ANN ARBOR, MI – Mayor Christopher Taylor and other city officials want the entire community to be carbon-neutral by 2035.

That means shifting away from fossil fuels, embracing clean energy, and balancing remaining carbon emissions with offsetting efforts like planting trees to achieve a zero carbon footprint.

Taylor is hoping City Council will join him in setting that goal and declaring a climate emergency Monday night, Nov. 4. The council meets at 7 p.m. on the second floor of Larcom City Hall, 301 E. Huron St.

If the resolution sponsored by Taylor and two other council members — Anne Bannister and Chip Smith — is approved, City Administrator Howard Lazarus will be directed to draft a carbon-neutrality plan for the city before the 50th anniversary of Earth Day next April.

The city already is planning a carbon-neutrality summit from 5:30-7 p.m. Nov. 13 at Cobblestone Farm, 2781 Packard Road, to launch the planning process and engage the public.

The city previously set a goal of powering 100% of the city’s municipal operations with clean and renewable energy by 2035 and city officials want to see similar strides throughout the broader community, including many more buildings going solar.

“I believe people in Ann Arbor are committed to doing their part and that’s what this plan and goal would be all about,” Taylor said.

“It’ll require resources. It’ll require a change in how we do business. It’ll require a change throughout the community.”

At this point, there’s no estimate of what it might cost or how such a transformative change in the community might be funded.

The resolution awaiting council’s consideration Monday night would direct Lazarus to consider the likely outcomes of the carbon-neutrality plan as he develops the city’s next fiscal year budget, and to collaborate with the University of Michigan and UM President Mark Schlissel’s commission on carbon neutrality.

Missy Stults, the city’s sustainability manager, laid out the case for such a plan in a memo to council.

Despite notable commitments by the city and other governments, the amount of action to meaningfully reduce greenhouse gas emissions has not been commensurate with what science indicates is required to avoid significant climate-related impacts, Stults said.

“In Ann Arbor alone, over the last 30 years the city has experienced a nearly 1-degree Fahrenheit increase in annual temperature, an increase of over 44% in annual precipitation and a 37% increase in the total volume of precipitation falling during extreme events,” she wrote.

Forecasts show the city is likely to experience a 3- to 7-degree Fahrenheit increase in temperature, 12 to 36 more days per year over 90 degrees Fahrenheit and a continued trend of increased annual and extreme precipitation by the end of the century if significant actions aren’t taken immediately to reduce emissions, Stults said.

“Globally, the impacts are even more dire with projections showing significant rises in the world’s oceans, the melting of permafrost and ice caps, salt water intrusion into water supplies, life-threatening temperatures across much of the world, an increase in the extent and number of wildfires and other extreme weather events such as hurricanes, and significant increases in inland flooding followed by prolonged periods of drought,” she wrote.

Those changes are already disrupting economies, public safety and wellbeing, social systems and the overall quality of life for natural and human systems, Stults said.

There’s a growing movement of communities and institutions declaring climate emergencies and working to achieve carbon neutrality, she said, and groups in Ann Arbor have asked the city to do the same.

In 2012, the city adopted a Climate Action Plan that called for addressing climate change by reducing community greenhouse gas emissions by 25% by 2025 and by 90% by 2050.

The city has struggled to make progress on its goals in the last several years, but it’s now ramping up efforts.

The city’s new sustainability office led by Stults has created a five-year work plan and the city is taking steps toward launching new programs, like new policies to make rental housing and other buildings greener.

The city also recently spent $74,000 installing solar panels atop a city fire station and officials want to do more similar projects.

A carbon-neutrality plan needs to have actions that can be operationalized, clear metrics to track success and money for implementation, Stults told council, indicating it’s not all going to be easy and there will need to be complicated, challenging and longterm solutions to avoid the worst impacts of a climate-altered future.

“Moreover, any carbon-neutrality plan needs to be considered ‘living’ as technology, politics, economics and other external factors are dynamic and will continue to change the backdrop upon which carbon neutrality is being explored,” she wrote.

The city and nearly 40 partner organizations are inviting the public to the Nov. 13 summit to explore what it would take for the entire community to transition to a clean and carbon-neutral future in a just and equitable manner. Register to attend.

Refreshments and kids activities will be provided. Bus tokens also are available.

At the summit, the city will launch a technical advisory committee to help ensure the carbon-neutrality planning process is technically robust, Stults told council.

The summit will be followed by additional opportunities for community input on the plan.

Residents can stay updated by contacting Galen Hardy, sustainability and innovations engagement specialist, at ghardy@a2gov.org.