Grantee Research Project Results
Final Report: Burlington EMPACT Project
EPA Grant Number: R827068Title: Burlington EMPACT Project
Investigators: Rosenbluth, Betsy , Wang, Deane
Institution: City of Burlington , University of Vermont
EPA Project Officer: Packard, Benjamin H
Project Period: January 1, 1999 through December 31, 2000
Project Amount: $508,000
RFA: Environmental Monitoring for Public Access and Community Tracking (EMPACT) (1998) RFA Text | Recipients Lists
Research Category: Water , Sustainable and Healthy Communities , Air , Ecological Indicators/Assessment/Restoration
Objective:
The objectives of this research project were to: (1) provide public access to clearly communicated, time-relevant (timely or real-time), useful, and accurate environmental monitoring data in an ongoing and sustainable manner; and (2) institutionalize a process for engaging citizens in developing environmental information accessible to a broad cross-section of residents and using it to inform collaborative actions that address priority problems in the urban ecosystem.
Summary/Accomplishments (Outputs/Outcomes):
The Burlington EMPACT Project is focused on the environment in and around Burlington, where its residents "live, work, and play." It was developed by a partnership of public and private institutions with a stake in both the environment and the quality of life in the communities that comprise the greater Burlington area. The city, through the Community Economic Development Office, represented the public governmental organizations directly responsible for the city's management. The University of Vermont, through its various departments (Natural Resources, Engineering, Computing, and Information Technology), provided technical assistance with monitoring and electronic communications. The Lake Champlain Basin Science Center focused on the mission to engage youth in this initiative so that engagement with environmental quality would extend to future generations. The Green Mountain Institute for Environmental Democracy provided consultancy relative to the public participation models used to access public opinion about what monitoring was most meaningful to the various "publics" in the Burlington area. The Vermont Monitoring Cooperative, an extensive partnership organization that conducts and provides environmental data to the research and public policy and management community, provided technical assistance with data management and historical data availability.
The direct project objective of these partners was to institutionalize a process for engaging citizens in developing environmental information accessible to a broad cross-section of residents and using it to inform collaborative actions that address priority problems in the urban ecosystem. Recognizing the breadth of public and private organizations and institutions engaged in all aspects of this objective, the initial project partners sought to develop relationships with as many appropriate organizations as possible. These relationships were seen to be critical to the long-term sustainability of the product of the partners work; the Burlington Eco Info Project infrastructure. These relationships include: the Burlington Department of Public Works, the Air Quality Division of the Department of Environmental Conservation, the Agency of Natural Resources of the State of Vermont, the camera network CAMNET monitoring program of the Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management, the Burlington Electric Department, the Sea Grant Program at the University of Vermont, the U.S. Geological Survey water quality program at Englesby Ravine, the Metropolitan Planning Organization, and the Burlington Neighborhood Project.
The approach taken for the project involved several components: (1) developing a central environmental information resource; (2) increasing access to this information through distribution of electronic kiosks and networking with existing information/technology sites (e.g., library, technological centers); (3) conducting environmental outreach and public surveys to determine levels of community interest in various environmental issues; (4) engaging a community advisory board to assist the technical team with interpreting the public survey data and translating that data into additional monitoring programs; (5) establishing new monitoring programs addressing environmental issues most relevant to the community, with results that could be affected by policy and personal behavior changes; and (6) engaging youth in environmental monitoring both as an outreach goal and to develop additional linkages to community involvement.
One distinctive feature of the Burlington EMPACT Project involved the public in determining the environmental monitoring programs that the partners should pursue. This level of public participation is part of the growing trend by government organizations to provide opportunities for deliberative public processes in many areas of public policy and program development. Public engagement in the quality of their everyday environment is seen as a critical component of building a sustainable community that pursues environmental policies to ensure the long-term viability of supporting ecological systems.
The integration of modern modes of communication with the daily lives of residents of the city of Burlington also was a goal of this project. The presumption of the national EMPACT Program was that providing time-relevant information about environmental quality was a key feature for engaging the public in discourse about environmental issues. Given the rapidly growing use of Web resources by the public, the Burlington EMPACT Project chose to employ this technology to reach the public with data in a timely fashion so that it would be relevant to their daily routine. To the extent that people’s daily or weekly behavior includes checking the Web to answer questions about news, weather, stock quotes, ski conditions, or other general interest information, we chose to try to make them include environmental information in their routine. Although the Web clearly is the emerging information technology of the new millennium, many organizations (mostly commercial) compete for the attention of the information-overloaded public. Thus lay our challenge: to provide accurate, time-relevant, easily understood, and publicly selected environmental information to the people of Burlington, and to get them to look at it. Our program sought to provide answers to such questions as:
· What is the ozone level in my city this morning?
· Is it safe to swim at the beach today?
· How high is the ultraviolet radiation in my metropolitan area today?
· Is it safe to drink the water out of the tap?
