Lake Oswego Goes All in for 2016 EcoChallenge

LAKE OSWEGO, OR — The City of Lake Oswego has been going all in for this year's Northwest Earth Institute EcoChallenge and the effort has been paying off. The city is ranked currently ranked 32 out of 441 teams around the world. The EcoChallenge is a fun way to encourage people to select an action related to health, energy, waste, simplicity, nature, community, water, transportation and food.

“We have been involved in it for years," Jenny Slepian, sustainability and management fellow for the City of Lake Oswego, told Patch. "We’ve always been a team that was mostly just city employees. This year I decided to open it up to the community.”

The EcoChallenge runs from Oct. 14 - Oct. 28, and so far Lake Oswego residents have spent 952 minutes outdoors and saved 1,606 gallons of water, just to give a few examples of the strides residents are making.

"A lot of people on our team have chosen going for a daily walk or a reasonable action every day," Slepian said.

The Northwest Earth Institute, a nonprofit based in Portland, has a mission statement to "inspire people to take responsibility for earth." The Institute's EcoChallenge began as a fundraiser, but Northwest Earth Institute Executive Director David Macek explained to Patch that in the last four years, the focus has shifted to changing people's behavior.

"We’re trying to create that culture of inquiry," Macek told Patch. "Small steps add up a big difference over time."

Lake Oswego residents can still join in before Oct. 28 by visiting the EcoChallenge website. People have been participating in the EcoChallenge from all over the world, including 40 countries.

"They say it takes 3 weeks to start a new habit," Slepian told Patch. Lake Oswego participants are picking a couple of things that they’ve been meaning to do, doing that for two weeks, and working toward creating a habit.

"Right now we have 441 teams -- businesses, municipalities, community organizations," Macek said.

The Northwest Earth Institute has EcoChallenges throughout the year. You can visit EcoChallenge.org to get involved.

Photo courtesy of the Northwest Earth Institute