On October 25, we testified to the Prince George’s County Board of Education Operations, Budget, and Fiscal Affairs
(OBFA) Committee on the need to include important climate action items in the PGCPS FY25 operating budget. Those include:
- Continue to fund the new sustainability/resiliency officer position.
- Continue to fund the Student Environmental Alliance Summit.
- Perform a comprehensive energy audit of all existing buildings.
- Purchase solar energy through Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs).
- Begin purchasing Electric Vehicles (EVs) and electric grounds maintenance equipment.
- Fund a baseline assessment for food waste.
- Provide staff funding for expansion of composting pilot programs to more schools.
- Provide funding for maintaining natural turf fields.
- Ensure that purchases related to school food packaging lead to less packaging that is destined to
the landfill by switching to packaging that is compostable, recyclable, or just reduced in amount. - Invest in planting more native trees across the school system.
You can read the full comment letter here.