Building the Aloha+ Smart Sustainable Communities Dashboard

On May 23-24, 2017, Hawai‘i Green Growth co-hosted the Aloha+ Challenge Statewide Measures Meeting with the County of Kaua‘i at the National Tropical Botanical Garden headquarters in Kalaheo, Kaua‘i. The meeting included over 50 statewide, cross-sector participants from the state, counties, non-profit, business, academia, and community organizations. Building on the Legacy from the IUCN World Conservation Congress and looking towards the Mālama Honua Worldwide Voyage homecoming, the group discussed shared measures to track progress, provide accountability, and inform action on Hawai‘i’s statewide Aloha+ Challenge 2030 sustainability goals.

Attendees discussed the Smart Sustainable Communities 2030 goal on livability, resilience, and community well-being to provide recommendations for the online Dashboard. This includes robust facilitated discussions on the 8 suggested target areas: Mobility/Accessibility, Affordable Housing, Connection to Place, Economic Prosperity, Land Use/Urban Impacts, Resilience & Disaster Management, Open/Public/Green Spaces, and Carbon Mitigation.

The groups provided recommendations on target language, priority indicators, data sources, narrative content, and public resources. The Statewide Meeting discussions built on a six-month Roundtable and Study Team process to define the Smart Sustainable Communities goal, in additional to a series of technical expert meetings, data discussions, and an online survey.

The group reinforced the exciting opportunities for “Dashboard 2.0,” which includes innovation to capture community-driven data, increased county-level measures, enhanced visuals and interactive features, and engaging students on maintenance through 2030. Other key discussion themes included integrating health and community well-being throughout all Smart Sustainable Communities target areas, as well as the utility of the Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) as a metric or meta-indicator to track progress and prosperity for Hawai‘i.

In addition to working sessions, the two-day event included a tour of Kaua‘i sustainability sites: the National Tropical Botanical Garden LEED certified building; farm to table pau hana at Kaua‘i Beer Company; bike ride on the coastal Kapa‘a Bike Path; walking tour through Hardy Complete Street and the TIGER Grant Area.

Mayor Carvalho’s video welcome to Aloha+ Challenge statewide meeting participants

Background: The Aloha+ Challenge was launched in 2014 by the Governor, four County Mayors, Office of Hawaiian Affairs, State Legislature, and public-private partners across the state, identifying six sustainability goals for 2030 in clean energy, local food, natural resources, solid waste, smart sustainable communities, and green workforce and education. The Aloha+ Dashboard – an online open data platform for decision makers and the public – currently features indicators for clean energy, solid waste, natural resources and local food goals. The Dashboard will showcase smart sustainable communities and green workforce and education at the end of 2017.

 

This article was originally published by ASU Now on May 1, 2017

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Marshall Terrill 

Students from the resource 'island' of Phoenix enlisted to help create strategy.

Hawaii faces a range of sustainability threats: The state can’t grow enough food; it imports 90 percent of its energy and water; coral reefs are disappearing; the islands are being overrun by invasive species; and because of global warming, residents are increasingly vulnerable to flooding, hurricanes and tsunamis.

It might seem like an unlikely pairing, but students from the desert have been enlisted to help.

“Phoenix is ostensibly an island, and the way resource allocation occurs is not much different than Hawaii,” said Darren Petrucci, a professor in Arizona State University’s Design School. If the Hawaiian Islands can become a sustainable, then “all of the other islands in the world can do it.”

In an example of interdisciplinary problem solving, ASU students and faculty from the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, the School of Sustainability, and ASU’s LightWorks energy center worked recently with a Hawaii public-private partnership network to find new answers. 

The ASU teams developed a four-tiered strategy, focusing on flood mitigation, community education, economic health and overall resilience. They incorporated plans from wetland filtration on a municipal golf course to creating a boardwalk for flood control.

“The big idea of this project is to empower local neighborhoods to find their own solutions,” said Paul Coseo, an assistant professor in landscape architecture in The Design School.

The project is the sort of thing that ASU has become known for. ASU has positioned itself as a pioneer of interdisciplinary learning and a leading center for entrepreneurship and innovation. The university was the first in the nation to offer a degree in sustainability and has been involved in partnerships including solar power and waste reduction. Also, the Herberger Institute pushes students to revitalize communities and transform neighborhoods.  

“Designers don’t engage in problem solving the way an engineer might look at things because we always start with the human condition and how it engages with nature,” Petrucci said. 

To that end, many of ASU-led proposals focus on neighborhoods and residents. Homeowners would learn to remove asphalt, build rain gardens and install green roofs to reduce storm water runoff, said Kristin Antkoviak, a former microbiologist studying landscape architecture.

“If everyone did just a small intervention,” she said, “it could make a great impact.”

Many strategies could be planned within a year and completed shortly thereafter, depending on funding, Coseo said.

ASU’s involvement began when President Michael Crow met with Hawai’i Green Growth leader Celeste Conners. They, along with faculty and staff from LightWorks and the School of Sustainability, discussed a statewide initiative to achieve environmental, social and economic prosperity for future generations.

