Sustainability Advisory Board

Parking Department Conference Room

Agenda — 9 items

1. 1. Roll Call & Call to Order
2. 3. Approval of May SAB Meeting Minutes Approved on Consent Agenda Pass
3. 3. Public Comment - None
4. 4. Keep Coral Gables Beautiful Program Updates (KCGB) i. Recent Events: 1. Planting For Patriotism: An America 250 Initiative – June 27 a. The KCGB team was awarded a $500 grant which was used to buy red, white and blue plants. The Coral Gables Garden Club was a large contributor to the planting event as well. The plants were used to decorate the Blue Star Memorial at the Youth Center before the 250th anniversary of the USA on July 4th. There were 50 volunteers who planted 126 plants including Girl Scout Troop 206, a few private companies, and a student club from FIU. 2. Composting Made Simple Workshop – July 20 a. The city hosted an educational workshop in partnership with the Miami Dade Library Coral Gables Branch and Renuable, which is the compost provider. There were 27 attendees including Vice Mayor Anderson who also participated in the presentation. There will be another workshop on composting during the fall season when more residents are in town and it will be on a Saturday. ii. Upcoming Events 1. Commercial Beautification Awards – Extended until July 31 a. The Board was reminded that they can nominate any business that has a beautiful exterior. They simply need three photos at different angles and to submit them online on the city website. 2. Summer Downtown Cleanup – August 10 a. This quarterly cleanup will be at 5 pm at the Chamber of Commerce. Volunteers will come to the Chamber office to get supplies then go out to pick up litter around the downtown area and get light bites after. The Chamber will be finding a restaurant soon to host the light bites after the cleanup portion of the event has been completed. 3. Senior Week Sustainability Presentation – August 18 a. This event will be held at the Adult Activity Center as we do every year. City staff will do a short presentation followed by an hour of tabling. 4. Pollinator Palooza – August 29 a. This event will be held at the War Memorial Youth Center from 9 am to 11 am. It is a great family event open to all. 5. Update on Composting Program – 3 Month Update a. City staff gave an update on the composting program, which has been ongoing for 3 months. It has been a great success with over 3,700 pounds of compost picked up and over 130 people signed up. The company working with us has been very responsible. Any issues have been addressed and fixed immediately. Frank and others expressed wanting to do more to spread the word about the program because not many people seem to know about it. The city informed the board that we will speak to Communications to put a post together and that the city newsletter has 20,000 people registered. The city also mentioned that the compost program is on the waste bill that residents receive. 6. Litter Index Scoring – July 28 or 29 a. Staff requested volunteers to help with scoring the Litter Index, which is a necessary activity we do every year to be in good standing with Keep America Beautiful. Volunteers will watch the recordings of the City of Coral Gables and rate on how clean or littered multiple areas are.
5. 5. Sustainability City Commission i. Summer Page Intern Presentations – July 7 1. The Page Internship Program offers students the opportunity to learn about government processes with a hands‐on approach to civic learning It provides a meaningful and exciting experience for students interested in learning about the daily functions of municipal government. There were eight presentations during the City Commission meeting and two were related to sustainability. i. Evan Coulter and Jacob Finley, Septic to Sewer ii. Evan Coulter and Jacob Finley, Benefits of Living Seawalls
6. 6. Standing Agenda i. Vulnerability Assessment Update 1. The draft for the vulnerability assessment was submitted to the State on June 30th. Currently, there are some minor modeling comments being addressed. There will be a presentation on the vulnerability assessment in one of the upcoming Board meetings. ii. Block by Block Update 1. The Block by Block team continues to do a fantastic job including managing Giralda and Miracle Mile with the influx of visitors due to the art installations on Giralda.
7. 7. Member Comments i. Frank: 1. Would like to develop outreach strategy ideas that expands its reach to include more residents who may not be aware of the sustainability initiatives and the composting program. Frank would like members to bring ideas to the next meeting and confirm with the city’s Communications team to see what can be done. ii. Stephen: 1. Discussed wanting to extend the E-news newsletters that the city sends to include more sustainability initiatives. City staff provided insight into how the city has over 20,000 subscribers and KCGB also sends out monthly newsletters. City staff will follow up with the Communications team to see what they think. 2. Stephen also updated the Board on his meeting with the Sustainability team and Economic Development, discussing his idea he brought to previous meetings about making a larger cleanup (Mother of All Cleanups). City staff and Stephen agreed on making this part of a possible grant funded project during the Greatest American Cleanup season in Spring. iii. Joe: 1. Brought up a question of where funding comes from for Keep America Beautiful. City staff responded to clarify that funding comes from State and private. It was discussed that funding received to KCGB is secure, but there is a chance of it being reduced. iv. Tiffany: 1. Is interested in working on the Green Business Program and would like to bring a new vision to the program. Tiffany’s goal is to find a way to encourage local businesses that may not be aware of such an opportunity that they can utilize for free. She brought up some ideas such as discounts for the businesses to attract new business as an example of an incentive. 2. Currently, the awardees are recognized at the City Commission Meetings, on the city website, and when the Chamber of Commerce holds their Dimond Awards, the new Green Businesses are automatically nominated for the Green Diamond Awards. The businesses also receive a decal for their storefront windows to commemorate their Green Business status. Staff do encourage businesses who do private corporate events with KCGB to apply to the Green Business Program when those businesses seem like they are good candidates. Staff are looking to rebrand the program with the suggestions from the Board. v. Nicolas: 1. There was a question from Nick about the status of the Biochar initiative. Staff mentioned from our understanding it is moving forward being spearheaded by the Public Works Department. 2. He is also in support of the communications discussion and would like to see that develop. vi. Teddy: 1. Brought up that Zarah’s mother is a professor at the UM Marketing & Business School would perhaps be interested in doing a project with her undergrad and graduate students to do a composting outreach strategy and one for the Green Business Program. 2. Teddy will be at the University of Tennessee on the week of July 27 for the launch of the College Youth Sports Sustainability Network which includes many different universities who will be in attendance. This is meant to use sports as a way to promote sustainability to college sports fans, including composting. Teddy believes strongly in this program and messaging and will be having more events during sports games like the Green U baseball night encouraging composting. He would like to invite the Sustainability team again to a few of those events as well.
8. 8. Adjourned - 6:11 P.M. Next Meeting – Wednesday, August 26, 2026, at 5:00 p.m. at the Parking, Sustainability & Mobility Services Office
9. 10 NOTE

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