Tracking Progress on the Aloha+ Challenge
The Hawai'i Green Growth (HGG) Sustainability Measures Start-up Project is developing joint indicators to track progress and facilitate collaboration on the Aloha+ Challenge – an unprecedented statewide commitment to sustainability with six shared targets to be achieved by 2030 to advance clean energy, local food production, natural resource management, waste reduction, smart growth/climate change adaptation, and green workforce/education. The Governor, the Mayors of all four Counties and the elected Chair of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) jointly launched the Aloha+ Challenge on July 7, 2014.

Beginning in January 2014, the HGG Sustainability Measures Start-up Project works with state agencies, four Counties and partner organizations across the state to achieve two major outcomes:

• Develop a shared set of practical, public sustainability indicators for at least two statewide sustainability targets and a process to add more indicators in the future.
• Initiate a statewide sustainability network and strengthen county-based collaborative action networks.

Indicators: What Gets Measured Gets Done

Coordinated and institutionalized sustainability indicators help move the needle in the right direction by providing a tangible mechanism to measure progress, maintain accountability and provide transparency. This will benefit and empower key decision makers, state and county government, private sector leaders and Hawai'i residents who all have an important role in working towards sustainability goals.

Indicators are an invaluable resource to the state and counties to:

• Evaluate implementation strategies
• Identify critical gaps and drivers (e.g. funding, policies, capacity to implement)
• Highlight achievements and entrepreneurial/partnership opportunities
• Justify funding requests and rationale for policy change to support successful strategies and address gaps