Sustainable Energy Panel Set For Saturday

Several Seminole Heights residents are taking part in a sustainable energy panel Saturday in Ybor City.

The free event starts at noon and is sponsored by The Bridge, a nonprofit focused on sustainable living in the Bay Area.

The panel portion includes two Seminole Heights residents who have long been a part of the local green movement. Tampa City Council candidate Kelly Benjamin will join fellow gardener Robin Milcowitz of the Seminole Heights Community Garden.

Both stress the importance of the local food movement, which was documented in the 2009 film “Fresh” and Barbara Kingsolver’s book “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life.”  Local food usually means fresh fare that’s grown within your own city or 400 miles of where you live and requires fewer chemicals and fossil fuels.

Community gardens can save energy in other ways, Milcowitz said. Seminole Heights’ garden, for example, uses no electricity. Water is collected and stored, and backup water can come from a neighbor’s well.

“Community gardens are just another leg of a sustainable community,” she said.

“Robin gets the whole green food movement and the push for food security,” Benjamin said. “As we move away from fossil fuels, we’ll see dramatic changes in our communities. Life will become more local as a necessity. Local food just makes sense, and community gardening is a huge part of that.”

Though Milcowitz certainly supports other types of sustainable living (like Central Tampa’s Green Artery), Benjamin lists global climate change and urban planning as his other interests.  As a journalist, he covered the last two U.N. Climate Change Summits, traveling to Copenhagen and Cancun, Mexico.

“Climate change is still considered an outsider topic in Tampa,” he said. “I’d like to bring a perspective that is a little more international. How are other cities in the world dealing with these issues?”

Benjamin, who grew up in Seminole Heights, is running to represent District 6 on Tampa’s City Council. Because the community was planned without automobiles in mind (unlike the suburbs), the area could become a model for sustainable urban planning, he said.

“Those short car trips and especially those trips that you can walk or bike are incredibly beneficial. They lead to better community and a much healthier lifestyle. There’s something wrong when you have to drive four or five miles to shop or eat.”

Community gardens and green food will only be a part of the Bridge event. Other panelists include Tampa Councilwoman Mary Mulhern, eco-friendly builders, the host of WMNF’s “Sustainable Living” show, and the director of USF’s Clean Energy Research Center and others.

“We need to begin a transition now,” Benjamin said, and I’m excited to be a part of that dialogue.”

If you go....

• Where: The Roosevelt, 1812 N. 15th Street, in Ybor City
• When: Saturday, Feb. 26, Noon.
• How much: Free, but reserve a spot.

If you can’t go...

Benjamin’s website offers a list of recommended readings on these topics.

• The Next American City americancity.org
• The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs
• Green Collar Economy by Van Jones
• Green Urbanism: Learning from European Cities by Timothy Beatley
• Post Carbon Cities
• Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream by Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk
• Superbia!: 31 Ways to Create Sustainable Neighborhoods by Dan Chiras and Dave Wann
• Congress for New Urbanism