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Sustainability division adds CivicSpark fellow as staff capacity for 2026 work plan
Summary
Sustainability staff told the Tree Board the division will host an AmeriCorps CivicSpark fellow from January to September 2026 to help implement the city's sustainability and food-systems priorities; staff also outlined hours allocation, below-the-line projects, and a recent $3 million grant application for solar and battery storage.
At the Nov. 10 Tree Board meeting, sustainability staff presented the draft 2026 work plan and said the city will have a CivicSpark AmeriCorps fellow assigned to the division from January through September 2026 to help build capacity.
"We will have a CivicSpark Fellow in addition to us," the presenter said, explaining the fellow is an eight-month, full-time member of AmeriCorps who will assist with resilience, food-systems and other projects. Staff said the draft work plan allocates hours across tasks (1,800 hours per FTE), noted Brian and Alyssa are each roughly two-thirds of a full-time allocation to these tasks, and that some actions remain "below the line" because of resource limits.
Staff also told the board they recently submitted a grant proposal seeking about $3,000,000 for solar and battery storage for the main fire station and library, and they described the distribution of staff time across city departments that will collaborate on plan actions. The board discussed possible volunteer support, clerical help for inventories, and the use of interns to update GIS and species records; staff said DNR will provide intern training for inventory work.
The board scheduled a January 12 meeting to deep-dive the Tree Board webpage and to review website visitation data before spending time on redesign. Staff reminded members the city will only post links from vetted sources (.gov, .edu, .org) unless there is a contract with a private provider. No votes were taken on staffing; the board and staff identified volunteer and intern opportunities to accelerate implementation.