· What is the level of contamination in the groundwater at the hazardous waste site in my community?
This project objective lies within the broader need of engaging citizens in their environment and in their community. The project coordinated its activities with a related project, the Burlington Legacy Project, which developed a 30-year vision for Burlington's future as a more sustainable community. Legacy, part of the broader Sustainable Communities movement, has four interrelated themes that form the foundation for sustainability: ecological integrity, social equity, economic opportunity, and education. Thus, the Burlington EMPACT Project became a key component to the community's broader sustainability goal.
To build toward a more knowledgeable and environmentally literate public, education of young people also was a high priority of the Burlington EMPACT Project. The hope of the youth education component of the project was to build environmental literacy in the local public. Students would help engage parents and friends in their work and the environmental data available through the Eco Info Web Site. In addition, students that stayed involved and interested in environmental work might become the next generation of leaders.
Support and enhancement of school and public programs of the Lake Champlain Basin Science Center was a key part of this strategy. An environmental monitoring curriculum was developed for middle and high school students, an interactive public exhibit on environmental research using DVD technology was designed and built, and teen employees at the Science Center became engaged in water quality monitoring.
The project formed a citizen advisory board to review the results of an extensive public process and existing monitoring and to recommend to the project partners an expanded monitoring program. This advisory board consisted of 15 representatives of business, government, youth, education, nonprofit organizations, and each of the city’s neighborhoods. The group reached consensus on two new monitoring programs (storm water and carbon monoxide [CO]/fine particulates) and agreed to serve in an advisory capacity during implementation. The group was expressly interested in monitoring programs that provided a feedback loop to affect local behavior related to the environment. An urban storm water monitoring program could be linked back to residential behaviors relative to animal wastes (coliform), roof and driveway runoff, and general maintenance of drainages (silt and P). A carbon monoxide and particulate monitoring program could be related to traffic density and routing.
During June 2000, the Eco Info Web Site averaged 365 accesses per week (accesses represent the number of requests for a text-based Web page). During the final month of the project (October 2002), the Eco Info Web Site averaged 2,955 accesses per week. This represents more than 800 percent growth during the project lifespan. Even more exciting, the week of November 4-10 broke 4,000 accesses!
Finally, the Burlington EMPACT partners committed to developing a project foundation that could be sustained beyond the project’s funding period. Finding an institutional home for the project requires the identification of structures in government and community organizations that embrace more integrative functions. Unlike a transportation or sewer department, quality of life and environmental issues transcend individual departments and require broader connections with diverse agencies and public entities that are responsible for the many aspects of environmental quality (e.g., water, air, health, transportation, energy, land, social infrastructure, etc.).
Journal Articles on this Report : 1 Displayed | Download in RIS Format
Other project views: | All 3 publications | 1 publications in selected types | All 1 journal articles |
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Type | Citation | ||
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Wang D. Engaging citizens in environmental decision making: Burlington, Vermont’s EMPACT project. Journal of Urban Technology 2002;9(2):95-109. |
R827068 (Final) |
not available |
Supplemental Keywords:
Environmental Monitoring for Public Access and Community Tracking, EMPACT, air, watershed, monitoring, northeast, air, ecosystem protection, environmental exposure and risk, geographic area, water, hydrology, monitoring/modeling, wet weather flows, air toxics, climate change, particulate matter, PM, tropospheric ozone, Vermont, VT, aquatic degradation, aquatic ecosystem, community outreach, community-based approach, ecological effects, ecological risk assessment, ecosystem health, environmental monitoring data, field portable monitoring, hydrologic dynamics, particulate emissions, particulates, public access, public information, public outreach, real-time monitoring, stakeholder involvement, stratospheric ozone, surface water, time-relevant monitoring, water quality, storm water, bacteria., RFA, Scientific Discipline, Air, Water, Geographic Area, Ecosystem Protection/Environmental Exposure & Risk, particulate matter, air toxics, Environmental Chemistry, climate change, State, Monitoring/Modeling, Wet Weather Flows, Environmental Monitoring, tropospheric ozone, Ecological Risk Assessment, aquatic ecosystem, EMPACT, hydrologic dynamics, ecological effects, monitoring, stakeholder involvement, particulates, stratospheric ozone, Vermont (VT), community-based approach, field portable monitoring, public information, particulate emissions, community based, aquatic degradation, surface water, time-relevant monitoring, web site development, water quality, community-based, community outreach, public access, ecosystem health, real time monitoring, environmental monitoring data, public outreach, real-time monitoringRelevant Websites:
http://www.uvm.edu/~empact/ Exit
http://www.cedo.ci.burlington.vt.us/legacy Exit
Progress and Final Reports:
Original AbstractThe perspectives, information and conclusions conveyed in research project abstracts, progress reports, final reports, journal abstracts and journal publications convey the viewpoints of the principal investigator and may not represent the views and policies of ORD and EPA. Conclusions drawn by the principal investigators have not been reviewed by the Agency.