Julia Milner is a neuroscience major at St. Mary's College of Maryland.
On Thursday, March 24th, the Sierra Club held the Sustainable Towns Forum that encapsulated what local towns in Southern Maryland could do to promote a clean, efficient, and environmentally friendly space for their residents. Teresa Ball, the head speaker of the forum, stated that a sustainable town was a town that is designed to hit social, economical, and environmental highpoints in order to ensure a sustainable future for its current and future residents. The panelists for this forum were Councilman David Jenkins of La Plata, Councilwoman Elizabeth Lawton of North Beach, and Councilman Nick Colvin of Leonardtown. The forum consisted of a few subject areas of sustainability that have been covered or are currently being worked on by the towns including air quality control, clean energy opportunities, waste management, open and native green spaces, and accessible and affordable transportation mechanisms. As a college student located in southern Maryland, I found it interesting to hear the many mechanisms the individuals at the governmental level are using in order to fight for sustainable futures for its citizens.
By highlighting areas such as air quality control and native green space restoration, I was able to engage with the panelists on what work was being done and grabbed my attention as to what to look out for in the future of the surrounding area. Air quality control is something that is integral to southern Maryland in particular since we have a lot of commuting residents and we receive a lot of air pollution runoff from major cities up north. Councilwoman Lawton highlighted that most towns aiming for a sustainable environment look at their solutions as either natural or technological. In the perspective of air quality control, she mentioned that North Beach focuses on the more natural side of control by maintaining tree canopy space and putting in efforts to restore plant life that would assist in cleaning the surrounding air. Councilman Colvin highlighted that in Leonardtown and across St. Mary's County, they are taking a more technological approach with air quality control monitoring systems to keep the community informed about the pollution in the air. It was interesting to see the different approaches these communities have been taking on the same area and within only a few towns of each other. Despite differences in ways to move towards a sustainable town, the council members also noted some similarities in other environmental areas. When discussing native green space restoration, all members agreed that instating open pasture settings in their large, unoccupied land areas alongside roadways or large building complexes would be beneficial for their areas overall. Native meadows in these empty lots would promote the native species from that area as well as help the community economically with property costs and cost of maintenance of what would be a regularly maintained lawn. The similarities and differences between communities shows just how broad and interdisciplinary creating a sustainable town can be!
As the panelists were speaking, I noticed a common theme throughout their statements for moving towards sustainability - they all said their actions started really from the top-down level. In a lot of situations nowadays, the pressure for a clean environment is put on the individual which is important; however, a larger impact can be made when large corporations and the government gets involved. Councilwoman Lawton even stated, "We are the stewards." These individuals at the governmental level are providing programs and opportunities for the public to get involved with creating a sustainable town rather than telling them what they could do without any follow-up action, which I think is a great thing to see. For example, Councilman Jenkins noted that the town of La Plata was changing its recycling program to not accept paper or cardboard products at one point. When the town members were lost as to how they should efficiently remove this waste, the town reinstated the program as they came up with new ways to efficiently get rid of this waste for this community. By heading sustainable action at the top level for community members to engage with, this promotes actual change that will last a long time. This was my biggest takeaway from the panelists: our local council members in southern Maryland truly care about the sustainable well-being of our communities and are willing to come up with innovative and effective ways to guide in an environmentally conscious direction.
I am glad I got to attend the Sustainable Towns Forum as a member of the Southern Maryland community and listen to the work that has been done by our local governments to promote sustainable communities overall. Thank you to the council members in attendance, Teresa Ball as our head facilitator, and the MD Chapter of the Sierra Club for holding a very informative and promising event. I look forward to using my knowledge for the future of my community and witnessing what is next for the Southern Maryland communities!