While carrying out our community work across Nassau and Suffolk counties, Sustainable Long Island also works with government to craft policies and legislation that move Long Island ever closer to economic, environmental and social sustainability.
Our advocacy efforts have helped achieved great victories for Long Islanders: we helped craft and successfully supported the passage of statewide brownfields cleanup legislation, adopted into law in 2003; we worked with other regional organizations to successfully convince the Long Island Department of Transportation (LIDOT) to create a $3 million Pedestrian Safety Fund; and we were part of the coalition of Long Island civic groups that helped pass four open space preservation measures on Election Day 2004. When government practices support sustainable development, our work in communities has a lasting impact.
September 30, 2009 - Testimony in support of Clean Water and Related Infrastructure Improvements
September 22, 2009 - Comments on the Lighthouse at Long Island
April 22, 2009 - Testimony at NYMTC Public Hearing
Sustainable Long Island’s advocacy efforts are concentrated in three topic areas:
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Economic Development
Economic development is the process of connecting profitable businesses with other interests and values, including education, health, housing, and the environment. Through economic development, communities become more creative, inclusive, and sustainable - now and for years to come.
Sustainable Long Island supports regulations that promote land reuse within existing downtown areas, thereby preserving open space and reducing public infrastructure costs. We support policies that favor utilizing existing public infrastructure to its full capacity before constructing new infrastructure with public funds.
We support requiring federal and state agencies to include the effects of proposed projects on suburban growth and sprawl in their analyses of environmental impacts.
We support increased citizen participation in all levels of planning to ensure that economic development plans reflect the needs and wishes of the communities they are meant to serve.
We support the coordination of fragmented local governments and/or the services they provide, as well as the strengthening of regional institutions at the metropolitan and state levels. Most growth-related problems are regional rather than local in nature, including transportation systems, environmental conditions, and work-force issues. Greater cooperation on these issues makes the goal of sustainable development attainable.
We support state and federal incentives for coordinated planning among local governments. A number of states and local governments have laws, policies or customs that inhibit joint planning and cooperation by local governments and other decision-making bodies. These barriers must be removed to enable collaboration among local entities.
We support a greater role for regional planning entities in planning for land conservation, cultural preservation, fiscal efficiency and ecological health.
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Environmental Health
Environmental health is our protection from environmental factors that may adversely impact human health or the ecological balance that is essential to long-term human health, whether in the natural or built environment.
Sustainable Long Island supports planning and funding policies that link land use and transportation choices at the local and regional levels.
We support planning policies that channel transportation investments to correct system deficiencies identified through regular performance monitoring of all transportation modes within a system.
We support the development and maintenance of regional and statewide multi-modal transportation plans.
We support federal, state and local initiatives that encourage the placement of new development, especially public facilities, in areas supported by a balanced transportation network. Such a network promotes active, healthy lifestyles by supporting pedestrians, cyclists and transit riders as well as car owners.
We support policies and plans that prioritize street connections in the development of transportation systems. Gated communities, private road systems, and disconnected cul-de-sac systems promote inefficiency in transportation. Proper street connectivity reduces miles traveled, encourages pedestrian and bicycle traffic, and supports transit use.
We support environmentally conscious design and construction, including "green architecture" practices, land and building recycling, and adoption of the LEED Green Building Rating System.
We support efforts to foster public and private cooperation that preserves and enhances ecological integrity over the short- and long-term.
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Social Equity
Social equity is the fair and equal access to opportunity that members of a sustainable community enjoy.
Sustainable Long Island supports increases in federal community development funds to remedy economic, social and racial inequities, to include input from all segments of a population in the planning process, and to ensure that planning and development decisions do not unfairly burden economically disadvantaged groups.
We support federal and state efforts to promote mixed-income neighborhoods as the foundation for healthy regions, including reinvestment in core communities and requirements for the provision of affordable housing in all new-growth areas.
We support the enhancement of public education, which plays an essential role in equitable community building.
We support processes that identify needs for transportation, housing, employment, and education and consider the special needs of population groups such as the elderly, youth, disabled, diverse cultural groups, and others.
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