A Birdseye View of The U.S. Mayor’s Climate Protection Agreement

Home Main Index Products Related WOW Websites

Bookmark This Page

A Birdseye View of The U.S. Mayor’s Climate Protection Agreement

Recently, the mayor of Seattle, Washington, upset with the Bush’s administration’s reluctance to accept the finding of scientist’s worldwide findings concerning global warming, has taken it into his own hands to do something about this growing threat, and other major city mayors are quickly falling suit. The city of Seattle had crafted a climate protection agreement that is intended to acknowledge the climate change is it calls an urgent threat to our environment.

The city of Seattle is seeking to bring greater attention to the urgent threat that global warming represents for our health, both economic and environmental. According to the climate protection agreement put forth by the city of Seattle, the preface of the climate protection states that the city of Seattle is joining many other cities, both in the United States and abroad, that already have strong policies intact on the local level that are meant to help protect against the effects and symptoms global warming.

According to the preface in the climate protection agreement put forth by the mayor and city of Seattle, more action is needed now than ever before at every level of government, including the local, state and federal levels in order to achieve any level of success in fighting the devastating effects of global warming. The preface of the climate protection agreement put out by the mayor’s office also talks about the Kyoto Protocol that was put together and ratified by 141 countries to date and signed don February 16, 2005.

On the day that the Kyoto Protocol was signed, the mayor of Seattle, Mayor Greg Nickels, proposed launching his initiative, which is focused squarely at advancing the proposals and goals put forth by the Kyoto Protocol. It was then that Mayor Greg Nickels launched the climate protection agreement that he proposed be signed and adopted by the leaders of at least 141 American cities. Mayor Greg Nickels, working closely with many other US mayors, proposed that at least 141 other US city mayors sign his climate protection agreement in time for the meeting of the US conference of Mayors which was to meet in Chicago in June of 2005.

The preface of the original climate protection agreement put forth three specific actions that the mayor hoped could be adopted by other city mayors across the United States. What are these three principal actions? The first stated principle is that the cities would strive to adopt the main principles and goals of the Kyoto Protocol and try to implement them in their own communities. They could do this by taking actions such as putting forth anti-urban sprawl land use policies as well as public information campaigns and various restorations projects.

The second principle included in the climate protection agreement is that the mayor and city government would seek to urge their state governments to take action and to encourage the federal government to take action as well. The climate protection agreement asks the mayors to petition their state governments to meet or cut greenhouse gas emissions by 7 percent by the year 2012, a goal that is stated in the Kyoto Protocol. The final mission of the climate protection agreement is the US city mayors should petition the US congress to pass a bipartisan piece of legislation that would seek greenhouse gas reduction and establish a national emission trading system.

The climate protection agreement put forth by the mayor’s office in the city of Seattle has been an important step toward pressuring the Bush administration to take action on the tough task of facing global warming. Mayor Nickels was successful in getting at least 141 cities to adopt the principles of the climate protection agreement, as well as to have it win an endorsement of agreement by the US conference of mayors. The climate protection agreement represents a strong step forward by local leadership.