It’s taken a long time to convince Congress, but Brooklyn has continued to forge ahead by making sustainable practices and green jobs their number one priority.

Brooklyn Community Foundation Introduces Brooklyn Greens

The Brooklyn Community Foundation just launched Brooklyn Greens, a $750,000 project that will span over three years. Brooklyn Greens is intended to set the precedent for how a community can create a sustainable, eco-friendly environment as a supporting foundation for health, employment, and urban growth.

Brooklyn has implemented this sustainable restoration to help lower income residents save money on their monthly utility costs. Introducing Brooklyn Greens allows the community to take an environmentally friendly approach in each area of their development to ensure both a healthy and sustainable community.

Currently, Brooklyn has the largest number of public housing units out of all of the boroughs in New York City, yet it has the lowest percentage of land used as public parks. On top of that, areas of Brooklyn like Williamsburg, Cyprus Hills, and Bedford Stuyvesant also have the highest cases of emergency room visits for children with asthma.

For this reason, Brooklyn hopes to become a trendsetter in green, healthy, urban development while minimizing their environmental impact at the same time. One of the first steps in the right direction is the NYC CoolRoofs program, where Brooklyn residents throughout three different neighborhoods will paint building roofs white. This small step makes a dramatic difference in reducing temperatures by up to 80°F, which will lower the interior temperatures of buildings by up to 30%. And when it comes to savings for residents, CoolRoofs will help to cut monthly energy bills by up to 40%.

Brooklyn Greens also aspires to create new, green residential housing, train community residents for green employment, and plant up to 750 trees on Brooklyn streets.

Brooklyn Greens Goals Overview

  • Improve community gardens by preserving open spaces and planting trees.
  • Increase the number of energy-efficient homes, organizations, and businesses block by block.
  • Support a green collar workforce by training community residents for new green jobs that have been created as a result of this community development.

According to the Brooklyn Eagle, the launch of Brooklyn Greens was scheduled for August 10, 2011. This innovative outreach, educational, and renovation program will engage hundreds of residents in the community to support sustainable, eco-friendly development.

Author: Bethany Ramos works at home full time as a freelance writer, and she also co-owns her own e-commerce website, The Coffee Bump.