Cresting the Summit of the Mount for a Second Time – Still a Thrill

 

This afternoon I received news that literally got me leaping out of my chair in happiness; we did it again!  You ask, what did we do again?  Achieve Gold, LEED for Communities Gold for the New York Olympic region.  If you have not read it, you may want to go back and read the post I made on 15 September 2019:  https://backusec.blogspot.com/2019/09/going-for-gold-and-making-it-my-our-new.html.  Once you have, you will get a large part of the background on what this meant then, and even more so now as we accomplished a full recertification of the same community using the most up to date version of the LEED for Communities rating system, achieving the same certification level even as it required us to meet even higher standards and having an even more robust submission.  As I wrote in this email to many today, this is a significant and summit type moment:

 

“Mayor Devlin, Supervisor Preston, Former Supervisor Doty, LPCSD Superintendent Seymour, ORDA CEO Walden, & Clarkson President Larson,

 

I am proud to relay to you the news below regarding the New York Olympic Region being re-ecertified at the GOLD Level of the LEED for Communities rating system.  This is a significant accomplishment for your community and represents your leadership as a sustainable and resilient community among the top across the globe.  It also is an acknowledgement of much more than just a certification effort, but a journey that your community has been on for decades.

 

As you know many community members have been a part of this effort, inclusive of a steering committee representing the town, village, school district, and ORDA (esp. Dean Dietrich, Marc Galvin, Haley Breen, Jackie Kelly, & Tammy Morgan).  Supported by ORDA's funding, and relying on undergraduate students to do the heavy lifting, we embarked on the recertification journey as part of Clarkson's Adirondack Semester in the Fall of 2023.  While it has taken longer than we expected, we achieved the goals we started out with in this effort to "Go for Gold" again; following up on our initial Gold level certification in 2019.  What has been great is how this has paralleled the Town & Village comprehensive planning efforts, ORDA's program development, community sustainability efforts through the school and elsewhere, and so much more while we have pushed forward on this global third party validation of your efforts.

 

I wish to give a special thanks to Ms. Maria Suffredini (EnvS&S, '25) and Ms. Rochelle Daniels (EnvE '26) who were the primary members of the student certification team pulling together our final submission and staying through to the end of this process.  I believe this is the first ever recertification of a community to LEED recertification standards by undergraduate students anywhere in the world.  I also want to thank the multi-institutional Sustainable Holistic Planning Systems (SHPS) research team who have been under-girding these efforts since 2018 with scholarship and support of students at both Clarkson and Syracuse University as well as now at the Universidad de Granada in Spain.  Finally, I want to thank the team at USGBC, especially Dr. Vatsal Bhatt and Ms. Hilari Varnadore, for their support on these efforts throughout.

 

We will await more details from GBCI as to next steps.  That said, I am sure you will be beaming as much as I was in hearing this good news.  Congratulations to all!!

 

Yours,

 

Erik C. Backus, Ph.D., P.E., LEED AP BD+C, ENV SP, FMP

Professor of Practice & Howard E. Lechler ’48, MS ’53, HD ’78 Endowed Director

Construction Engineering Management Program

Clarkson University”

 

As I indicated in 2019, and now say here, boy does it look great from the summit of the Olympic mountain.  I often have wondered what it is like to be a multiple gold medal winner, and now I can honestly say, the rush is almost identically the same.  And much of this has to do less with me, and much more, just like then, with the accomplishments of the students, the community, and all the other people that made this possible.  Like Herb Brooks might say, “now is our time”!  And Al Michales, to answer your question from 1980, yes, I do believe in miracles, especially those that strike more than once.

 

Akin to the original certification, this represents several firsts, namely this is the first recertification of a LEED Community that is:

1.      multi-jurisdictional, representing 4 different and collaborating municipalities and authorities

2.      an Olympic host site community

3.      a community with a tourist centric economy community

4.      entirely within a world renowned State Park, including parts of the Adirondack reserve

5.      executed by collegiate level students guided by faculty immersed in a non-urban community

 

I don’t know yet when the formal presentation will be, but you can be assured it will be all smiles.  And I very much look forward to being able to share this story for many years to come.  Not only did we help this amazing magical place achieve initial certification, we proved that because of those efforts and all they have and continue to do to make their community the best that it can be, they were recertified as a demonstration of all they have and will accomplish, together for the betterment of all.  I couldn’t be prouder of all involved and thankful for the partnership that has allowed it to happen.  This Gold has a very powerful glow to it, and I am so glad to have been in service to something much bigger than all of us could have imagined.  We did it, again!  So cool.  And as I ended the last post, now we are upward and onward to the next, amazing and sustainable goal.