COMMUNITY EVENT INVITES NEIGHBORHOOD PARTICIPATION IN ENERGY RETROFIT PROJECTS

On May 1st, members of the Spokane Alliance held a community event at Liberty Park United Methodist Church to create awareness about SustainableWorks and give community members a chance to have input on the project's trajectory.

Right now, SustainableWorks is implementing a pilot project in the South Perry neighborhood in order to refine cooperation with other private and governmental organizations, so that larger retrofit projects will become more streamlined. This is especially important with the passage of SB 5649, which allocated 14 million dollars in grants for residential energy retrofits. SustainableWorks is in a position to apply for the aid. The money, if awarded to SustainableWorks, will be distributed to projects throughout the state, and the grant application is expected to be in sometime in July.

Commissioner Bonnie Mager

One of the main functions of the event was to allow the community a chance to guide and help develop this project as it moves along, and is illustrative of the importance placed on community at the Spokane Alliance. By enabling leaders to listen to the interests and ideas of members' from the community, variations to the project emerged including setting up follow-ups on weekends for the customers convenience, having a lockbox for valuables when the work is being done and developing guidelines for homeowners detailing the proper preparations before an energy audit or retrofit is done.

Banner Fuel installing new heating system at Center Pointe

Six commercial projects have already been completed and have demonstrated energy savings. One such project was the CenterPointe retrofit. Spike Cunningham, the executive director of Center Point, recounted his experience during the retrofit. Mr. Cunningham was pleased with the programs ability to, “assess our needs of insulation and in retro-fitting the furnace, which helped ensure that the project was beneficial in reducing consumption.”