The Cost of Going to Green Vehicles: Questions for the City Council

There is a proposal coming to the city council to create a policy to purchase and lease fuel efficient vehicles for the foreseeable future. Does this mean the city has not been doing this already under the current entrenched leadership? Surely not!

I'm confident the city staff has been using rational anaylsis to ensure the most cost effective return on the investment and covering the criteria important for the vehicle needed. So why does this proposal need to be made? Is fuel efficiency to be the sole or predominant measure of vehicle purchasing from now on?

One can read between the lines of the overall staging of the proposal and surmise that the policy is meant to direct puchases to be of hybrid vehicles. Are we now to gauage the viability of vehicle puchases on catch phrases, a desire for civic awards, patting ourselves on the back for being greener than the next city?

How about we simply continue to use the tried and true total cost/benefit anaylsis so the citizens get the best bang for their buck?

And of course if this is such a good cost saving idea, how is it that our elected leaders, save one, in all the years of promoting green living have yet to spend their own money on such purchases?