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How Can a City Measure Its Happiness?

Santa Monica will begin to survey residents about their well-being next month. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel)By Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow | Next City | August 19, 2014

At one time, questionnaires about well-being were the province of mental health professionals. But in recent years, a growing number of city governments have been getting into the game. Last year, Santa Monica, California won a Bloomberg Philanthropies Mayors’ Challenge grant to create a “Local Well-Being Index,” based in part on a survey it plans to administer next month. Other cities, including Seattle and Nevada City, Calif., are at various stages of implementing the idea as well (with different levels of direct municipal involvement). All share a goal that some see as unsuitable for government and others consider its fundamental task: to make citizens happier.

http://nextcity.org/daily/entry/happiest-cities-well-being-survey-policy

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Rockaway Resilience Network Activities

The Rockaway Resilience Network has engaged a full set of actvities for 2014 to address the Rockaways' mission critical gaps and to move the community toward sustainability.  

 

For more information, go to:  http://rockaway.newyork.resiliencesystem.org

 

For those seeking to actively help the Rockaways improve its resilience and sustainability, please consider coming to one of the upcoming Rockaway Resilience Roundtable meetings, or help with the Rockaways' neighborhood resilience assessments.

 

 

Mike

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Canarsie Resilience Network Activities

The Canarsie Resilience Network has engaged a full set of actvities this winter to address Canarsie's mission critical gaps and to move the community toward sustainability.  

 

For more information, go to:  http://canarsie.newyork.resiliencesystem.org

 

For those seeking to actively help Canarsie improve its resilience and sustainability, please consider coming to one of the upcoming Canarsie Resilience Roundtable meetings, or helping with Canarsie's neighborhood resilience assessments.

 

Mike

Michael D. McDonald, Dr.P.H. 

 

Chairman

Global Resilience Initiatives

 

Executive Director

Health Initiatives Foundation, Inc.

 

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Transitioning to a Green Energy Economy: How Municipalities Can Benefit

Date: 
Wednesday, November 20, 2013 - 09:00 to 13:30

Kaplan Hall, SUNY/Orange,One Washington Center,Newburgh Campus

Please pre-register at www.surveymonkey.com/s/TGEE. There is no charge for the event.

Ecodistricts SUMMIT -- Boston, MA -- Nov. 12-14

Date: 
Tuesday, November 12, 2013 - 09:00 to Thursday, November 14, 2013 - 15:00

Experience EcoDistricts Summit, the premier conference dedicated to promote sustainable neighborhood development.

Each year the EcoDistricts Summit convenes leading municipal policymakers, developers, business leaders, planners, and community leaders – people with decision-making power – to share best practices and shape the growing EcoDistricts marketplace. Take a look behind development and neighborhood revitalization - for this can’t-miss event for leaders who are shaping and building the cities and urban neighborhoods of the future.

Tim DeChristopher: 'We Have to Be the Carbon Tax'

By Peter Rugh, Waging Nonviolence,07 November 13 - Reader Supported News

f you walk along Manhattan's West Side Highway, upon the long strip of bike lanes and greenery between the Hudson River and the droning automobiles, you'll come to a fresh patch of pavement that's a stone's throw away from the Pier 51 Playground. You can't tell by the look of it, but beneath the new asphalt hundreds of millions of cubic feet-worth of natural gas are flowing.

While the national climate movement has focused on the transnational Keystone XL pipeline, this tiny site has been the object of a more-than-two-year local battle over the first natural gas pipeline to enter New York City in 40 years. Objecting to the high radon content of the fracked gas and the risk of explosion this pipeline carries, my friends and I waged a campaign of legal challenges and protests against its operator, Spectra Energy Corporation.

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New Yorkers Rally Against Fracking Infrastructure and Flawed LNG Regulations

Preceding the public hearing hundreds of New Yorkers rallied outside, demanding that the LNG regulations be withdrawn. Photo credit: Frack Action

On Wednesday, Oct. 30, hundreds of New Yorkers from across the state came to Albany to expose Gov. Cuomo (D-NY) and the Department of Environmental Conservation’s (DEC) proposed Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) regulations for what they are: fatally flawed, a danger to public health and our wellbeing and supportive of a massive fracking infrastructure build out.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

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Canarsie Community <Light our Way to Recovery> October 29, 2013, Canarsie Park 6:30pm

 Light Our Way To Recovery is a candlelight commemorative gathering of the constituents of the Canarsie community, one of the many disaster impacted communities on the Eastern USA coastline. This event is given in remembrance of those persons who lost their lives as a result of Hurricane Sandy; to honor the people who volunteered and who continue to help; to highlight the need for support for Canarsie disaster victims who continue to struggle to rebuild, recover and survive the emotional maelstrom caused by the life changing events of October 29th 2012. 

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What’s Really Happening In Blacked-Out Manhattan

Manhattan at night during the crisis.

Image: Manhattan at night during the crisis.

factcoexist.com - November 2nd, 2012 - Anya Kamenetz

The darkened stairwell of the tower on Broome Street on the Lower East Side is like a dripping, foul-smelling cave lit only by a few headlamps and flashlights. A group of eight 20- and 30-somethings are climbing to the top floor of the 23-story building to check on public housing residents who have been stuck without power or water since Monday night.

"Hello? Hello? We’re volunteers! Do you need help? Water? Agua? Ayuda?" The women do the talking in hopes that people won’t be intimidated. Theo, a resident on the 18th floor who escorts us up, says that this is a dangerous building in the best of times.

(VIEW COMPLETE STORY)

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Susan's Perspective on Superstorm Sandy

This e-mail may be more stream of consciousness than anything else but I'll do my best to organize my thoughts.  I'll also include video links where I can.
  • Citizens did not follow the mandatory evacuation order because 
    • When they evacuated for Irene, they found that the places to which they evacuated were hit hard whereas the homes they left behind were fine.
    • Many residents live in highrises and feel that as long as the water doesn't reach their apartment, they'll be safe.  They stock up on batteries, food, water, and medication for a few days but not enough to sustain them for over a week without power.
    • Folks living in houses figured that if things got really bad, they could flee at the last minute.  They did not expect the water to flow in in such a violent fashion nor did they expect the water levels to rise as quickly nor as high as they did.  A friend of mine thought she was prepared because parked her car in her driveway facing outward.  I haven't been able to speak with her since Monday morning, but my guess is that her car is totaled and possibly has floated away.
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