Willmar’s GreenStep Cities program powers ahead

When an organization experiences staff turnover, it often has to reboot projects. The City of Willmar staff and community members did just that with the GreenStep Cities program, and experienced impressive results.

City and community staff met multiple times to review the steps and best practices that had been accomplished, and update the GreenStep Cities reporting matrix. Willmar was able to complete 10 actions under 7 of the GreenStep Cities Best Practices, one-fourth of the program’s 29 Best Practices.

In total, the city completed 12 Best Practices since joining in 2012. They achieved Step 2 and are certainly closer to Step 3 with this recent community effort.

West Central CERT Regional Coordinator Jacob Selseth was also impressed, "Willmar is such a regional hub here in west central Minnesota, it's great to see how the team is bringing clean energy concepts into their community in their own way."

One of the keys to the success of the Willmar GreenStep Cities program was the involvement of community members and city staff from different departments. By working together, they were able to accomplish more than any one person or group could on their own. And, as Kristin Mroz-Risse noted, the small CERTs Seed Grant they received to reboot the program went a long way.

The GreenStep Cities program is a great example of how cities can work toward sustainability and quality-of-life goals by implementing best practices and involving the community in the process. By continuing to work together, the City of Willmar can make even greater strides in the years to come.