Community Profile

Pledge Status

Complete

Pledge Date

Friday, April 28, 2023

Program Year

2023

Achievement

Leadership Circle

2023

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Action Item Report

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Village of Oak Park

Oak Park, IL

Vicki Scaman

President

Pledge Summary

Oak Park is a thriving community of about 54,500 people located immediately west of the City of Chicago and known for its architectural heritage and diverse population. Within its 4.5 square miles live one of the region's most diverse mixes of cultures, races, ethnicities, professions, lifestyles, religions, ages and incomes. Our community climate action, resiliency, and sustainability plan, Climate Ready Oak Park, commits to enhancing or protecting thirty percent of our community land for biodiversity.

Community Spotlight

Action Items Committed for 2023

Communications and Convening

  • 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.)
  • 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.
  • 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.

Program and Demonstration Gardens

  • Plant or maintain a monarch and pollinator-friendly demonstration garden at City Hall or another prominent or culturally significant community location.
  • Display educational signage at monarch gardens and pollinator habitat.

Systems Change

  • Reduce or eliminate the use of herbicides, pesticides, or other chemicals that are harmful to monarchs and pollinators and urban wildlife.
  • Change weed or mowing ordinances to allow for native prairie and plant habitats.
  • Integrate monarch butterfly conservation into the city’s Park Master Plan, Sustainability Plan, Climate Resiliency Plan or other city plans.
  • Launch, expand, or continue one or more ordinances to reduce light pollution to benefit urban wildlife.