The Administration, in partnership with leaders in all relevant sectors and the Smart Growth Network, should launch a public action campaign on smart growth. These partners should sponsor a five-year national campaign and dialogue addressing land use and growth issues through community and business action. The campaign should be launched at the National Town Meeting for a Sustainable America, which will take place May 2-5, 1999. The campaign should ask communities throughout America to identify natural assets and local and regional land use and growth issues; assess the impacts of sprawl-related problems; identify possible solutions and their benefits; identify ways to measure progress (i.e., establish indicators of progress); and make commitments to form or strengthen partnerships to implement solutions. The campaign would link to three other efforts: (1) National incentive programs for Smart Growth and Regional Cooperation; (2) Growing Smart, a five-year project funded by the federal government which provides a compendium of useful tools for states, regional entities, and local jurisdictions to consider, adopt, adapt, and use; and (3) Land-Based Classification Standards (LBCS), a project funded by several federal agencies and the American Planning Association. LBCS standardizes a broad variety of land use and development data collected and stored at the local, regional, state, and national levels, enabling jurisdictions, agencies, and institutions to share data more easily. Following the National Town Meeting for a Sustainable America, the Administration should work with leaders in all sectors and prominent civic journalists and media specialists to develop a communications strategy that can continue to promote, explain, and popularize sustainability and livability goals and concerns.

The Administration, in partnership with others, should reinvigorate the Education for Sustainability program. Federal agencies should increase their activities to promote lifelong learning about sustainable development, including the Sustainable Development Extension Network, as proposed in Sustainable America and Education for Sustainability.28 The federal government should also encourage partnerships among businesses, localities, and regional organizations to develop and implement educational programs and curricula on sustainability for children and young adults. For example, corporate leaders from forest-products company Louisiana-Pacific sponsor the Portland, Oregon, crew of the Salmon Corps, a program that engages young Native Americans and other at-risk youth in the restoration of salmon habitats in the Columbia River Basin.While educating young people about their heritage and traditions, the program provides useful skills and helps restore critical salmon and wildlife habitats throughout the region. In the South Bronx, the Phipps Community Development Corporation, based at an innovative, city-funded .Beacon School, which combines gang intervention and workforce programs with organizing around community environment and livability issues.