A new, comprehensive math is showing up across the nation and around the world — one that gives cities and regions a fresh perspective on their economic, environmental and social health.
This new math measures sustainability, or the ability of communities to satisfy existing needs without jeopardizing future generations' needs.
With the old math, we measure the economy in part by how much money Americans spend. But this math paints only a partial picture of our economic health. If car accidents fuel a boom in the ambulance industry, that boosts the economy, and we count the impact just as we would a boom in the paper-recycling industry.
Traditional statistics do a poor job of showing connections between the environment, development, education, health, crime and other phenomena. For example, what influence does pollution have on the local economy? Are local schools preparing students to enter the local workforce? Is there a relationship between the number of local transportation options and how much residents pay for transportation?
"No problem exists in a vacuum," says Jim Walker, director of the Central Texas Sustainability Indicators Project, based in Austin.
Cities, counties and regions all over the U.S., including Greater Cincinnati, are realizing this and creating sustainability indices. The indices are often a few dozen statistical snapshots of how much cities recycle and pollute, the level of civic participation (such as voting) and what drives the local economy.
Sustainability emphasizes the environment but isn't just about using recycled toilet paper or keeping your thermostat set at 68 degrees. The point is to make better-informed decisions by using new and old information to answer previously unasked questions.
"It's about a values system, as opposed to a research project," says Elizabeth Brown, a community builder for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
For about a year, local leaders from an array of civic, business, government and social-service groups have been meeting informally under the umbrella of the Cincinnati Area League of Women Voters to lay the groundwork for Sustainable Cincinnati, which will cover the seven-county Greater Cincinnati area. Brown leads the group's discussions. The effort has put together groups that don't often sit at the same table, such as the Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce and Housing Opportunities Made Equal, which fights for the housing rights of low-income residents.
Not every Cincinnati Business Committee (CBC) member is rushing to jump on the sustainability bandwagon, but the CBC is very interested in the project, in part because of the wide range of organizations participating, according to CBC associate director Eric Avner.
"It's an amazing group of people," Avner says.
Few, if any, in the business community are challenging the concept of sustainability, according to Susan Laffoon, Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce vice president for government and community affairs. The year of meetings has produced a tentative list of goals based on the framework of other sustainability projects, including:
· A public forum in October to launch Sustainable Cincinnati;
· A formal organization to carry out the project;
· A series of meetings in the spring to engage the public;
· Selection of 10 to 20 easily understood indicators dealing with the most important Greater Cincinnati issues, to be published by the end of 2001.
So far more than 35 organizations have joined the project, including United Way and Community Chest, Forward Quest, Urban League of Greater Cincinnati, NAACP, Citizens for Civic Renewal, city of Cincinnati, Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments, Hamilton County Regional Planning Commission, Archdiocese of Cincinnati and Urban Appalachian Council.
In early October, 187 people gathered for a forum at the Mayerson Academy in Clifton to listen to sustainability consultant Maureen Hart. Sustainability isn't a one-size-fits-all concept, according to Hart. It's important for each community to tailor its indicators to delve into local issues, she says. San Francisco, with its expensive housing market, tracks per capita income at the top and bottom of the population and the amount of money spent on low-income housing. Sprawling, traffic-clogged Orange County, Fla. compares the increase in median rent to the increase in median income and follows per capita gas consumption.
Sustainable Seattle, formed in 1991, might be the highest-profile and earliest sustainability project. The group published the first half of its indicators in 1993, the rest in 1995, and updated them to a list of 40 in 1998, according to Lee Hatcher, executive director of Sustainable Seattle.
The results have been revealing. Although the American economy has been booming, the value of Seattle workers' earnings hasn't changed for the past several years, Hart says. In 1990 the average Seattle worker needed to put in 80 hours weekly to pay for basics such as transportation, housing and food. Ten years later, the average wage has increased by $10,000, but the average worker still needs to work 80 hours weekly to cover the same basic needs, Hart says.
Although only one Seattle City Council member was involved early on, one of the group's leaders later won a council seat, and sustainability is now a city priority. Seattle recently changed its department of environmental management to the department of sustainability and environment, Hatcher says. Sustainable building — including the use of recyclable, energy-efficient structures — is a city priority now.
More than 50 countries have requested the Seattle indicators, and Sustainable Seattle representatives even gave a presentation in China, Hatcher says. The group is considering what to do next. One possibility is assembling a high-school curriculum on sustainability.
Unlike Seattle, the city of Austin already had a sustainability office when Central Texas Sustainability Indicators began in 1997, and Austin city workers backed the project. A series of surveys and public forums led to a list of 150 indicators, which project members whittled to 42 to cover the three-county region. The group published the final set in March, and plans to update them in March 2001.
One of the project's more interesting findings was the dominance of white males in central Texas leadership positions, according to project director Walker. Although they constitute less than half of the population, the project found white males make up three-quarters of political, business and other leaders. While the three-county region's unemployment rate is below three percent, parts of the region suffer 10 to 15 percent unemployment, Walker says.
Austin's mayor plans to use the indicators to judge the value of projects financed with bonds, such as highways.
One difficulty in this kind of project is getting opposing sides to speak the same language, Walker says. While anti-sprawl groups believe we are losing land when farms are converted to subdivisions, business groups believe the land is simply being transferred to a higher and better use.
"You have to have (project backers) who are known as consensus builders," Walker says.
Sustainable Cincinnati met Dec. 1 and created three committees to handle fund-raising, membership and the structure of the group and project.
Sustainable Cincinnati needs to raise at least $175,000 to hire a consultant and publish its final report. Project leaders hope their report will attract the same attention as the 1999 Gallis Report, which highlighted the political fragmentation of Greater Cincinnati and is often cited by community leaders as evidence reforms are needed.
"We want to make sure this has a very Gallis-like impact on the community," says Rebecca Kelly of the YMCA of Greater Cincinnati. ©
