Feature image: The LEED Platinum Billings Public Library. Image credit: City of Billings, Montana.

One of the most important challenges facing U.S. cities and counties involves determining how best to manage rising operational costs while also planning and implementing critical plans to deal with obsolete infrastructure and increasingly complex social and environmental issues. Enter LEED for Cities. This comprehensive, data-driven rating system offers an internationally recognized framework for not only developing or refining critical ESG plans, but also organizing, benchmarking and implementing those plans.

Billings, Montana, (population: 117,000) is one of those municipalities that has benefited from LEED for Cities. Glenn Foy, chair of the city’s Energy and Conservation Commission (ECC), helped lead an ongoing effort to conserve resources and save money. In this interview, Foy explains how the commission helped the city to earn Gold-level LEED for Cities certification and, in the process, realize milestones that will benefit the community for decades to come.

A man speaks at a podium at a city event, with a LEED Gold certificate display next to him.

Glenn Foy, chair of the city’s Energy and Conservation Commission. Image credit: City of Billings, Montana.

What is the Energy and Conservation Commission?

We’re a volunteer citizens’ advisory commission. Our mayor and City Council established it in 2019. As per the name, our core purpose is to advise the city with respect to energy and conservation. Those were our priorities.

Montana doesn’t have a sales tax, so we must be cost-conscious. We’ve been operating like that for a long time. In fact, part of what led to the creation of our commission was work done by an earlier group. A decade ago, that group made recommendations that allowed the city to lower its annual electricity use by $700,000. That was the jumping-off point for the creation of our group.

From there, where did you go?

We identified three priorities. The first was an updated energy inventory. The second was to provide a framework for city decision-making with a means of measuring and monitoring the implementation of future projects. The third was to advise the city on its energy and conservation strategy.

How was LEED for Cities introduced?

We were in a meeting and really struggling with an early recommendations list. It included lots of projects and ideas, but no cohesive or strategic vision. One of our commission members, who is an energy lawyer, suggested that we look at LEED for Cities. That turned out to be the "aha" moment. With LEED for Cities, we were ultimately able to organize that project list into a strategy and develop data-driven rationales for our recommendations.

Did you immediately begin pursuing certification?

No. We kicked the tires. How much time and effort would it take to get certified? How would we manage things? Did we have support from the City Council? Once we saw that we were in a good place, we decided to go for it.

How did you organize?

Around the rating system’s nine categories. Based on those, we formed seven teams. Each was led by a commission member with relevant expertise. An architect led our Integrated Process team. Natural Systems and Ecology’s lead was a landscape architect. Other teams included Transportation, Water Efficiency, Energy Efficiency and Material Resources.

After a commission member was elected to the City Council, I headed up the remaining three categories: Quality of Life, Innovation and Regional Priority. And because each team leader had category-related expertise, we knew who to contact to get things started and keep the project moving forward.

Everyone was a volunteer. Was that a problem?

You know, we originally planned to do this in a year. It took 15 months. That said, adding an extra three months to complete a project of this scale, at no extra cost to the city—that was a pretty good trade-off.

A transit center in the midst of a city view, with mountains in the background.

View of the LEED Platinum MET Transfer Center in downtown Billings. Image credit: City of Billings, Montana.

What were some of the rating system’s key benefits?

Because it’s so comprehensive, I’d say the main benefit was that it enabled us to connect our recommendations to a broad vision. The second thing is that it gave us the structure we needed to establish a whole range of benchmarks. We were then able to determine how best to optimize performance and savings—which was our mandate. Third, there are some things in LEED that we hadn’t even considered. That led to meaningful discussions: Maybe this isn’t something that we can address right now, but we can benchmark it and improve on it later.

Were there challenges?

The biggest issue was how people interpreted “sustainability.” Politically, across much of the U.S., the definition can be controversial. We were able to overcome those concerns by demonstrating that in cutting the city’s operating costs, we were also reducing its carbon footprint. We proved that Billings could drive sustainability while lowering costs. Everybody can get on board with that. It was critical to what the city has been able to accomplish.

Did the commission get solid support from the city?

Absolutely. Mayor Bill Cole and the City Council were all very supportive, and the city department heads all stepped up—as did our utilities. That’s where we got most of our performance data—and there was a lot of it. We never received a “no.” I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Louis Engels; he was the city’s liaison to the commission. He’s a leader who’s always looking to make things better. He was a tremendous help.

How about the folks at USGBC?

Very supportive. They helped us settle into the LEED for Cities cohort. Then, they reviewed a significant portion of our application before it was submitted. As I mentioned, we didn’t have funding for consultants, so we very much relied on their technical expertise.

Have things changed since Billings earned certification?

The certification really encouraged some of our community-based organizations to get involved. We recently had a large health care provider step forward. They were working on their own initiative that linked climate and health. So, yes, earning certification opened things up so more community and business leaders felt comfortable talking about things.

What happens next?

Step one is to help city leaders—government, business, community—understand how the rating system works and how it can be used as a decision-making tool to solve problems. Step two will advise the city on sustainability projects that utilize both economic and LEED for Cities benchmarks to measure effectiveness.

Lastly, and this is my opinion: We’ll be able to use our certification in support of city grant applications. What’s the one thing that funding sources hate? That their money will be wasted. The LEED for Cities certification recognizes the city’s success in implementing sustainability programs.

How about accomplishments?

Money aside, the biggest accomplishment was that, as a community, Billings now has a much more future-oriented identity and a greater ability to have very comprehensive and informed communitywide conversations.

Second, as a LEED-certified city, Billings is much better positioned to attract new business, since sustainability is becoming a strategic imperative for many companies today. It’s also great for our existing business community, which can now put a little green dot on its product packaging.

Any advice for other municipalities?

No advice, just one question: What’s going to enable you to drive this effort forward? In Billings, our initiative came about as a cost-cutting effort. That’s what propelled us. What’s going to drive this kind of initiative forward in your community? What makes sense for all your constituents? Find it, and then let it guide the process.

Learn about the next LEED for Cities cohort

How a volunteer commission led Billings, Montana, to LEED for Cities Gold