County unveils searchable Green Initiatives Repository to help municipalities share projects

Erica Pierce, chair of the Parks and Environment Committee, opened a briefing with Peter McCart, director of the Office of Energy Conservation & Sustainability, on the county's new Green Initiatives Repository website. McCart said the site organizes initiatives into 11 clickable categories and lists roughly 70 projects across Westchester so municipalities and volunteers can find examples and contact people who have implemented specific measures. "And there's 70 initiatives underneath all those, those clickable initiatives," McCart said during the demonstration.

Committee members asked for ways to make the repository more accessible to nontechnical users. Pierce suggested adding short case-study blurbs or videos that show how a single municipality implemented an initiative, and McCart proposed a GIS map layer and a prominent update button so communities can report changes. McCart said the county plans outreach tied to an existing press release and will use interns and municipal contacts to keep entries current.