It?s snowing in Sundance, Utah, but Annapolis Mayor Ellen Moyer is there to share plans for curbing global warming on a local scale.
Moyer and more than 30 other mayors are meeting at the second annual Sundance Summit: A Mayor?s Gathering on Climate Protection, running from Sunday until today.
“We are looking at all the data, of where we will end up if we don?t make some significant changes,” Moyer said.
The point of the convention is to offer mayors a forum to discuss effective local policies for fighting climate change.
In the waterlogged Annapolis area, one of the greatest threats from global warming could bean increase in flooding, Moyer said.
Annapolis is surrounded by the Severn River and the Chesapeake Bay.
It is the capital city of Anne Arundel County, which ranked the 20th worst ozone-polluted county in the nation in 2006, according to the American Lung Association?s State of the Air report.
But the 7-square-mile city is already taking action to stop ozone pollution, with 42 percent of the city covered with tree canopy, and a goal of increasing that to 50 percent, she said.
Annapolis also boasts the only public urban land trust in the nation, the Annapolis Conservancy, which has preserved more than 200 acres of land since forming in 1990.
The city has constructed a “green roof” on the Annapolis Police Department, and replaces its worn out public vehicles with ones that use alternative energy sources, Moyer said.
Moyer said she is sharing some of these tactics with other mayors at the convention, and she is looking at the environmental practices of other city leaders.
“You can always learn from what other people are doing. There is so much new information out there. It helps each one of us make a commitment,” Moyer said.
The conference is hosted by Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson, and Robert Redford, founder of Sundance Preserve, an environmental conference center where the convention is being held.
“State and local officials are way ahead of Washington on this,” Redford said in a news release.
The event is also sponsored by ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability, an international association of local governments committed to sustainable development.
