Baner Balewadi Development Plan

The Development Plan for the 23 villages merged into the PMC limits was submitted to the State Government for approval. The State Government has deleted all reservations for public amenities, without giving reasons. This is likely to have serious implications for the nature of development and resulting quality of life for people in this area / connected to this area.

Citizens have 60 days to provide their views on the modifications - the deadline is 2 December 2008. Read about the Baner Balewadi DP and the Call to Action for citizens at http://government.wikia.com/wiki/Baner_Balewadi_DP

DC Rules Minutes of Meeting 20 Sep 2008

Revision of Development Plan (1987) of Pune City
Minutes of the Meeting on DC Rules Sub-Group
Date & Time: - 20th Sept, 2008 at 3.30 pm

Meeting of the sub-group on Development Control Rules of Revision of Development Plan (1987) was held in the conference hall of PMC

Mr. R.N. Gohad welcomed the members & stated that as per decided in the 6th Steering committee meeting, the various D.C. Rule subgroups are reformed into one group under the chairmanship of Shri V.W. Deshpande. The important discussions held in the meeting hall are as follows.

Shri Gohad presented the copy of comparison table on Banglore DCR’s as decided in last meeting.

Shri Vikas Bhandari stated that along with Shri Kembhavi & Shri Raje, they have prepared a draft guideline for the DCR’s to be prepared. In that they incorporated various aspect to make the DCR’s transparent & user friendly. He gives briefs of the DCR guideline, explained the objectives, methodology, & strategies to be formed to prepare DCR’s. He has circulated copies of work done by their group.

Mr. V.W. Deshpande stated that before formulating DCR’s we have to make policies & strategies considering growth trend of the city. For that various survey data & its analysis is required. With the help of this data we can predict growth trend of the city & then we can formulate the idealistic DCR’s.

Mr. Raje suggested that they are working on three important categories of Rules as Mandatory, Optional & Incentive type of Rules & they suggested different color coding for each type of Rules.

There a discussion was made on various important issues like further DCR’s- is a tool for achieving goals?, sustainability norms, implacability of DCR, densification & infrastructure, incentivisation of areas which are not developing, objectives of FSI, etc.

It was decided that the draft of the D. C. rules in preparation by Shri. Vikas Bhondari, Shri. Kembhavi, Shri. Raje may be complete shortly & will make available to the group for discussion and finalization.

Shri. Phatak Ex. Chief Planner, MMRDA is called for association of this group. He emailed certain points which are mentioned below:-

I. The technical aspects of DCR’s related to structural public health and other engineering aspects can be decided with reference to NBC

II. Similarly the procedural aspects including use of IT and e-governance in the process of development control could also be independently pursued

III. However other aspects can not be decided independently the objectives. For example if the objective is to support & promote car based travel, the parking regulations will be different from those that serve the strategy of promoting public transport and restraining use of private vehicles

IV. Planning objectives and strategies therefore need to be decided first before launching the DCR exercise. Please do not follow the example of Mumbai by concentrating on DCR’s alone without having a bigger picture in mind

V. I do not know whether any terms of reference have been formulated for the group. If not it would be a good staring point.

VI. I would be able to meaningfully participate only when these issues are clarified.

Certain plans are there for discussion which will be necessary for formulation & proposed changes in the Development Regulations.

Shri. Shirish Patel one of the leading architect in Mumbai has also associated with this group. However he can not attend the meeting which scheduled on 20.09.2008.

Mr. Ranjit Gadgil highlighted some important points on the discussions held in the meeting are as follows:

1. It is important that the basic purpose of FSI should be made clear. This has an important policy decision implication. If FSI is a tool that is used to control the density of persons so as to ensure that there is proper provision of basic amenities, then the policy of greater FSI for low income housing is contary to this principle. This is a double impact since low income houses are smaller, hence more tenements are accommodated in the same FSI and low income family sizes also tend to be bigger. This point has been explained by Mr. Shirish Patel and should be discussed at the next meeting.

