Thanks to REALNEO's lmcshane [1] for pointing out one of the most interesting developments in the American "sustainability movement" ever - what appears to be Chicago's real news source, The Chicago Reader, broke the news, September 4, 2009, that "The Green Mayor's Green Policy Maker Leaves for Vancouver [2]". This is the story of former Cleveland and Chicago area sustainability guru Sadhu Johnston, now set to become the deputy city manager of Vancouver.
From the Reader:
Under Daley the city has embarked on aggressive tree planting, installed a green roof atop City Hall, and mapped out an ambitious plan to slash greenhouse gas emissions—but failed to ensure basic recycling services [3], force dirty power plants [4] to clean up, or confront the city's traffic and transit problems [5].
This being Chicago, the news about Johnston hasn't officially been announced here, even though Johnston was just profiled in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer [6] as the guy tapped to carry out "Mayor Gregor Robertson's 'Greenest City' initiative aimed at turning Vancouver into North America's pacesetter on clean energy."
Sound familiar to Clevelanders. Chicago may be full of green-washing, and on St. Patrick's Day the streets flow with green beer, but Chicagoland ain't remotely green. Neither is Cleveland. More on Sadhu, and his performance in Chicago, from the Reader:
Johnston has been widely viewed as an innovative thinker and advocate for environmentally friendly issues such as developing green jobs and cutting energy waste by making buildings more efficient. I also give him props for riding the CTA when he wasn't driving his hybrid—I've even seen him on the bus.
Yet he also serves under Mayor Daley, which has meant that he's repeatedly had to try to explain why it's taken 20 years—and counting—for the administration to develop a comprehensive recycling and waste-reduction strategy, or why it did nothing to force the coal-fired power plants on the southwest side to cut emissions. In 2005, for example, I asked him about a proposed ordinance [7] that would impose tougher standards on the plants. He said the administration was of course interested in improving the region's air quality but wasn't sure it had the legal standing to do anything about the coal-burning facilities. "We at this point don't have a position on the ordinance," he said. He didn't sound to me like he believed it himself.
This summer, four years later, environmental advocates were still wondering [8] why the city hadn't done a thing about the plants—couldn't it at least have pressured the state and federal governments to act? Local clean-air groups got fed up and announced plans to sue the plants themselves [9]—and a few weeks later the federal government responded with its own lawsuit [10].
Sadhu is moving to a place where the citizens truly care about their world being green - Canada - to become deputy city manager of the place that really wants to be the world's real green capital - Vancouver. From the Reader:
It sounds like Johnston may have a much different sort of boss in Vancouver. As the Post-Intelligencer described him: "Mayor Robertson is a biker, hiker and founder of a successful company called Happy Planet that produces organic juices, preaches nutrition and fitness, and supports family farms."
The thing really holding the Canadian economy back, and killing their people, is all that pollution blowing up there from dirty, un-green places like Cleveland and Chicago.... making Vancouver's choice of Sadhu especially curious.
Canadians well know the harm American pollution causes their economy and people [11], so why would they want the man who sent so much pollution to Canada, from Chicago, and who allowed Chicago to proceed on a path to pollute excessively for years and perhaps decades to come.
I hope Sadhu moving from Chicago to Vancouver is not a sign Canada is green-washing their economy but rather a sign that, while Sadhu did not have the impact needed while leading environmental planning for Chicago, it was not his fault, and he is positioned to do better.
In this case, whatever the circumstances, I expect Sadhu to now stand across our borders and even come to Cleveland with a big Canadian stick and demand we stop killing the people and economy of his new homeland with dirty American pollution.
Best wishes for that, Sadhu. Enjoy iving in a truly beautifl place, working for wht seems a cool boss, but think long and hard each day about what you leave behind. We are counting on you to have a real global impact, this step in your career.
