FERRYSBURG, Mich. — In Ottawa County, three communities are working together to create an energy plan for the future — but they need the input of the people who live there.
They’ve created an online survey to get ideas on how to move forward with energy efficiency and adapt to electric vehicles.
“Part of the study or the outcome of the study is to have information we can share with our residents, things that they can do to retrofit their homes to for energy savings,” said Ferrysburg City Manager Craig Bessinger.
A plan to reduce the carbon footprint in Ferrysburg, Grand Haven and Grand Haven Township is what’s behind a survey funded by the Board of Light and Power.
The survey will help city leaders determine what the energy future will look like in the community.
John Kinch, the executive director of Michigan Energy Options, said community input is valuable.
“All of this stuff becomes pretty complex pretty quickly, and it really involves community input and participation,” Kinch said. "Thus, we're doing this energy plan, thus we're doing this community survey because we want to help people both understand things and also recognize that they are going to be part of the solution going forward.”
Bessinger said he hopes people in the area will benefit later from the planning that’s happening now, with a focus on things like wind and solar energy and the growing popularity of electric vehicles.
“Once we get all this information, we hope that some of these residents in the city can use this information to their benefit, to help reduce their energy costs at their homes and businesses,” Bessinger said. “There's already an ordinance to allow electric vehicle charging stations in the city, so those are all regulated now, so we're willing to work with people to put those in the city.”
People are urged to take part in an online survey because city leaders say without input, it will be difficult to help all three communities move forward.
“People are concerned about climate change and those impacts, so what's going on now is that we have to reach out to the community and find out what they know about these topics, what they're interested in what they're concerned about, where they see barriers, where they see opportunities, and then include them in this decision making and planning that we do for our cities,” Kinch said.
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