2. The FSI restriction also is linked ultimately to the provision of basic services. Basic services are made possible either by the private sector or the Municipality. It was stated at the meeting that development funds collected by the PMC are used specifically for improvement of infrastructure in that "zone". It is important that we collect information about how much money has been raised in these zones and how much infrastructure has actually been provided. It was also pointed out that this scheme has the disadvantage of skewed development since better developed areas tend to get more funds which in turn allows for greater development.

3. It was also decided to create norms for eco-housing that are in-line with incentives/dis-incentives framework being adopted. Essentially depeding on the usage, energy consumption per sq m should be decided. Buildings that exceed this consumption would be charged higher taxes/fees. This should force builders to seek more eco-friendly friendly designs, which is currently not being done. Special reference was made to the statement of Hon'ble Energy Minister, Shri Dilip Walse-Patil at a meeting at MCCIA in this regard.

4. It was also decided that upon distribution of draft DC Rules by Mr. Bhandari, Ranjit Gadgil and Sujit Patwardhan will provide the appropriate measures keeping in mind the sustainable transport policies adopted by the PMC.

5. The issue of TP Schemes was also raised since it has been generally agreed upon that it is the preferred method of planning whether for re-development or green field development. This matter must be raised in the larger group, since it will have a bearing on the DC Rules.

It is proposed to arrange further meeting after 15 days when the draft of the proposed changes in DCR completed by Shri. Vikas Bhandari, Shri. Kembhavi and Shri. Raje will be circulated to the members. The Schedule of the next meeting will be informed a week before to all the members. The meeting concluded at 5.45 p.m. with the vote of thanks of the PMC.

Present

Mr. Vidyadhar Deshpande

Mr. R. N. Gohad

Mr. Vikas Bhandari

Mr. Shirish Kembhavi

Mr. Rajiv Raje

Mrs. Anagha Paranjpe

Mr. Ranjit Gadgil

Mr. Sujit Patwardhan

Mr. Vinay Zagade

Mr. Mahendra Pardeshi

Mr. Shivprasad Murari

Ms. Nital Kapse

Connect Pune meeting on 20 Aug 2008

The Pune wiki is at http://government.wikia.com/wiki/Pune

Actionable Items
1. Wiki training sessions are to be arranged by
- BIVEER (Katraj) Thanks to Dr Erach Bharucha and his team

- Seed Infotech (Erandwane) Thanks to Ajay Phatak, Narendra Barhate and his team and

- Zensar (Kharadi) Thanks to Lavanya Jayaram and her team
on Sundays.

Those interested in a training session on 31st Aug from 10 am to 1 pm are requested to send in their registrations in the following format to sanskriti.menon@gmail.com

Preferred location:

Name,Email, Phone number:

The wiki training is expected to train participants as trainers and provide the basics of:

- adding/ editing content - Devnagari content; images, video, audio, tables, etc;

- wiki etiquette;

- inappropriate content;

- categories etc.

The training will involve each person creating/editing a page of a vision for Pune Wiki

- What should Pune wiki accomplish? The training should also include a page seeding what you would like to accomplish.

2 If possible, volunteer to be wiki trainers, provide wiki training space etc - the Pune wiki will be as good as we can make it

3. All who attended - to spread the word amongst your friends and colleagues to contribute content to the wiki,

4. Puzzle and hypothesis on the Pune Wiki: Dr Madhav Gadgil will lead an effort to compile, collect and seed questions and hypothesis that could lead to general interest, involvement and even student projects on the wiki.

5. Vision dialogue on the Pune wiki to be furthered by Dr. Erach Bharucha and his team, particularly encouraging student visions. They will also help reach out and connect to other educational institutions.

Minutes
1. Presentations were made on possible projects (and some experiences) in waste, mobility, energy, biodiversity and how students might take these up (existing spaces in school and college curricula). These are being uploaded in pdf form on the Talk page of the Pune ENVIS wiki page. http://government.wikia.com/wiki/Talk:Pune_Environment_Information_System

2. There was discussion on the nature of educational projects and creating involvement, not compliance from students. This is an area for continued thinking. Some students may be more attracted to projects where they can see they are contributing to change or bringing about change; others may like to posit hypothesis and work in a 'research' mode. Thus, projects may be related to data collection feeding into a larger information system, hypothesis based leading to knowledge generation, action projects etc. Students should also be encouraged to do projects relating to visioning rather than only problem solving.

