Jolt
Enviro Advocate Lands Job with Former Legal Foe
Today's winner: The Puget Sound Regional Council.
Sara Nikolic, the longtime co-director for the environmental group Futurewise, is joining the Puget Sound Regional Council as its senior transit communities planner.
Nikolic's new job is significant not just because the PSRC is getting one of the region's premier environmentalist brainiacs, but also because Futurewise was one of several organizations that sued PSRC over its Transportation 2040 plan last year, arguing that the plan violated state environmental laws.
Transportation 2040 (T2040 for short) is the 30-year plan for the Puget Sound region’s highway, road, rail, bicycling, and walking infrastructure growth.
That lawsuit will have its next hearing in King County Superior Court on May 31.
Futurewise, along with the Sierra Club and the Cascade Bicycle Club, argue that the plan includes too many provisions for cars (including almost 1000 miles of expanded highways) and too few provisions for mass transit and alternative transportation like bikes and walking.
As such, the groups say, it will not meet Washington State greenhouse gas greenhouse gas reduction laws , which require a reduction of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, a 25 percent reduction of 1990 levels by 2035 and a 50 percent reduction of 1990 levels by 2050.
PSRC, in response, has argued that the measures the three groups support, including higher parking prices, increased gas taxes, and tolls, are "draconian and inequitable measures" that would be all but impossible to implement.
Nikolic says her new gig, which is also her first foray outside the nonprofit/advocacy world, is "completely in line with what my values are," and notes that she'll be working on a separate plan called Vision 2040, not T2040. Her green pals on Facebook—state Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon, Futurewise lobbyist April Putney, and Environmental Priorities Coalition spokesman Craig Benjamin, among others—are certainly interpreting her hiring as good news for the somewhat hidebound PSRC.
Sara Nikolic, the longtime co-director for the environmental group Futurewise, is joining the Puget Sound Regional Council as its senior transit communities planner.
Nikolic's new job is significant not just because the PSRC is getting one of the region's premier environmentalist brainiacs, but also because Futurewise was one of several organizations that sued PSRC over its Transportation 2040 plan last year, arguing that the plan violated state environmental laws.
Transportation 2040 (T2040 for short) is the 30-year plan for the Puget Sound region’s highway, road, rail, bicycling, and walking infrastructure growth.
That lawsuit will have its next hearing in King County Superior Court on May 31.
Futurewise, along with the Sierra Club and the Cascade Bicycle Club, argue that the plan includes too many provisions for cars (including almost 1000 miles of expanded highways) and too few provisions for mass transit and alternative transportation like bikes and walking.
As such, the groups say, it will not meet Washington State greenhouse gas greenhouse gas reduction laws , which require a reduction of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, a 25 percent reduction of 1990 levels by 2035 and a 50 percent reduction of 1990 levels by 2050.
PSRC, in response, has argued that the measures the three groups support, including higher parking prices, increased gas taxes, and tolls, are "draconian and inequitable measures" that would be all but impossible to implement.
Nikolic says her new gig, which is also her first foray outside the nonprofit/advocacy world, is "completely in line with what my values are," and notes that she'll be working on a separate plan called Vision 2040, not T2040. Her green pals on Facebook—state Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon, Futurewise lobbyist April Putney, and Environmental Priorities Coalition spokesman Craig Benjamin, among others—are certainly interpreting her hiring as good news for the somewhat hidebound PSRC.
