City of Rochester recognized for sustainability efforts

(ABC 6 News) — On June 20, Minnesota GreenStep Cities awarded the City of Rochester a certificate of achievement for maintaining Step 4 and Step 5 recognition in the voluntary challenge, assistance and recognition program.

Minnesota GreenStep Cities is a free, continuous improvement program based on 29 best practices that are tailored to Minnesota cities and tribal nations.

The program is in its 14th year and offers five steps for cities to follow.

Step levels 1-3 involve implementing an increasing number of these best practices. Step 4 identifies efforts to measure and report performance metrics. Step 5, the highest level of recognition, is awarded to cities that have shown improvement in those performance metrics.

“This award demonstrates to our community members and to other cities across Minnesota that the City of Rochester is making great strides in the area of energy and resource conservation and innovation,” shared Kayla Betzold, sustainability coordinator and GreenStep program lead with the City of Rochester via a press release.

The City has documented 89 completed actions across the 29 goals to meet its own sustainability goals with support from the GreenStep program and peers. Actions taken within the program focus on cost savings, energy use reduction, resource conservation, climate change, and the encouragement of civic innovation. You can learn more about Rochester’s efforts here.