Cool Cities Challenge: Cool Block Program
Climate Action Subcommittee
July 13, 2022
Peter Martin
Deputy Director Water Resources, Santa Rosa Water 1
Cool Cities Challenge
“ A Climate Moonshot Strategy”
• Grant Program Opportunity from the
Empowerment Institute
• Attempt to accelerate the rate at which cities
pursue carbon neutrality
• Cool Block Program’s primary strategy
• Pursue “bottom-up” change driven by the citizen
consumer
• Implement change one block at a time 2
Cool Cities Challenge Grant
Program
• First round of grant awards were
issued in 2021
• Three pilot cities in California
were awarded $1,000,000:
• Petaluma
• Irvine
• Los Angeles
• Programs implemented on 45 blocks
• Goal: Institute framework for
carbon neutrality by 2030
without offsets
3 Petaluma Cool
City Program
4 • $500k will be spent on organizing
• Establishing Cool Block Leaders
• 300 volunteers
• Integrate businesses and leaders
• The grassroots effort was spearheaded by a
Petaluma resident (contractor) and is co-lead by
Petaluma Councilmember D’ Lynda Fischer
• Two-years: “Moonshot” Project Launch ($500k)
Cool Block Program
• Implements the Cool City Challenge
• Begins with Cool Block Volunteers:
Block Leaders
• Block Leaders requests creation of a
Cool Block
1. Schedule informational meeting
w/neighbors on the block
2. Schedule a team building meeting
3. Use established curriculum – 8 topics
4. Residents take actions initially in
their home and leads to actions
impacting their block
5 https://coolblock.org/
Cool Block Program
• Cool Block Topics Include:
• Energy and Disaster
Resiliency
• Cool lifestyle
• Daily practices
• Home efficiency
• Transportation
• Water stewardship
• Safe, Healthy and Green
Block
• Community Resource
• Living as a Cool Block
6 Cool Cities Challenge Next Steps
• Pilot Programs in the three cities were launched
in January 2022
• In January 2023, the pilot results will be
evaluated and details for the next Cool City
Challenge will be released
• Future applicants must have a minimum
population of 50,000 and a city council
resolution to become carbon neutral by 2030
7 Santa Rosa Community-Wide
Climate Action Plan
• Adopted in June 2012, the Community-wide Climate
Action Plan (CCAP) guides greenhouse gas (GHG)
reduction policies and activities at a community level
• Includes GHG reduction and climate adaptation strategies • Regulatory and incentive-based programs for new &
existing development
• These were assigned to city departments and supporting agency partners
• An update to the CCAP is currently being
encompassed within the Santa Rosa Forward
General Plan Update
8 Future Planning
• Cool Cities Pilots may lead to
better understanding of
using this “bottom up”
approach to achieve GHG
reductions
• Santa Rosa will look to the
evaluation of these pilot
programs to determine the
best way to incorporate this
or similar programs in the
update to the CCAP
9 Questions?
10 Cool Block Program - coolblock.org
Cool Cities Challenge: coolcity.earth