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<br /> DRAFT
<br /> 249 Adam Beeman: It seems like it benefits the utility company extremely well, so I would just say I would try to figure
<br /> 250 out a way that we can get—because all these folks are producing more than they're ever going to consume. It'd
<br /> 251 be nice if we could offset some of the county's utility bills with what's—I mean,we're promoting this growth. Why
<br /> 252 shouldn't we benefit from the excess? The utility company's just putting it in their pocket and saying thank you,
<br /> 253 so I would say I understand it's difficult, but that would be something that I'd like to figure out. Even if it's a
<br /> 254 contract that the county actually owns the panels and you guys get the benefit of it and something, somehow,
<br /> 255 some way, but it's not fair that the utility company is getting all that for free because I guarantee you most of those
<br /> 256 people are producing more than they're actually consuming, and they're leaving money on the table, and the
<br /> 257 county can use every single penny. So that's just my two cents, and I'm going to leave it there. I'll start over on
<br /> 258 this end. Steve, do you have any questions or comments?
<br /> 259
<br /> 260 Steve Kaufmann: Well, transportation's an interesting one because we want to reduce the amount of miles
<br /> 261 people travel, yet I just read as survey in the, I think it was the New York Times just a couple days ago, how the
<br /> 262 percentage of travel distances is much greater now than it ever has, because since the pandemic people have
<br /> 263 moved farther away from their work. How can you— I know that Hillsborough wanted to have a plan in which
<br /> 264 people could have their homes near where they worked and everyone could just walk around casually, and
<br /> 265 meanwhile, you know, that was a few years ago,traffic is just mounting and building, and the town doesn't seem
<br /> 266 able to really have a plan of what to do with all this traffic, so I'm kind of curious about the transportation part,
<br /> 267 actually.
<br /> 268
<br /> 269 Amy Eckberg: That's a tough one. There's no silver bullet when it comes to any of these things, and so we
<br /> 270 have to attack it from multiple fronts. I think our plan does a pretty decent job of laying out a lot of different
<br /> 271 strategies that we can deploy, and, you know, a lot of people are working from home nowadays, and so really
<br /> 272 promoting telecommuting as best that we can, promoting our public transportation options, promoting what the
<br /> 273 towns are doing with their public transportation as well as the county promoting mobility on demand, promoting
<br /> 274 micro-mobility options. We're looking at doing an EV bike pilot program,too,to encourage folks to get out of their
<br /> 275 cars and just get on bikes instead. And so just really trying to look at so many different strategies to tackle what
<br /> 276 is a huge problem.
<br /> 277
<br /> 278 Steve Kaufmann: Right. It just seems like it's a larger problem than all the things you mentioned can really tackle
<br /> 279 with what resources we have. You know, especially like the bicycle. I mean, I'm a biker, but I refuse to go on
<br /> 280 roads like Old 86 or Orange Grove because I don't want to get killed. And there's no incentive for DOT to
<br /> 281 increase the lanes at all, and I know the county can't do that. It's actually out of their realm, so it's very confusing.
<br /> 282
<br /> 283 Amy Eckberg: Yeah, it's a tricky problem with no easy solutions, and safety, I know, is a huge aspect of it, and
<br /> 284 1 know that's why a lot of folks are hesitant to get out there on their bikes. But we're just going to do the best we
<br /> 285 can and work with our partners to be able to learn from them and what's working with folks in the towns and our
<br /> 286 regional partners and try to incorporate some of those successful measures into what Orange County can do.
<br /> 287
<br /> 288 Marilyn Carter: Thank you for the presentation. I took a look at the climate action plan when it was passed late
<br /> 289 last year, and it has a lot in it. I was so impressed to how many different areas of action have been identified.
<br /> 290 Two questions. One has to do with green building incentives -do we have a sense of when some of those
<br /> 291 incentives would come online, knowing the urgency of the problem. Is there a sense of when some of those
<br /> 292 actions would come online, those incentives for builders?
<br /> 293
<br /> 294 Amy Eckberg: I think in my conversation with Cy, it sounds like 4 months is probably the average period of time
<br /> 295 in order to push things forward, thereabouts. So it's not something that can happen immediately. It's going to
<br /> 296 take some time, and it's going to take some really good thought and planning, but probably within a year, I would
<br /> 297 hope that we start seeing some of this come forward.
<br /> 298
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