Peoria continues to demonstrate its commitment to sustainable development with the Livability Initiatives, which is comprised of six overarching goals for the city, including Economic Prosperity, Superior Public Services, Integrated Transportation, Arts and Cultural Enrichment, Smart Growth, and Healthy Neighborhoods. In 2009, the City of Peoria released its first Sustainability Action Plan (SAP), a guiding framework and action plan to support the city’s sustainable development. Since the first plan, the City of Peoria has continually revised its action plan, with the release of the Sustainability Action Plan 2.0 (SAP2).
As the City prepares for its next revision, Peoria seeks to gather community input to inform and develop metrics to measure success towards the goals. In a partnership with two ASU courses, graduate students continued to research best practices for community input and developing key performance indicators (KPIs), as well as research funding opportunities to support sustainable development initiatives. Students developed recommendations for the Sustainability Action Plan 3.0 (SAP3).
Two graduate students from the Public Affairs Capstone course each researched funding opportunities and strategies to support the city’s sustainability efforts considering the development of the SAP3 revision. One student reviewed funding strategies for the City’s Water Services department and the other researched opportunities for the City’s Solid Waste division. For their final deliverable, students compiled potential grant opportunities, and recommendations for funding
strategies.
As Peoria moves forward with its planning, students have also provided recommendations to seek out additional funding, using a variety of funding resources, including community grants and partnerships with other municipalities.