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Cool Cities is a national Sierra Club campaign to get individual cities to take the lead on minimizing climate change. There are three categories of strategies being pursued: cleaner vehicles, energy efficiency and renewable energy. The campaign is being carried out at the chapter and group level and this page covers what is going on in the Rio Grande area. So far, the chapter has seven Cool Cities:
There is more information, including a Cool Cities Guide and fact sheet on the national website's Cool Cities pages.
On Jan. 30, 2007, Taos became the seventh city in the Rio Grande Chapter area to start down the Cool Cities road by endorsing the U.S. Mayor's Climate Protection Agreement. Read the Town Council's resolution (pdf. 224Kb).
From Rio Grande Sierran, March/April 2008
El Paso Regional Group activist Gil Pinon has been working for months since returning from Al Gore’s Global Warming Training in Atlanta to get El Paso’s Mayor and City Council to sign on to the Cool Cities initiative. Attempting a feat which would have been impossible with past city administrations, Gil has meticulously laid the groundwork in one-on-one meetings with council members and the mayor, who has always been in favor of a Cool Cities designation for El Paso. Gil has also taken the time to work with council representatives to develop a full-fledged plan for implementation so that council’s approval will lead to meaningful change in El Paso. With everyone now ready to support the ordinance, the time seems right to place it on the agenda for March 4th.
Gil Pinon is a member of what is probably El Paso’s first family of environmentalism. His father Joe Pinon, a pharmacist by profession, has fought for many years against polluters like the Jobe Quarry on the eastern slope of the Franklins which not only defaced the mountain, but spewed dust across the road to a nearby elementary school, causing respiratory problems for students there. In issue outings to the quarry Joe would also point out the slurry running off the property and down toward the school.
In the Sierra Club’s previous encounter with the ASARCO smelter back in the ‘90’s, Joe was outspoken about the poisoning of El Pasoans and the cover-up by the local medical establishment as well as the industry-dominated Texas Council on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). He had the foresight to oppose the Sierra Club’s agreeing to the permitting of the failed ConTop technology at the smelter. Gil’s brother Perry, a lawyer, also made many sacrifices in exposing and opposing the polluters. Sister Yvonne, a classically-trained soprano whose health and singing career were severely impacted, now volunteers with El Paso Environmental Justice Organizer Mariana Chew.
