Clayton was selected as a 2020 Green Cities Challenge Award recipient, which actually honors years of the city's staff and residents fostering a holistic and healthy outdoor environment for all.
This eco designation serves as a complete thumbs up to the true green thumb of Patty Deforrest, Clayton's longtime director of the parks and recreation department and nationally certified parks executive. She's worked for the city since 1999, initially as the aquatics supervisor, then becoming director in 2002. She's now part of the team that oversees maintenance of the municipality's 12,000-plus trees.
Clayton earned a Tree City USA designation in 1991, and former Mayor Linda Goldstein was known for encouraging and starting green initiatives during her 2007-2013 term.
As a subset of the St. Louis Green Business Challenge initiative, the St. Louis Green Cities Challenge is a Missouri Botanical Garden program that supports sustainability within operational requirements unique to local governments. Participating municipalities incorporate sustainability policies and secure measurable results in environmental, financial and social areas.
Patty says the city's focus on environmental enhancements ramped up when Clayton board of aldermen created a Sustainability Advisory Committee with volunteer residents during June 2012. In fact, ensuring Clayton provides attractive green spaces is part of the city's strategic plan.
"What to do makes sense, such as ensuring that new buildings are Silver LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certified, but initially, the challenge was paying for it. Even designing and constructing a new ice rink with this level of certification was estimated to cost an additional half million dollars," she says. "Like us, the whole world is grappling with how to prepare for climate change. It's the 'short-term pain for long-term gain' factor."
Clayton Mayor Michelle Harris says the city has a strong record of valuing sustainability. "Recycling programs, use of rain gardens, a city-wide smoking ban, and commitment to green building design are embedded into our culture and operations," she adds.
The mayor confirmed that joining the 2020 Green Cities Challenge proved invaluable, helping them focus efforts to revisit past accomplishments and determine future priorities. "Led by our Sustainability Committee, we'll continue to prioritize green practices, identifying additional ways Clayton can continue to be a sustainability leader in the St. Louis Region,” she says.
Clayton’s recent sustainability efforts include:
- Implementing energy management software to track and report on energy usage and monitor measures taken to conserve energy.
- Renovating the city's recreation hub, Center of Clayton, including installation of high efficiency HVAC systems, LED lighting with occupancy sensors, installation of ENERGY STAR appliances and planting stormwater detention facilities with native landscaping.
- Replacing the City Hall/Fire Station boiler with 96% thermal efficiency, low emissions and multi-heat exchanger boiler. City staffers shared that lowered thermostats in the Fire Station engine bay in November 2019 resulted in a savings of nearly 11,000 therms of energy.
- Removing invasive species throughout city parks and rights-of-way has been a priority for years, but during 2020 staffers achieved nearly full eradication in Clayton's developed parks.
- Replacing water fountains with water bottle fillers throughout city facilities and parks to reduce use of plastic bottles in the community.
- Installing a woodland native urban trail in Oak Knoll Park, including more than 700 native plants and bushes that will ensure the area thrives.
"This award helped set the standard of where we go now. We paused for 5 minutes to celebrate, but honestly, went right back to brainstorming what more we could do better. We still have a long way to go, so we can't stop now," Patty says.
She confirms that Clayton again is participating in the 2021 Green Cities program.
Highlighting the $300 million, 7-mile St. Louis Metropolitan Sewer District's new underground sanitary tunnel project underway in Anderson Park (previously Haddington Court) off Clayton Road, Patty is quick to remind that it's a wonderful way to use parkland to address stormwater management. "We can't wait to reopen it all next year."