SUSTAINABILITY ACTION NETWORK 16th ANNUAL MEETING & POT LUCK

Friday, 10 May 2024, 6:00pm pot luck, 7:00pm keynote talk, 8:00pm Q & A
Pioneer Ridge theater room, 1000 Wakarusa Dr., Lawrence KS 66049

This year’s Sustainability Action Network annual meeting will feature keynote speaker, Bobby Evans, Bicycle Transportation Planner for Kansas City, Missouri.  He will address “Bikeways for All Ages and Abilities”.  With the transportation sector responsible for the most climate emissions, Kansas City has been making great strides building some 15 miles of “all ages and abilities” protected bikeways per year.  This may be a timely presentation, because Lawrence is on the cusp of shifting our emphasis from single-occupancy vehicles to a greater use of bicycling and transit.

Sustainability Action has been advancing ecological sustainability since 2007.  We focus on helping individuals live a sustainable lifestyle, while pushing for institutional policy change that can impact the broader population.  We work in areas of prime agricultural soils preservation, energy conservation and renewables, conserving biodiversity, healthy climate, multi-modal transportation, and local food and permaculture.

Some of our 2023 actions and accomplishments included:

• Hosted the largest electric vehicle showcase in our six years of events.
• As a stakeholder, we helped develop the County Climate Action Plan.
• Successfully advocated for a City ban on single-use plastic bags.
• Worked with a coalition to get the City to not fund the Wakarusa Extension.
• Worked with a coalition to get the Planning Commission to preserve prime farmland in the Kansas River valley, by recommending denial of a large solar power plant there.
• Raised the alarm about a 177 acre development in the 100-year floodplain of the Wakarusa River.
• Submitted 8 pages of proposals for the new Lawrence Land Development Code.