| Action |
Implementation Status |
| Declare a climate emergency |
Completed. |
| Support the State’s recent climate goals and taking action to achieve them |
Ongoing. |
| Establish an interdepartmental task force of all Department heads, or their senior deputies, that will focus on urgently implementing the County’s Climate Action and identifying additional actions, policies, and programs the County can undertake to reduce and adapt to the impacts of a changing climate. The task force will report to the Board through the Sustainability Commission and the Sustainability Committee on a semi-annual basis starting in March 2021 |
The first meeting occurred December 16. The second meeting will be February 1. The group is on track to bring a report to the Board of Supervisors in March.
|
| Seek input from the community (with a special focus on highly impacted Environmental Justice communities), workers (especially impacted workers), and business/industry to help the County anticipate and plan for an economy that is less dependent on fossil fuels, helps plan for a “Just Transition” away from a fossil-fuel dependent economy, and considers how the County’s recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic can incorporate the County’s climate goals |
County staff met with staff from the Governor’s Office of Planning and Research (OPR), which is developing a roadmap for statewide Just Transition work. OPR anticipates releasing the roadmap in June 2021.
The Sustainability Commission is discussing suggestions on how the County might proceed. |
| Develop policies to require all new construction to be fully electric through the adoption of new building codes that exceed current State codes |
Ongoing. Update provided to Sustainability Commission on December 14, 2020. Staff will return to Sustainability Commission in February 2021 and anticipates bringing draft ordinance to Sustainability Committee in March 2021. |
| Prioritize implementation of the Climate Action Plan as soon as possible and considering equity and social justice issues in the implementation of the Plan |
Ongoing. |
| Include health, socio-economic, and racial equity considerations in policymaking and climate solutions at all levels and across all sectors |
This work is beginning with the development of the environmental justice policies for the General Plan. |
| Include land use policies and actions that will facilitate greater availability of fresh food to County residents by creating more opportunities for community gardens, urban gardens, farmers markets, and related policies and programs. |
The County’s proposal to the California Department of Conservation for a planning grant to develop a carbon sequestration feasibility study was approved by the Strategic Growth Council on December 17. The County is partnering with the Contra Costa Resource Conservation District and the University of California Cooperative Extension to develop the feasibility study. |
| Call for all Contra Costa cities and agencies, as well as regional agencies, to also approve a Climate Emergency Declaration |
Completed in October 2020. |