Where can you find the Climate Control Task Force recommendations?

Well, I wish that I could tell you what they are. The following announcement was sent out this week by the City:

Topics in the Tropics

Information Line:

561-586-1791

03/24/08 – Lake Worth Mayor Jeff Clemens, joined by fellow Lake Worth City Commissioners and members of the Mayor’s Climate Protection Task Force, will make a major announcement from the steps of Lake Worth City Hall on Tuesday, March 25th at 10:00 a.m. For six months, the Mayors' Climate Protection Task Force has been meeting to develop recommendations to help the city meet the goals of the U.S. Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement. Tomorrow, Lake Worth will become the first city in Palm Beach County to announce its initiative to meet those goals, which call for the reduction of CO2 emissions by municipal governments.

Lake Worth City Hall is located at 7 North Dixie Highway. For more information, contact

Mayor Clemens at 561-215-0306.

Update: I drove by City Hall around 10 a.m. and saw a small group - maybe 15 to 20 or so - gathered on the front steps. There was a T.V. camera there. Those on the steps were holding a sign of some sort. Unfortunately, I was unable to stop and attend what was going on as I was on my way to an appointment.

Now, one would think and expect that if this was a formal announcement from the Task Force, which is making recommendations to the City Commission on ways the City can act to protect the climate, you would be able to easily find what those recommendations are on the City's website - on the day they were announced. Perhaps even on the homepage.

The homepage was last updated on March 3, 2008 - about three weeks ago. The Task Force recommendations are just not there. Am I missing something?

If you go to the Volunteer Board section, you have a set of minutes of the task force from February 26, 2008. There is some discussion about the communication they will be sending the Commission and how long the presentation will be, but nothing of the contents of their recommendations.

They met again last Thursday to sign what they were sending to the Commission, but there is no back up for that other than the one page agenda. No minutes from that meeting are posted.

I know that these will probably come out with the City Commission agenda sometime Friday, but why make the announcement now if the document is not available to the public.

Or, am I just being punished for having expectations that the City should provide timely information to its residents?

And I left a message at the number given above for the Mayor and asked where I could find the recommendations. I haven't heard back from him yet. I will let you when and if I do.

The Palm Beach Post has an article that will appear in tomorrow's paper. Interestingly, the article notes:

The task force's report recommends using recycled paper, printing on both sides of the sheet and, when possible, sending documents by e-mail to "do away with printing entirely."

The task force report itself is 13 pages and is printed — single-sided — on recycled paper.

One would think that having an electronic copy available on the City's website would be a working example of implementing the recommendations.

Oh well.

Update to the update. The Mayor did call me back and will e-mail me a copy tomorrow. I urged him to put a copy on the website, which he thought was a good idea.