Volunteers plant a rain garden at the Cloverly Heights playground in Harrisburg. Stormwater management projects are one area that the city’s new Environmental Advisory Council will study.
After more than two years of dormancy, Harrisburg’s Environmental Advocacy Council is back in action.
City Council repopulated the all-volunteer body on Tuesday night when it voted unanimously to approve five appointees nominated by council members and the city’s administration. One appointee, Rafiyqa Muhammad, is a holdover from the former EAC that dissolved in 2016.
She’s joined by new members Tanya Dierolf, Christine Proctor, Molly Cheatum and Melanie Cook.
Council nominated two members of the new EAC, and the city’s administration offered three.
The five-member body will advise the mayor and other city officials on matters related to the environment and sustainability. As an advisory group, it does not have the power to manage or disburse money, but it will make recommendations on how to spend the money collected by Harrisburg’s “host fee.”
Harrisburg collects more than $250,000 a year in fees for hosting a regional incinerator, which is owned by the Lancaster County Solid Waste Management Authority (LCSWMA.) State law allows cities with regional waste sites to assess a $1 per ton fee on the waste processed there. That money must then be used to make environmental improvements in the city.
Christopher Nafe, the city’s new sustainability coordinator, will manage the EAC and attend all of its meetings, Mayor Eric Papenfuse said.
Papenfuse hopes that having a designated city hall staff member will help the EAC avoid the dysfunction that felled it in 2016, when three of its five members resigned in a joint letter to the mayor.
“The atmosphere of the EAC has become so dysfunctional that it is not possible to accomplish business in a professional manner,” the March 24, 2016 letter reads. “Too much time has been taken up by disagreements and disrespect for fellow EAC members.”
With the resignations, the remaining two members of the EAC – Muhammad and Bill Cluck – did not have a quorum and could not conduct business. Cluck resigned a month later, according to a PennLive report, leaving Muhammad as the only remaining member.
Nafe hopes that the new EAC will advise the city on existing and new initiatives. Those include working with the Tree Advisory Council, which monitors the city’s tree population, and developing educational programs at the city’s new composting facility in Susquehanna Township.
Harrisburg has also invested heavily in its parks and public spaces in the past year, which creates ample opportunity for the EAC to recommend new projects or amenities, Papenfuse said.
In addition to the ongoing renovations at five city playgrounds, Harrisburg is also re-opening its greenhouse in Reservoir Park. Volunteer labor and in-kind donations have allowed the Public Works Department to bring the greenhouse back from years of neglect. Papenfuse hopes the facility will be functional by the end of the year.
“There are a lot of ways a good committee can advise the mayor on policy,” Papenfuse said. “I think this is a good thing for the city.”
