SGA Monthly Coalition Call

5/27/10

4:00PM EST

Attendance

Bill LaBorde –Transportation Choices Coalition, WA

Ray Christman – Livable Communities Coalition, GA

Jacky Grimshaw – Center for Neighborhood Technology, IL

Adam Garcia - Greenbelt Alliance, CA

SGA Staff – Will Schroeer, Rayla Bellis, Tamar Shapiro, Jon Zeidler, Chelsea Allinger, Stefanie Seskin, Stephanie Potts, Natalie Robles, Eryn Rosenblum, Shelly Hazle, Steve Davis, Kate Rube

Federal Policy Updates:

For more information, view SGA’s biweekly Washington Update.

  • Climate Bill(Stephanie Potts): We’re considering the Kerry-Lieberman climate legislation (released on 5/13) a major victory for our coalition. The bill contains all the transportation policy language we were pushing for and significantly more funding than in previous bills (and the funding is specifically tied to emissions reductions.) At this point our primary focus is on keeping everything in the bill by continuing to show that there is broad support for our language and funding. Related materials, including a detailed bill analysis, are available on both the SGA and the T4 websites. Action Item: Call your senators asking them to support the transportation provisions.
  • Q: What are the prospects for the bill overall? A: Things are up in the air right now, but the Obama administration is getting more engaged (probably partially due to growing concerns about the oil spill). We should know more after the Memorial Day break.
  • Brownfields Reauthorization Bill (Stephanie Potts): Rep. Pallone Jr.’s legislation to reauthorize the EPA brownfields program was recently introduced in the House. A Senate bill will hopefully be introduced soon.
  • Budget Appropriations (Kate Rube): Thanks to everyone who signed the letter that recently went out. We are hopeful that the full proposed amount for HUD will stay in the final budget. We are focusing our heaviest efforts on the EPA and DOT sides at this point. In terms of a timeline, within the next few weeks the budget committees will move, and the process could be wrapped up over the summer.
  • Livable Communities Act (Kate Rube): On the senate side there’s a hearing on June 9. We’re currently working on building cosponsors.
  • US DOT Strategic Plan (Stephanie Potts): DOT is accepting comments for its strategic plan. We’ll be sending around our comments to the coalition list. Action Item: Vote for SGA’s comments on the comment list—they are currently at the top with 16 votes.
  • Complete Streets (Stephanie Potts) We are still building sponsorship for the Complete Streets Act. Action Item: You can see who’s on the bill on the National Complete Streets Coalition website and if your senators aren’t on we encourage you to call them.
  • Q:(Ray Christman, LCC):Where do things stand in congress in terms of the reauthorization of the transportation bill? SGA and T4’s priorities seem to be shifting toward the Kerry Lieberman Bill. At some point it would be helpful if SGA could put together materials addressing the path forward in terms of the transportation bill.
  • A: (Kate Rube): The Senate is currently working to draft legislation for the transportation bill. We’ve met with them a number of times over the past few months to talk about priorities and language for the bill. The draft bill should be mocked up this summer or early fall, and we’re spending time now lining up the support we need for our policy priorities. The House already has a draft bill, but the financing mechanism is causing the delay on that end. Generally, the chairs of the committees don’t want separate pieces of legislation to move. They want to see the whole reauthorization pass as a unit, so the climate bill shouldn’t play a major role in breaking it up.

Get to Know SGA

John Zeidler—works on federal policy related to water issues including storm water management, Chesapeake Bay issues, etc. He’s currently putting together a PowerPoint as a resource for the coalition highlighting the economic benefits of smart growth.

Tamar Shapiro—directs the Smart Growth Leadership Institute and the Governor’s Institute on Community Design, and works on land use and water policy issues largely at the state level.

Chelsea Allinger—is a fellow with the Governor’s Institute and Smart Growth Leadership. She assists with research and provides general support.

Shelly Hazle—works with Tamar on the Governor’s Institute of Community Design and the Smart Growth Leadership Institute. She has expertise in state-level smart growth policy.

  • Q: In terms of the work Tamar and Shelly do on water issues, do they focus at all on urban areas or is it primarily agricultural A:(Tamar) Most of the work they do is actually urban, not agricultural. They have funding from EPA to do demonstration projects in 7 states. There is a link to a page with more info on these projects at

Steve Davis—works on communications for SGA and T4. He organizes our online strategies and coordinates online advocacy, social media, and outreach. He also writes for the SGA blog.

Stefanie Seskin—is a State and Local Policy Associate for the National Complete Streets Coalition and is the go-to person for questions about state and local complete streets policy and issues.

Eryn Rosenblum—is a Complete Streets fellow and works mainly on federal policy with Stephanie Potts.

Natalie Robles—is a Federal Policy Analyst, focusing primarily on the Livable Communities Act, the Healthy Food Financing Initiative and the Sustainable Communities Partnership.

Kate Rube—is the SGA Federal Policy Director. She works primarily on climate policy and appropriations issues for the Sustainable Communities Partnership, as well as other smart growth-related budget issues. She also spends half her time with T4 doing legislative work.

Stephanie Potts—spends a quarter of her time on complete streets federal policy and focuses the rest of her time on federal and state climate policy and on any other federal policy issues that come up, including water issues.

Elisa Ortiz—is the State Campaigns Director, and is the first point of contact for state and local coalition partners. She also works on SGA’s state campaigns including the transit campaign and last year’s stimulus campaign.

Will Shroeer—is the State Policy Director. In addition to working on the major SGA state campaigns he also contributes to several other projects including an SB375 project in California. He focuses on determining the direction our state work should take in the future and on figuring out how to raise the money we need for that work.

Rayla Bellis—is the State Campaigns Fellow. She provides support on the state transit campaign and helps Elisa with general coalition work.

Neha Bhatt (Absent)—is the Deputy State Policy Director and focuses on the State Transit Campaign, as well as local work with WMATA. Her areas of expertise include transit and transportation policy.

Paula Offord (Absent)—is SGA’s Office Manager.

Mara D’Angelo (Absent)—works on Brownfields and underground storage tank issues. Her areas of expertise include housing and vacant properties.

Geoff Anderson (Absent)—is the President and CEO of SGA

Contact information for all SGA staff is available on the coalition website ( password=coalition) and coalition members should feel free to contact any SGA staff with questions about state, local, and federal smart growth policy issues.

Reminder: Next call will be Thursday, June 24th at 4:00pm EST.