Peak Oil Task Force Report - City of Bloomington - State of Indiana

MITIGATION GOALS & STRATEGIES
SHORT­TERM STRATEGIES (1­5 years)
1. Establish an emergency fuel reserve to prepare for a fuel shortage.
The City should shift its practices to maintain an emergency reserve of fuel (beyond that
which it already maintains for daily use) in the event of a shortage and/or drastic price
increase.
2. Establish a measurable goal for reducing total vehicle miles driven.
Toward that end, the City should start tracking total miles driven on each vehicle.
3. Encourage Team Process to develop a plan for a Model City Green Fleet.
As the City’s Team Process examines and audits the current City fleet and prioritizes
acquisition, it should do so with an eye to discerning which vehicles might be eliminated
and how we might maximize fuel efficiency in the short term. In the long term, the City
should transition its fleet away from reliance on fossil fuels. Some ideas Team Process
might pursue include: reducing the size of the City fleet through partnerships with car
sharing groups (this might be a consortium of City, County, the schools, and IU) and
requiring best‐in‐class purchases, with priority given to electric and plug‐in hybrid electric
vehicles as appropriate
4. Encourage use of more bicycles, Segways, motorized bikes, and electric cars
in code enforcement, where feasible.
5. Establish a City bicycle fleet
Institute a City bicycle fleet so that City employees have the option to ride a City bicycle
rather than drive a City vehicle. Currently, the City’s Parking Enforcement Division owns
two bicycles for use by two of its nine enforcement officers. Each employee using such a
program would likely have to have her/his own helmet. While liability concerns may arise
from such a proposal, it should be noted both that employees already often walk or ride
their own bikes for City business where appropriate and that many other municipalities
Report of the Bloomington Peak Oil Task Force
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