Multi-Year New York City GreenWorks Project Launched

GREENPRINT for CHANGE
Green Works

Multi-Year New York City GreenWorks Project Launched
Public Conference Event with Exhibitors, Panels, Speakers, to Take Place, Sunday, July 26

The publishers of Our Time Press have engaged in a sustainable work life for many years; we’ve racked up thousands of hours in bike time and speed-walking to and from our offices.  Those basic efforts clearly save money and time, and reduce the carbon footprint.  We learned yesterday that utilizing subway travel to write stories like this saves and generates income – although we’re not exactly sure how that works.

Poised to tell us explain the what, why, where and how every business in the Big Apple can be green is Manhattan District One Councilman Alan J. Gerson, and environmental activists and industry leaders.  They are betting their GreenWorks NYC, a new and innovative multi-year green economy project, will not only explain how green works in New York’s own economy, but it also will connect all the disparate entities to make for green connections and collective consciousness.
“The Green Marketplace is exploding,” said Councilman Gerson at the launch, “but there’s a dynamic missing: information is sporadic and fragmented making it difficult for businesses and our community to be prepared for opportunities when they arise. Currently, information is disseminated through specialized sector-specific networks. No one has created a cross-sector collaborative platform for managing large-scale change and mobilizing actionable intelligence.”
Gerson stood with several leading environmental activists and industry leaders to announce what they consider to be the solution to the “disconnect” and to invite the public to day-long community sustainability strategy and information-sharing sessions to be held this Sunday, July 26 (12:00n – 5:30pm) at the New York Academy of Sciences Conference Center, 7 World Trade Center, 250 Greenwich St., 40th Floor in Manhattan. Tickets: $15. Advance Registration Required for Building Admission.  (Visit: www.GreenWorks NYC.net, or email: GW-RSVP@WeTheWorld.org.  Your advance ticket payment registers you for the event.  Go to www.WeTheWorld.org/greenworkspayments.)
The July 26 event kicks off the multi-year effort to inspire “results-driven collaborations” with respect to designing “new models” from disparate disciplines and different voices.  Event speakers and/or panelists include:  Rick Ulfik of We, the World (Building local-to-global networks of collaboration), George Gosieski of Corenet Global Business Ecosystems (Built Environment), Debra Italiano of GreenWorks NYC (Sustainable Food Systems), Deborah Stern of the 2020 Fund (Sustainable Earth by 2020); Mike Gordon, C-Power (Smart Energy); Whitney Smith (Social Innovation); Mathew Ahrens (Environmental Law and Policy); Scott Beall of Integrated Vision Learning (Education & Green Workforce Development); Ariane Burgess, Regenerative Culture (Regenerative Leadership & Community Systems) and Douglas Cohen of the U.S. Partnership/Education for Sustainability (Leadership & Community Engagement), who made the case eloquently for GreenWorks NYC early yesterday morning on WBAI-FM radio.
Proactive supporters and partners in this GreenWorks effort include: Battery Park City Authority, the Communications Coordination Committee for the United Nations , the New York State Energy Research & Development Authority (NYSERDA), Earthventure Capital, LLC and Green Map System.
Year One of the GreenWorks NYC Forums will focus on the following sectors: Green Buildings & Smart, Renewable Energy; Sustainable Food Systems; Capital Markets; Urban Planning & Transportation; Social Innovation; Health & Wellness.  The Sunday event’s overarching objectives include: Convening Solutions Roundtables, Creating a Social Network Map for the emerging Green Business landscape and providing strategies for Education and Green Jobs Development pathways bridging K-12, Higher Education, Industry and Government.
To illustrate and chronicle the development and growth of New York City as a global green marketplace, results from the GreenWorks forums, panels and roundtables will be published on the web and various media, including Our Time Press.   For more information, visit: www.GreenWorksNYC.net.