3. Will data lead to action or change? - data and information alone may not produce action or change but they are key ingredients, and data converted into useful information can spur action. The wiki will serve to connect people around key initiatives. It will enable share initiatives with others. This can lead to exciting ways to use the Pune wiki platform to connect and transform Pune.

4. Localized information models/ frameworks need to be developed - waste (KKPKP), transportation (Ashok), energy (Prayas), ecosystems (Dr Madhav Gadgil) are some that will be developed in the near future through a combination of physical meeting and then in a wiki mode.

5. Uploading existing information from student projects could also be undertaken- BIVEER and others to explore the possibility.

Dr. Anupam Saraph, Ph.D., Chief Information Officer, Pune City
url: http://www.linkedin.com/in/AnupamSaraphcell: 99237 56977

DC Rules Meeting 26 July, 2008

DC Rules Group Meeting held on Saturday July 26, 2008 at BNCA

The following attended the meeting:

1. Ar Rajiv Raje

2. Ar Shirish Kembhavi

3. Ar Poorva Keskar

4. Mr R N Gohad, with the members of the ELU team

5. Mr Dinesh Girolla

6. Ar Anagha Paranjape

The meeting discussed the following:

1. The points discussed in the July 12 Meeting on Urban Renewal and incentives (via FSI) for plot agglomeration in the congested areas was discussed further. It has been decided that case studies will be done in each category of plot size to check for feasibility issues etc.

2. Discussion also happened on the point of progressively Incentivising TDR use in the outer zone, thereby further ensuring euitable TDR loading in the outer zones of B, C and D, prioritizing zones that face lesser development pressures today.

3. It was discussed that while TDR is being loaded in the outer zones, it will be necessary to look at each zones 'carrying capacity' in terms of various parameters including water availability, road and transport infrasrructure, sanitation infrasstructure etc.

4. The possibility of introducing marginal variations in the DC Rules for various PLANNING SECTORS in the city to promote and enhance the individual character of each sector. These Planning Sectors shall be formed based on various criteria such as landuse character, population dynamics, type of existing building development, environmentally sensitive properties etc. These criteria are to be dicussed in details in further meetings.

5. Marginal variations in the DC Rules in the various sectors will then take into consideration the individual character of each sector to address variations in urban design, special cases, curltural adn heritage significant structures, environmental considerations such as riverfront, lake front, forestland, BDP frontage etc.

6. The following preparation is to be done before the next meeting which is planned on Thursday August 14 , 2008 at BNCA. 2 pm to 4 pm.

a) The DC Rules for fives cities are to be read and analysed based on specific points (to be circulated by Ar Shirish Kembhavi). The five cities and the respective readers are as follows: Mr Gohad - Bangalore; Dinesh - London; Ar Raje - Singapore; Poorva - DDA; Anagha - Hyderabad.

b) Ar Rajiv Raje to circulate the synposis of the DC Rules for Pune that he has compiled. Additionally, he has to circulate the Hyderabad DC Rules in soft form.

Reminder to Mr Pawaskar: Please issue to us the letters that 'appoint' us to work with the DP Steering Committee at the earliest.

Input from Ar Shirish Kembhavi

A format for making a comparison of Key DC rules prevalent in other cities as decided has been prepared and is available at http://government.wikia.com/wiki/Development_Control

The last meeting was to determine the threshold of growth of the City with Water supply as the criteria. It was discussed that we need to find out what is the total water supply to the City including ground water and thereby determine the population that could be sustained.

Mr.Girolla suggested that the sewage received at the treatment plats can be an indicator of the consumption and thereby the information could be interpolated. This being an important aspect, We need to find this out.

ESR Framework

Pune produces an Environmental Status Report (ESR) every year, and it has done so since 1997. This is mandated in the state-level legislation (the BPMC Act) following the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act and the Twelfth Schedule.

