The village of Brookfield is looking to go even greener than it already has — with a dedicated plan for sustainability.
At the village’s March 11 committee of the whole meeting, members of the Brookfield conservation commission presented a draft of a five-year sustainability plan for the village. According to the draft, the plan will create “a multi-way channel for the community to act on sustainability in Brookfield.” It will guide the village’s decisions and policies through 2028 in order to “effectively advance” measures supporting climate change mitigation, environmental justice and more while remaining “financially feasible” for the village and its residents.
“I want to make sure that’s really, clearly understood that having a sustainability plan for a municipality paves the way for so many other pieces of work,” said conservation commissioner Jennifer Nelson. “This is a plan that’s going to have a benefit for every resident in Brookfield.”
What’s actually in the plan?
The draft sustainability plan consists of 36 goals for the village broken down into 106 specific action items that span nine main focus areas: land, water, air, energy, waste, mobility, leadership, economic development and a sustainable community. Each action item includes a timeline of when, and metrics for how, it will be completed as well as the village office responsible for overseeing the item.
According to the draft, the nine focus areas are based on the Metropolitan Mayors’ Caucus’ Greenest Region Compact, a list of sustainability goals that have been adopted by more than 150 municipalities across Chicagoland. Brookfield adopted the GRC in 2019. The sustainability plan’s focus areas are also based on “existing village plans” and “credible sustainability frameworks.”
The draft also includes lists of previous village accomplishments that fall under each focus area.
“We’ve had so many achievements already in Brookfield in terms of sustainability,” said Bridget Jakubiak, the chair of the conservation commission. “Brookfield is already way ahead of the curve compared to many neighboring communities … Adopting and implementing the sustainability plan would further cement our role as a sustainability leader.”
Village board feedback
At the meeting, Brookfield trustees gave their thoughts and feedback on the draft. Trustee Edward Côté suggested adding several achievements to the plan that were not mentioned in the draft, including the village’s ongoing rain barrel program and the bicycle lanes on Washington Avenue. Trustee Julie Narimatsu pointed out the draft did not mention the village’s plan for lead service line replacement and suggested creating a plan to educate residents about it, which Jakubiak said she supported.
At one point, Côté questioned the conservation commission’s use of inclusive language within the draft, such as specifying the goal of educating “residents, underrepresented residents and businesses” about clean energy systems.
“In quite a few spots in here, there were items that would say, ‘We want to educate residents and educate underrepresented residents,’ but they’re still residents,” Côté said. “That one kept throwing me off. I mean, like, we’re just educating everybody, so do we have to specify anybody outside of just residents?”
“I think the one thing we want to make sure is nobody’s left out, you know, and that we’re making sure the people who need the resources most are getting [them],” Jakubiak said in response. “So, if we have older residents who aren’t, say, on Facebook, are we getting the message out in other ways that they can find it? … I think that’s what we’re trying to get at, making sure that we’re not leaving anybody out and that we’re thinking inclusively about the groups that are gonna benefit.”
Outside of suggesting extra information to include, the trustees had little negative feedback to give on the draft. At the end of the presentation, board members who spoke had only good things to say to the presenting commissioners.
“This plan absolutely blew me away in so many different ways,” Trustee Nicole Gilhooley said. “The detail, and the quality, and then the incredible professional thinking and research that’s gone into this. It’s really impressive and makes me really, really proud to be here and be a teeny, tiny part of it.”
“Adopting this plan is a big step. We’ve already come a long way, but this is something that, you know, when we, if and when we adopt this, that it’ll be a challenge for future boards to pick it up and run with it and carry it and make it grow,” Village President Michael Garvey said. “We will challenge future boards, and you will challenge future boards, to keep this going and make it a priority.”
How did the plan come about?
According to a village memo, the conservation commission was initially referred by the village board to consider developing the sustainability plan in March 2020 but did not begin the project “in earnest” until 2022. At that point, the commission began analyzing all of Brookfield’s adopted plans, including the GRC and Cross-Community Climate Collaborative plan, to find “any and all sustainability initiatives” already in place that could be included within the plan’s draft.
“That’s not light reading, and the conservation [commission] really dug in to identify sustainability within each of those plans,” said Assistant Village Manager Stevie Ferrari.
The plan was further developed when more than 50 residents attended a public workshop last year to give their feedback to the conservation commission. Then, village staff from each department reviewed the draft and provided additional feedback for the commission. Getting the village board’s feedback was the final step in the process before the commission could finalize the plan, which will be brought before the board for adoption at a meeting next month.
“I just wanted to, again, thank the commission for the countless, countless hours. This is like the ultimate volunteer project,” said Trustee Katie Kaluzny, who is the village board liaison for the conservation commission, at the end of the presentation. “It’s one thing to do a volunteer activity. It’s another thing to do a volunteer activity with some bureaucracy involved, so thank you for that continued persistence and commitment.”
