Sustainable Warwick forms 'Green Screen' Committee to interview candidates for public office
Warwick /
| 26 Jan 2020 | 08:33
There is an exciting new direction that Sustainable Warwick is taking that you should know about.
We have formed a new "Green Screen” Committee to interview all candidates for local elections — Town Council, Village Board and School Board — before the elections and disseminate their thoughts on issues of sustainability to both our membership (via email and our website) and the general public (via press release).
We did this once before a few years ago with the Warwick School Board election and it worked extremely well. Not only did strong, sustainability aware candidates get elected, but once on the board, they helped pass a series of very positive, sustainability focused initiatives.
So we are bringing this process back, but broader and better this time.
Broader because we will go beyond the School Board to reach Town and Village elections — and we plan to expand to include Greenwood Lake and Florida in the near future. And possibly even to our State Legislator and Senator elections.
Better because there will be a committee and much stronger dissemination of the results.
The first election to be coming up is for the Warwick Village Board on March 18th — very near. So far, there are three announced candidates — incumbent Barry Cheney and newcomers Corey Bachman and Mary Collura. The interviews will be scheduled for early February so that we’ll have time to write up their answers to the questions below and get them out.
It is our hope that the Green Screen process will result in stronger candidates getting elected and stronger, “greener” policies being enacted, and we will accomplish these objectives without endorsing specific candidates, which our 501(c)3 status forbids us to do.
We will simply accurately relay the candidates thoughts on issues of sustainability.
Finally, to give you the flavor of the process, the questions we plan to pose to the Warwick Village Board candidates are included below.
Bill Greene and Geoff Howard
Co-Chairs, Green Screen Committee
Questions about Sustainability for Village Board Candidates
1. Considering the threat of climate change, what are your views about managing the village’s carbon footprint? Do you have any specific areas you would wish to work on to make the Village “greener?"
2. What are your views on development in the Village? Please include your views on Pulpit Rock and Yesterday’s in your answer. How do you see the village growing in the next 10 years. Do you think we have to revisit zoning?
3. Would you support the establishment of a “Green Committee” on the Village Board?
4. Do you have any other thoughts about village sustainability that have not been covered in your previous answers?