The development, writing and production of the ESR is usually tendered out. The Pune ESR has been prepared over various years by Mashal, Change Re-engineering, PATPL, and in recent years by the PMC Air Quality Cell. Since the approach and detail in the different chapters is quite varied, it appears that there is no continuing information framework for the ESR as a whole or for the individual sections.

In order to make the ESR a more useful / usable document, some reorganization of the ESR has been suggested by the Pune Citizens Environment Forum (various meetings):

1. The purpose of the ESR has to be clear
1. It should reveal the health status of the population linked to the state
   of services and the environment
2. It should provide information support for investment and management
   decisions for the PMC
3. It should serve as an important input into the annual budgeting and
   planning exercises of the PMC
4. It should be a tool for citizens' use as well, serving both as an
   information/ education resources, as well as a way for tracking improvements
2. It should have some overview chapters for a comprehensive picture of the city, including key sectors
3. Certain data sets have to be presented disaggregated at ward-level so that actions needed to be taken by corporators are clear, and these can in turn be linked to ward level municipal budgets and plans
4. It is important to create the framework, even if data is not there. The purpose of this is to identify data gaps and put in place appropriate data collection systems
5. Descriptive material, detailed data tables, references etc are valuable information and the ESR is a good way of making such information publicly available and these may be included. However, the key actionable aspects may be presented as a separate section for facilitating monitoring and follow-up
6. Information, such as flights operating out of Pune and list of Malls, which has appeared in the ESR of some years may be removed from the report as it is not directly relevant. However, a lot of the development-related data could still be included, albeit in the form of appendices.
7. The ESR will need to draw upon data apart from the official data gathered and provided by PMC departments on municipal services and functions
8. Which data is gathered and reported by the PMC depts. needs to be looked into, as they may not necessarily be collecting some critical information – this depends on what goals (short and long term) are being set for improvements – for instance if reducing energy use is a goal, then data related to energy use in specific service provision will have to be tracked
9. In any case the Key Performance Indicators for PMC depts exercise initiated by Janwani should link with the ESR preparation work; the KPI work in Pune is also linked to the Benchmarking of Municipal Services initiated by JNNURM
10. This means that citizens, academic institutions, independent organizations, NGOs etc can also and should contribute information
11. A system to receive and categorize information needs to be created for this
12. Information collection/ compilation/ review etc can happen year round
13. The ESR should be available on the internet – creating wikis may be a useful way to do this

'''Which indicators?'''
Draft frameworks have been developed for biodiversity and water. These are available under the respective Work Themes in this blog

The CEROI set prepared by UNEP GRID Arendal may also give useful insights [http://www.ceroi.net/ City Environment Reports on the Internet]

DC Rules Meeting 12 July 2008

MINUTES OF THE MEETING OF THE D.C.RULES STUDY GROUP MEETING
HELD IN THE OFFICE OF AR. RAJIV RAJE ON SATURDAY 12TH JULY, 2008.

A] The following were present :
Mr. Dinesh Girolla – Representative of the PMC DC Rules Committee
Ar. Vikas Bhandari – Member of the PMC DC Rules Steering Committee
Ar. Pushkar Kanvinde – Director, NIASA, and PCEF Member
Ar. Rajiv Raje – IIA Pune Representative and PCEF Member
Ar. Shirish Kembhavi – AESA Pune Representative
Ar. Anagha Paranjpe – PCEF Co-ordinator for DC Rules Committee.
Mr. Ranjit Gadgil – Director, Janawani, and Member PCEF & PTTF

B] The following points were discussed in the meeting:

1. The general structure of DC Rules in Pune City and the constraints in application were discussed in general. It was pointed out by Ar.Vikas Bhandari, that there was a need to remove the “extra flab” in the DC rule book – to remove the unnecessary, irrelevant and inoperable regulations. He highlighted several such Rules in the current Rule book which were redundant and required to be deleted.

2. Ar. Vikas Bhandari also emphasised on the need to make the TONE of the rules
“ POSITIVE ”. For instance, instead of a rule saying “ aaa should not be LESS than bbb…”, the phrasing should always be that “ aaa should be MORE than bbb …” .This will induce a
more POSITIVE response in the adoption and application of Rules.

