But not if it winds up being a tremendous waste of public funds.
It may sound like heresy to even question the value of green solutions such as rain gardens, roof-top gardens, rain barrels and areas planted with native vegetation, all in an effort to keep sewage out of local waterways.
But a recent disturbing string of events has sidetracked the city’s sewer improvement program. At the center of the controversy is how much money the city should be required to spend on green infrastructure vs. gray solutions such as more pipes and more tunnels.
A little background:
Last month City Council member Jan Marcason — along with the city staff, citizens groups and a variety of engineering consultants who have worked for years on a new sewer program — brought forward a $2.3 billion plan to improve the wastewater system. The proposal included $30 million for green solutions.
Then all heck broke loose.
• Eight of Marcason’s council colleagues piled on her and demanded more money for green initiatives in the plan.
Pulled out of the blue, council members are talking about spending upwards of $500 million on green upgrades.
The engineering experts involved in this proposal for years say that’s a hokey number. More diplomatically, Marcason says, “It was kind of a figure that was thrown out.”
Green solutions could be wonderful if they are not outrageously expensive. However, many are relatively new and untested in how much they can actually do to cost-effectively help the city solve its problems.
In addition, the council members’ cavalier approach has angered some members of citizens task forces that have long studied the wastewater problems.
Northland Neighborhoods leader Jim Rice said at a hearing Wednesday that some council members had engaged in a “knee-jerk reaction” to the new plan.
Carol Grimaldi, chairwoman of the Wet Weather Community Panel, said she was bothered by the council’s “disregard” for the public process.
Bottom line: The council members’ sudden concerns about green solutions were poorly laid out. The elected officials’ actions made it appear there was another agenda at City Hall, to create work for more consultants or for political payback of some kind.
• On May 8, U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver wrote a letter to the city demanding that its upcoming plan “utilizes green infrastructure as aggressively as possible.”
Unfortunately, Cleaver offered few specifics on where to go from here. Indeed, it’s politically puzzling that Cleaver would write such a letter fully aware that the federal government hasn’t stepped forward with any significant amount of money to fix the city’s sewers.
• EPA Regional Administrator John Askew wrote an opinion article in The Star urging Kansas Citians to “do what it takes to make smart and sensible green solutions happen.”
Agreed. But Askew himself says the cost effectiveness of green upgrades “may be open to debate.”
Now the proposal that 15 engineering firms and dozens of other Kansas Citians have worked on is in limbo.
Some council members want as much as a six-month delay in presenting a proposal for final approval by state and federal officials. And they want to hire a new consultant to look at the plan’s greenness.
Frankly, elected officials such as Russ Johnson, Ed Ford, Cindy Circo, Cathy Jolly and others haven’t fully participated in studying the ins and outs of the $2.3 billion sewer plan.
Marcason and others who do know the intricacies need to plainly answer questions about how much the city should spend on green solutions.
Should it be more than the $30 million? Probably, if only for public relations purposes. But is it sensible to spend $500 million to “go green?”
Doubt it. So let’s find a reasonable number somewhere between the two extremes and get going on fixing the sewers.
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