Pledge Status
Did Not Report
Pledge Date
Friday, February 17, 2023
Program Year
2023
Links and Uploads
View Links and UploadsAction Item Report
Community Spotlight
Member of the Southland Green Committee explains t
Students from the Friends of Rachel Club at Homewood-Flossmoor High School partnered with the Green Commission and the Southland Green Committee for an impactful day of environmental stewardship. They worked together to harvest seeds.
Green Commission gives away pollinators.
The Green commission gave away native trees and pollinators at all of our events this year.
Milkweed Giveaway at Chamber Night
The Green Commission gave away milkweed plants at the annual Chamber Night Event.
Action Items Committed for 2023
- Issue a proclamation to raise awareness about the decline of the monarch butterfly and the species’ need for habitat. This proclamation must incorporate a focus on monarch conservation.
- Create a community art project to enhance and promote monarch and pollinator conservation as well as cultural awareness and recognition.
- Create a community-driven educational conservation strategy, initiative, or practice that focuses on and benefits local, underserved residents.
- Engage with developers, planners, landscape architects, and other community leaders and organizers engaged in planning processes to identify opportunities to create monarch habitat.
- Engage with Homeowners Associations (HOAs), Community Associations or neighborhood organizations to identify opportunities to plant monarch gardens and revise maintenance and mowing programs.
- Engage with city parks and recreation, public works, sustainability, and other relevant staff to identify opportunities to revise and maintain mowing programs and milkweed / native nectar plant planting programs.
- Engage with community garden groups and urge them to plant native milkweeds and nectar-producing plants.
- Launch or maintain a public communication effort to encourage residents to plant monarch gardens at their homes or in their neighborhoods. (If you have community members who speak a language other than English, we encourage you to also communicate in that language; Champion Pledges must communicate in that language.)
- Display educational signage at monarch gardens and pollinator habitat.
- Launch, expand, or continue an invasive species removal program that will support the re-establishment of native habitat for monarch butterflies and other pollinators.
- Add or maintain native milkweed and nectar-producing plants in gardens in the community.
- Earn or maintain recognition for being a wildlife-friendly city by participating in other wildlife and habitat conservation efforts (i.e., National Wildlife Federation’s Community Wildlife Habitat program).
- Launch or maintain an outdoor education program(s) (e.g., at schools, after-school programs, community centers and groups) that builds awareness and creates habitat by engaging students, educators, and the community in planting native milkweed and pollinator-friendly native nectar plants (i.e., National Wildlife Federation’s Schoolyard Habitats program and Monarch Mission curriculum).
- Plant milkweed and pollinator-friendly native nectar plants along roadsides, medians, or public rights-of-way.
- Plant or maintain a monarch and pollinator-friendly demonstration garden at City Hall or another prominent or culturally significant community location.
- Facilitate or support a milkweed seed collection and propagation effort.
- Host or support a native seed or plant sale, giveaway or swap.
- Launch, expand, or continue an effort to change municipal planting ordinances and practices to include more native milkweed and native nectar producing plants at city properties.
- Increase the percentage of native plants, shrubs and trees that must be used in city landscaping ordinances and encourage use of milkweed, where appropriate.
- Change weed or mowing ordinances to allow for native prairie and plant habitats.
- Remove milkweed from the list of noxious plants in city weed / landscaping ordinances (if applicable).
Past Pledge Archive
| Mayor Name | Program Year | Pledge Date | Achievement | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mayor Michelle Nelson | 2024 | 4/10/2024 | Leadership Circle | View Pledge |
| Mayor Michelle Nelson | 2023 | 2/17/2023 | View Pledge | |
| Mayor Michelle Nelson | 2022 | 3/28/2022 | Signatories | View Pledge |
| Mayor Paul Braun | 2021 | 2/1/2021 | View Pledge |