3. Shri.Dinesh Girolla suggested making a comparison of key development rules as are prevalent in major indian cities along with a few overseas examples of model cities, only to get an overview of the way in which issues have been handled elsewhere. Rules of Delhi Municipal Corporation were already circulated for this purpose and the Rules of Bhopal City were handed over to Shri.Girolla for study. It was suggested by Mr. Girolla that comparison of Development Control rules and its impact on the development of those cities for various cities such as Delhi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Singapore and Tokyo to be done. Also, the similarities and future trend of growth between Pune and these cities to be studied.

4. Ar.Vikas Bhandari presented a workable scheme for revitalisation of the Core City by providing an incentive based system which encourages land pooling. It was agreed that this would help in a much better urban fabric in the core city, with more civic amenities, and create Open Spaces in areas which needed them most. A tabular format of the consolidated rules suggested by Ar. Vikas Bhandari in this unique scheme is enclosed herewith in attachment.

5. Shri.Dinesh Girolla suggested that a threshold of ONE ACRE ( approx 4000 Sq.M ) be set in the core city for application of this concept, and rules of non congested area be applied
for such plot with increased FSI being the incentive. There was a counter-suggestion, however, that if an upward sliding scale be adopted as suggested by Ar. Vikas Bhandari, more properties would opt for amalgamation to avail of the incentives – which would be beneficial for the city.

6. Ar. Kembhavi has undertaken the task of splitting the current DC rule book into THREE segments viz. Administrative Rules, Layout & Building Rules and Rules for Services – as a primary exercise for the new structure.

7. There was a discussion on merging all premium paid built-up areas into the basic permissible FSI - as has been done at Bangalore - in order to simplify the process. The pros and cons of the system were discussed and generally found to be promising. This concept would be explored further in detail. It was also pointed out that this idea should not again bring restriction on the open areas within a building.

8. Ar.Rajiv Raje suggested that the new rules should also be categorized into THREE categories or Classes viz. A, B, and C, wherein, Category-A rules would be mandatory to all and sacrosanct - not to be touched or modified, except with a statutory Sect.37 Modification by
the Government. Category-B Rules would be flexible within a RANGE – with options available against payment of premiums to PMC. Such premiums would be treated as payment of compensation paid to the city for availing of some flexible non-detrimental relaxations in rules. Category-C category rules would be completely optional, but highly incentive based. These would allow further non-detrimental concessions in construction, in lieu of proportionate benefits offered for the city without any price tags. This concept would be examined in more detail later.

9. There was an overall concern expressed by all on the issue of parking and various ways to mitigate the problem. Ranjit Gadgil highlighted the issues involved and several options were discussed without any conclusive course of action. The issue is flagged for more discussions.

10. Ar.Bhandari discussed the mobilisation plan for the city and his views on the same. Shri. Girolla was requested to provide an integrated map of old PMC limits and the extended areas to facilitate a more detailed explanation of the concepts and subsequent further discussion.

11. It was agreed unanimously that the DC rules are not an exercise in isolation, but needs to be closely integrated with the physical planning exercise The framework of Rules should be directed to achieve the VISION of the development plan. Ar. Raje cited the lesson given by City Planner Shirish Patel of Ahmedabad where a concept of Density Zoning and its control through DC Rules is in practice. Similar use of DC Rules could be made in Pune to provide a suitable DIRECTION to the inevitable growth in the next 20 years, instead of being just a regulatory tool.

12. It was felt that while the exercise of the ELU is on, an exercise of assessing and recording the infrastructure available in all areas, and future plans if any for the same, also be recorded to facilitate future planning.

The meeting concluded with a decision to meet every week for further discussions. The date, time and venue of weekly meetings will be co-ordinated and communicated by Anagha.

Mobility in the City

Do you have an idea or experience to share on how your work place or neighbourhood has addressed or could contribute to improving mobility in Pune? Do write in ...

