Now, thanks to an April update to PlaNYC, Bragdon, who is in charge of implementing it, has more than 400 specific goals to meet by the end of Bloomberg’s term in 2013. He also has 132 new initiatives to get started on, including an effort to divert 75 percent of the city’s 14 million tons of annual solid waste from landfills.
A Harvard graduate and native New Yorker, Bragdon came to the job in 2010 well prepared. He was the longtime president of the regional Metro Council in Portland, Ore., where he was an influential decisionmaker in that region’s famously progressive planning. What separates the Big Apple’s plan from Portland’s notable sustainability efforts, Bragdon says, is that “it’s very specific about short-term milestones that are the pathway to long-term goals,” like combating climate change.
Bragdon also attributes the plan’s initial successes to the mayor, who uses cross-agency collaboration to cut through the bureaucratic red tape that typically slows sustainability projects. “It’s a group effort around here,” Bragdon says.