Blog: City Blog

Mayor Rogero Signs Chicago Climate Charter

Mayor Madeline Rogero and Office of Sustainability project manager Brian Blackmon traveled to Chicago this week to represent Knoxville at the North American Climate Summit, sponsored by the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy and hosted by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Mayor Rogero was one of 51 mayors from cities across the United States, Canada, Mexico, France and other countries gathered to sign the Chicago Climate Charter, an agreement among municipalities to uphold the goals of the Paris Climate Accord to address climate change on a local and global level.

During the signing ceremony, Mayor Rogero joined Mexico City Mayor Miguel Ángel Mancera on stage to sign their respective pledges, and was greeted by Mayor Emanuel; Anne Hidalgo, Mayor of Paris; and Christiana Figueres, Vice Chair of the Global Covenant of Mayors.

Mayors Mancera and Rogero

At the C40 Cities Bloomberg Philanthropies Awards luncheon at the Summit, Knoxville was recognized as a finalist alongside Chicago and Austin in the Cities4Energy U.S. category for the Knoxville Extreme Energy Makeover (KEEM) project, a two-year effort between the Knoxville-Knox County Community Action Committee, Knoxville Utilities Board, Tennessee Valley Authority, and the Alliance to Save Energy to make nearly 1,300 homes of low-income families more energy efficient and affordable.

c40cities Knoxville banner

Congratulations to winner Retrofit Chicago! It was an honor to be nominated and acknowledged among the worldwide municipal efforts to make our cities more livable, affordable and energy efficient.

Climate Mayors panel discussion

At the Summit, Mayor Rogero participated in a plenary panel titled "How Cities, States and Businesses are Keeping the U.S. Climate Promise." She was joined by Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto and Alistair Child, Vice President of Global Sustainability for Mars Wrigley Confectionary. The panel was moderated by Antha Williams Cochran (far right) of Bloomberg Philanthropies.

The North American Climate Summit also featured a special guest -- President Barack Obama, who thanked the mayors for signing the Chicago Climate Charter and taking local action to address climate change.

Posted by ptravis On 11 December, 2017 at 2:00 PM