#33, January 12, 2000
"If you want to get to the east, don't sail
south." Some forgotten sage uttered these words; for me, they speak the
essence of good planning. Too often, people charged with reaching a goal don't
make the connection between where they are heading and where they will end up.
This year we have a fabulous opportunity in Petaluma, as we
begin rewriting the City's General Plan (GP), to take a quantum leap in
innovative city planning and make another mark in American history. It was only
a few decades ago that our City Council enacted an ordinance to set limits on
housing construction. It was controversial, and it was challenged and
successfully defended all the way to the US Supreme Court. Petaluma led the way
for other communities to grab the growth tiller and set a healthy course.
Back then, residential growth was exploding in our face; we
couldn't ignore the fact that we were moving rapidly away from the kind of
community we wanted. Today's challenge is more subtle, but no less serious.
While our many planning innovations have helped create a great little city, we
are not guaranteed continued success.
The business world provides the best analogy to our
predicament. A firm can be very profitable this year, but if it fails to
anticipate sea changes in the marketplace, boom quickly goes bust. IBM, once
the invincible Big Blue, got lost in an ocean of red ink when it misinterpreted
the personal computer revolution, but recovered its profitable course by
reinventing itself as an internet solutions provider.
Today, businesses are facing the biggest change ever. The
earth's "natural capital" is becoming dangerously scarce, having been
subject to 200 years of free-for-all liquidation (natural capital includes not
only metals and fossil fuels, but the living systems that give us air, water,
and food.) Amory and Hunter Lovins, and
Paul Hawken, in their new book Natural Capitalism, describe how innovative
businesses are responding to the natural capital shortage by restructuring
their products and processes, giving them competitive advantage over companies
who don't.
While municipalities aren't competing per se, they
can benefit from the from the same approach by restructuring city maintenance
and development plans within a sustainability framework. But sustainability
can't be just a footnote in the General Plan, shoved behind chapters on surface
water and transportation. That makes no more sense than separating
considerations of profitability from a business plan's discussion of R&D or
procurement. Sustainability must be at the foundation, an organizing principle
as important as economic health or quality of life.
And we mustn't mistake sustainability for sacrifice.
Sustainability flows from whole systems thinking, looking at the bigger
picture. This can yield huge cost reductions with no loss of comfort,
convenience, or safety. Natural Capitalism describes, for example, the
"hyper-cars" now being developed by the auto industry: ultra-lite and
aerodynamic, with impact-absorbing, carbon-fiber unibodies and long range
super-clean electric hybrid engines. They may look and drive like a Taurus, but
they get 100 mpg.
In Petaluma, a whole systems approach to wastewater
management would reduce upstream inputs (by replacing wasteful toilets, washing
machines, and industrial processes, and leaky sewer mains) and provide beautiful
aquatic wetlands for recreation and education downstream. Yet it could cost
less to build and operate than a plant that is far more dependent on our
dwindling supply of natural capital.
Community involvement will be critical to the success of
Petaluma's new GP. We need not only our citizens' creativity to fashion the
plan, but their commitment to support its implementation. Sustainable Petaluma
Network will be augmenting the City's outreach efforts with a Sustainability
Education Project. Working with the school community, the SEP will help
students and their parents understand sustainability principles and practices,
and help them make a meaningful contribution to the General Plan. It will
include the publication and distribution of a children's picture story book,
development and presentation of age-appropriate instruction and activities, and
a community-wide city visioning event. If you are interested in helping with
the SEP, you can contact Sustainable Petaluma Network at
SustainablePetalumaNetwork@iname.com, or by calling 793-2244.