County Services News

The Joint Center for Sustainable Communities: Counties and cities work for a better future

The second most poverty stricken county in Virginia is working to create a vision for a better future. A city whose vibrant industrial economy is of the past, is finding new ways to revitalize its downtown. A county and city that have battled for decades sign a historic agreement to work together on solving common problems. These are all examples of communities taking a negative situation and coming up with a creative and positive solution. Whether you call it visioning or strategic planning, multi-jurisdictional approaches, or a multi-stakeholder process, it is all part of an upsurge of communities taking control of their futures.

Many other communities struggling with similar problems need to know what their elected colleagues and respective local governments are doing to meet these challenges. It is because of these efforts that NACo and the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) united last winter to create the new Joint Center for Sustainable Communities.

The Joint Center provides local elected officials with assistance to meet the challenges of job growth, environmental protection and social equity, the three pillars of a sustainable community. Through this historic arrangement, the Joint Center will combine the forces of more than 3,000 counties represented by NACo and 1,100 cities represented by USCM to promote the development of sustainable communities. The Joint Center will also encourage local governments to adopt the recommendations made in "Sustainable America," the President's Council for Sustainable Development Report, on issues such as sprawl, brownfield redevelopment and natural resources protection.

To support counties and cities in leading the way toward more livable communities, NACo leadership identified as a major need a clearinghouse where the most current information of sustainable communities practices can be collected and disseminated. One of the most important aspects of the clearinghouse is access to existing information and resources. For example, EPA, Department of Energy (DOE) and the Commerce Department, the Joint Center's current federal partners, all have services designed to help local governments that are connected to the clearinghouse. To this end, the clearinghouse will serve county officials looking for accurate information no matter where it comes from. The clearinghouse and Joint Center staff can be accessed through an 800 number (see box) and will include information in three major areas:

County/City Profiles - The best way to understand how to incorporate sustainable principles into local government organizations is to see what other counties are doing. Currently, the Joint Center has 14 county profiles in such issue areas as strategic planning/visioning, sprawl, multi-jurisdictional collaboration, brown fields and cultural heritage preservation. These profiles are brief overviews on current county activities that are designed to be quickly accessed and disseminated. Through the clearinghouse, we plan to link callers with other counties working on similar issues. Profiles will be collected and written on an ongoing basis.

Codes and Ordinances - Many county officials are not only looking for information, but for real local governmental implementation examples that may be applicable to their community. The Joint Center is currently gathering codes, ordinances, county/city sustainable development agreements, and other local government documentation that reflect implementation of sustainablity in areas such as multi-jurisdictional agreements, easements, zoning and taxes.

Resource/Publication Listing - The Joint Center has a comprehensive library and links to other sustainable development resources including reports and case studies, videos and Web sites. Every effort will be made to make this information available via the clearinghouse.

The Joint Center also has several publications that county officials can obtain by calling NACo's publications department or the clearinghouse.

The clearinghouse is one of many services provided by the Joint Center.

Other services include the Joint Center Web site (which can be accessed via the NACo Web site), and includes much of what is in the clearinghouse; workshops on such issues as community indicators and metropolitan strategies; a peer-to-peer site visit program; a direct technical assistance program, and periodic reports and fact sheets.

(For more information on the Joint Center and its resources, call 800/696-1667.)

(County Services News was written by Nicholas Keller, co-director of the Joint Center for Sustainable Communities.)

Looking to make your county sustainable?
Working on such issues as smart growth, land use, public participation programs, brownfields or comprehensive planning? Look no further! Contact NACo's Joint Center for Sustainable Communities Clearinghouse at 800/696-1667. The Joint Center wants to serve your needs to make your communities even better.