Kupu, Kamehameha Schools (KS), Hawai’i Green Growth (HGG) and University of Hawai’i Office of Sustainability (UH) are hiring a cohort of four to six highly motivated, creative individuals with experience and a passion for communications and public engagement and education to help develop and execute a Communications & Engagement Strategy for the Aloha+ Challenge – Hawai‘i’s statewide commitment to achieve six interconnected sustainability goals by 2030 in Clean Energy, Local Food Production, Natural Resource Management, Solid Waste Reduction, Smart Sustainable Communities and Green Workforce & Education.

Position Overview

Application Requirements: Please go to the following web page and complete the application form for the Aloha+ Challenge Communications Specialist at www.kupuhawaii.org/sustainability.

Essential Duties

1. Engagement Strategy Development

• Develop stakeholder map and public/student engagement strategy for the Aloha+ Challenge
• Participate in relevant stakeholder meetings
• Conduct student engagement research for the Aloha+ Green Workforce & Education goal and to inform Year 2+ student outreach strategy

1. Develop Communications Strategy for General Public

• Conduct research on Aloha+ Challenge and sustainability in Hawai`i and assess current communications and marketing processes and strategies, including website and social media presence
• Work closely with HGG & KS Communications Teams, UH Office of Sustainability, and partners to identify input for social media marketing strategy for the Aloha+ Challenge
• Identify Metrics and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for Marketing, Communications, Social Media, etc.
• Develop Aloha+ Communications Strategy for general public
• Monitor trends in social media tools, applications, channels, design and strategy

1. Implementation of Communications Strategy

• Implement initiatives and campaigns identified in Communications Strategy:
• Develop relevant content topics to reach the general public, students and stakeholders
• Assist in creation, curation, and management of all published content (images, video and written)
• Develop and expand community and/or influencer outreach efforts
• Compile reports for management showing results (ROI)
• Track, monitor, and analyze Metrics & KPIs; tweak strategy as needed
• Set goals for next cohort strategy period

1. Participation in Hawai’i Green Growth Statewide Network:

• Participate in Statewide Measures Meetings, multi-stakeholder meetings, and other events for professional development, research and stakeholder networking opportunities
• Support the planning, preparation and execution for Statewide Measures Meetings on the Aloha+ Green Workforce and Education and Smart Sustainable Communities goals
• Record and prepare meeting summaries for relevant stakeholder or statewide meetings
• Provide event set-up and support for priority events or meetings
• Support substantive development of agenda, presentations and materials, including cohort-led presentations as requested

1. Other duties as assigned

A Part of the BUILDING VOICES Ideas + Action Festival -- Presented by the School of Architecture at the University of Hawaiʻi and University of Hawaiʻi Community Design Center

(Honolulu, March 13, 2017) –The University of Hawai’i’s School of Architecture and Community Design Center is pleased to announce the launch of the BUILDING VOICES DESIGN COMPETITION, part of the BUILDING VOICES design festival featuring local, national and international designers, architects, artists, engineers and problem solvers. The day-long event will be held on Earth Day, April 22, at the Hawaiʻi State Capitol.

The BUILDING VOICES DESIGN COMPETITION focuses on the value of design and its impact on built and natural environments and fostering communication between multiple communities and organizations. The BUILDING VOICES DESIGN COMPETITION closes for entries on April 5, 2017. Entering the competition is free.

“We are seeking design solutions that draw knowledge from multiple disciplines, including architecture, product design, engineering, service design, landscape architecture, urban design and others,” said Karla Sierralta, assistant professor at the University of Hawai’i’s School of Architecture. Designs must be socially, economically, ecologically and culturally sustainable. For full details, please visit: https://www.buildingvoices.org/competition/.

“The goal of the BUILDING VOICES DESIGN COMPETITION is to highlight local emerging, midcareer and established design talents alongside national and international ones, with a thematic emphasis on prototypical solutions for the built environment that generate a positive impact for the natural world,” explained Sierralta.  “We’re excited about sharing Hawaiʻi’s perspective as an integral part of the global discussion on design and welcoming participants from around the world to join us through an open invite to the BUILDING VOICES DESIGN COMPETITION,” said Brian Strawn, co-founder of Strawn+Sierralta.

The distinguished jury includes Xavier Vendrell of Rural Studio, Healoha Johnston of the Honolulu Museum of Art, Rebecca Buck of Amazon, T. Annie Nguyen of the U.S. Digital Service at the White House, Andrew Tang of Transit-Oriented Development Honolulu, and architects Aljoša Dekleva from Slovenia, Clément Blanchet from Paris and Daniel Vasini of West 8 New York.

The first prize will win $5,000, second prize will win $2,500, and the third prize will win $1000. The winning designs will be featured in the BUILDING VOICES TRAVELING EXHIBIT to be launched at the Hawaiʻi State Capitol on April 22 and presented by the University of Hawai’i Community Design Center.