motion could have been improved by the thoughtful contributions of our colleagues.”

He continued, “It seemed, however, that those present felt that passing the motion and endorsing the formation of the CES were the overriding concerns, so that’s what happened.”

“This is one of the things that the Oberlin community feels good about,” said MacKay. “There’s nobody who doesn’t think this is a good idea. In so diverse and fractious a place it’s not often that you can get this kind of consensus.”

“This is uncharted territory,” concluded Porterfield. “For the first time, key administrators, institutional managers and the people who hold Oberlin’s purse-strings will be sitting around the table with interested faculty members and students, some of whom will have considerable expertise in the environment and campus sustainability.”

Everyone, however, seems to agree on the committee’s prime directive. As Petersen put it, “The crucial task is to oversee the translation of the comprehensive environmental policy adopted in May 2004...into a set of concrete actions. There is much work to be done.”


 
 
   

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