Here is an article from the July 26 08 issue of Outlook Business on mobility in our cities
http://www.outlookbusiness.com/outlook/26072008/home.aspx (see page 51)

with a special mention of the Pune Traffic and Transportation Forum at

http://www.outlookbusiness.com/inner.aspx?editionid=49&articleid=1874&catgid=3&subcatgid=894

Meeting Notes 13 June 2008 at Air Quality Cell

Environment Status Report

Ajay presented the work done thus far for the ESR 2008. The discussions at the Jan 10 meeting were revisited, where it had been stated that the ESR framework would be reorganized. The main points of reorganization are:

1. The purpose of the ESR has to be clear – it should reveal the health status of the population linked to the state of services and the environment
2. Overview chapters for a comprehensive picture of the city, including key sectors
3. Certain data sets have to be presented disaggregated at ward-level so that actions needed to be taken by corporators are clear, and these can in turn be linked to ward level municipal budgets and plans
4. It is important to create the framework in the next few weeks, even if data is not there. The purpose of this is to identify data gaps and put in place appropriate data collection systems
5. Descriptive material, detailed data tables, references etc are valuable information and the ESR is a good way of making such information publicly available and these may be included. However, the key actionable aspects may be presented as a separate section for facilitating monitoring and follow-up
6. A point was raised about lot of the information in the ESR being irrelevant, such as tourist sites, flights operating out of Pune and list of Malls - Commissioner agreed that all such material can be removed from the report. However, a lot of the development related data could still be included, albeit in the form of appendices.

Sharad Mahajan raised issue of printing the ESR on recycled paper and this was accepted

Aneeta, Ranjit and Himanshu would help Ajay evolve the ESR framework.

Update: This group has met and a new framework is to be made available by Ajay shortly.

Biodiversity
The following aspects were suggested for inclusion in the ESR:
1. Aggregate and per capita green zones and reservations
2. Status of aquatic ecosystems
3. Number of municipal gardens and per capita garden area, and change over the last few decades
4. Naturalness of municipal gardens
5. Tree plantation and tree cutting
6. Status of selected rare species
7. Status (incl mapping) of biodiversity hot specks

Anchal and Sanskriti are to help develop a section on Biodiversity

Update: The above have been incorporated in the Biodiversity framework draft, which is posted on http://pcef.blogspot.com

Non-motorized Transport
Dinesh reported that an NMT cell has been created at PMC. This group has been meeting regularly. Several implementation tasks have been identified which PMC is to take up.

Schools
Ranjit reported that three areas have been identified by the School Group for focusing effort:

1. Testing of learning attainment – a set of tests is being developed to be discussed with the school dept and administered in July; while testing is done by PMC, the effort from the School Group would be to improve testing systems and to monitor efforts to improve quality
2. Infrastructure status – the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and PMC have been gathering this information, and the School Group would like to monitor whether improvements are being made based on this data – are schools moving up from being ‘C’ to ‘B’ and ‘A’, as well as by examining and improving the level of data gathered
3. Out of school children – again, this data is gathered by SSA and PMC, but there may be constraints in the data gathering methods as certain sections of the children population may not be getting counted (such as children of construction labour families, children employed as resident domestic help). The School Group would like to help improve systems reaching out of school children including the alternative education schemes, funding, the capacities of NGOs providing non-formal education etc

The School Group has had a number of meetings to clarify its role. It has revamped the format of the Annual Report of the School Board, so that it now focuses more on outcomes and not just on activities, as it did before. Besides the new format seeks to emphasize the important aspects & indicators wrt Schools, and to drop or dilute the less important ones. The School Group will now encourage the School Board to adopt this format to prepare its next Annual Report.

MC suggested that Schools be taken out of the purview of the PCEF and the individuals/ organizations interested in contributing to school improvement should join the monthly meeting forum already initiated by PMC.

Update: The School Group is requesting an appointment for next week with the Education Officer, Chair of School Board and MC to discuss the above and to request inclusion in the monthly meetings

DC Rules
MC suggested that the DC Rules group work in coordination with the Planning Cell and especially Mr Gohad and Mr Vikas Bhandari.

