City's Climate Protection Measures Highlighted at Council Meeting

It was a relatively uneventful – and given the nature of the last few meetings – a relatively non-contentious gathering of the La Mesa City Council on Tuesday, as the council heard an updated report on the city's climate protection initiatives from city staff.

Scott Munzenmaier, an administrative analyst for the city, walked the council and attendees through a 20-minute presentation detailing the city's efforts at protecting the environment in each of 12 different categories: global warming emissions related to city operations, land use policies, transportation, clean energy, energy efficiency, appliance efficiency, green building designs, fleet fuel efficiency, wastewater treatment, public education, urban forestry and recycling.

The initiatives are being done as part of the U.S. Mayor's Climate Protection Agreement, which was endorsed and approved by the council beginning in 2007. Munzenmaier provided updates on what has been accomplished since last year.

Some of the city's accomplishments and highlights include:

• Installation of lighted crosswalk with LED lights on Allison Avenue between University and Palm. The crosswalk has helped improve safety for pedestrians and promoted increased walkability.
• Additional installation of solar panels to both residential and commercial buildings. Between 2008 and 2011, Munzenmaier said that 124 residential units and nine commercial units have installed solar. The residential units produce an average of 3.81 megawatts of output.
• Increasing energy efficiency with a plan to replace doors and windows at the La Mesa Community Center.
• Installation of high-efficiency induction street lighting, which save the city close to 50 percent on its street lighting costs.
• Installation of LED energy-efficient lights on police, fire, and other public service vehicles, which can will lit even when the engine is not running, and adding AIMS fuel-efficiency systems on some vehicles.
• EDCO acceptance of styrofoam, which can now be placed in curbside bins.

There were three other presentations shown to the board: the budget monitoring report, the City Treasurer's quarterly report, and the police chief's quarterly report.

Some notables from La Mesa Police Chief Ed Aceves's report include:

• Residential burglaries are way up in Q1 for 2012 (61), compared to the same quarter last year (28). Aceves said that this is a result of Q1 burglaries for 2011 being abnormally low. All other property crimes showed decreases.
• Robberies are down over the same time frame, but aggravated assaults are up by two instances.
• La Mesa collected 678 pounds of prescription drugs during the recent , which was the 3rd highest total in San Diego County.

In other agenda items, the council voted unanimously 4-0 to approve the following items (Mayor Art Madrid, out of town on business, was absent):

– A resolution to award a service contract to American Asphalt South Inc. for annual street maintenance, crack sealing, and rubberized slurry coating. American Asphalt South won the contract with the lowest bid, which is worth around $645,000 for the year.

– A resolution that would temporarily close off streets along, and some adjacent to, the parade route for the 2012 La Mesa Flag Day Parade, which will occur Saturday, June 2. The resolution calls for a closure from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the date of the parade.

In a non-agenda item, several residents spoke out encouraging the city to lift its ban on owning backyard hens, not roosters, for the purpose of promoting urban agriculture. The city currently has a ban residents owning backyard poultry.

Libby Tweed said that the city of La Mesa should follow suit with other municipalities that have changed their stance on owning chickens.

In January of this year, the Santee City Council , after having rejected it for several years. The City of San Diego did the same about two weeks later, permitting residents to own hens.

Tweed's daughter Addison, 8, also spoke to the council, extolling the benefits of owning backyard hens.

"Hens make really lovely pets," she said. "There are many great reasons to have hens in La Mesa. They teach me how to be responsible for an animal, and teach me where my food comes from. I love eating their fresh eggs."

Addison also said that the hens feces makes great fertilizer, allowing her to use it in her garden, and that the hens help control pests by eating bugs.

After the residents spoke out, councilmember Ruth Sterling suggested that the council add the issue to a future agenda, though no motion was made.