And the rest is history. From meeting and greeting such an amazing committed group of people, to running around tying to find the very late food on a red warning weather and football home game evening really did add to my adventure.
To add a few words wearing my Preston City Councillor hat - PCC did declare a climate change emergency back in 2019, but has been working for the last 10 years or so towards carbon neutrality - installing combined heat pumps, voltage optimisers, roof insulation’s, solar panels, double and triple glazing, LED lighting plus water saving measures, and also upgrading some of our smaller vehicles to electric ones. Unfortunately as the lower tier authority public transport and highways are not in our remit, but I am very proud that this summer we achieved the Carbon Neutral International Standard granted by One Carbon World for our work on measuring and reducing our carbon emissions. We also have a plastic free policy.
We are also exploring ideas with our University of Central Lancs for a citizen led co-produced approach to address the climate emergency and promote local economic and social benefits as i am particularly mindful that we bring our residents with us on this journey and aren’t simply local tax collectors.