Update: The DC Rules group is discussing whether the earlier task they had taken up – of simplifying existing DC Rules – should be done or not, as in any case, the new DP will have a new set of rules. It may be better to focus the discussion on what the new DC Rules should be. A meeting is being arranged by Anagha for end of June/ early July

PCEF Work Scope
The PCEF will now focus on ESR, Biodiversity and Water. Groups and individuals interested in Schools and DC Rules should work with the other forums as suggested above.

Draft Framework for ESR Status of Biodiversity

I. Introduction and Scope
Biogeographic zone in which Pune is located

Why is BD important to assess - impacts on human health and environment locally, regionally and globally (as appropriate)

The ESR reports on

• status of ecosystems, hot specks and selected groups of plants/animals, and selected species in the city
• institutional aspects of BD conservation/ management: specialized govt/scientific agencies to deal with bd, civil society engagement, forums of complaint/redressal, conflict resolution

Definition / ownership related issues

• while some major ecosystems (river, forest) are not technically under PMC limits and are governed by other government depts, they are enclosed by PMC lands and they are heavily impacted by the city and contribute in a major way to the citizens’ health and city aesthetics
• several hotspecks are within private / institutional lands

II. Values
What values does the city current place on bd?
What values could/should it place?
Differential values between rich and poor? How to put these values into the city’s planning?

III. Policy and legislative framework

• Land records (for river ecosystem integrity) administered by District Collector
• Water Act (for surface water quality) regulated by MPCB
• Irrigation agreement (for water returned to regime and net consumption) by Irrigation dept
• Forest Act for reserved forests
• MRTP Act for urban environment and planning (Development Plan and DC Rules) for BD reservation, green zones, open spaces, setbacks, parks and gardens in municipal lands
• Tree Act for tree felling permissions
• BD Act for management aspects and setting up of Biodiversity Management Committee

IV. Key drivers or factors influencing Biodiversity

• Population growth and pattern of settlement (?) affecting land conversion and usage of BD rich areas
• Amount of untreated or uncollected sewage and garbage (for river / water body quality)
• Road widening/ construction
• Any others? Biomass collection?

V. Status and Change in Key Indicators

1. Aggregate green cover extent: total area and per capita green cover (from Sharad/ DP Cell), disaggregated between forest/wild/semi-wild and lawns/parks
2. Tree cutting and transplantation/survival, plantation and survival rates, exotic/indigenous ratio in plantations (from Tree Authority records and Garden Dept)
3. Select rare species status (TBD – Dr Sane, Dr Ankur Patwardhan, Ranwa)
4. Ecosystems/ hotspecks (including small wetlands) status report in table below (needs a quick outreach to various research and study groups, colleges for data on different parts of the city)

5. Ecosystem type (forest, grassland, river, reservoir, garden, hotspeck)

   Name (for e.g. Vetal Hill, Baner Hill, Mula R, Mutha R, Ramnadi R, Katraj Lake, Pashan Lake, Turtle Pond, Bat roost site .....)

   Location (with a map key)

   Ownership/ regulatory authority (for e.g. PMC, private ...)

   Legal status (Reservation, green zone, private/ institutional)

   Area (ha)

   Status of major indicators of health of ecosystem (state methods and reliability elsewhere)

   For e.g. for Lakes: Hyacinth cover increased; Fish species decreased by x; Black winged stilts increased; Migratory species number decreased

   For Rivers: Physical-chemical characteristics at various points; indicator species of fish, birds, plants + Ecosystem physical integrity by measuring naturalness of banks in terms of area of encroachments in the form of lawns, roads, tenements etc

   For Gardens: Number of indigenous vs exotic trees and %

   For Hotspecks: Flapshell turtles number same, Bats number same etc....

   Based on above, state Change in Ecological Status (improved, degraded, no change from previous year – TBD over time)

6. Status of Institutional aspects of BD Management in City
   Current institutional methods of BD Mgt: Garden Dept, Pune Tree Authority, Encroachments Dept, Water and Sewage Dept
   Existence of BD Management Committee: No
   Steps taken to set up one: None
   Mapping of BD: Not done
   BD Info system: Not done

(add civil society institutional aspects and actions…PTW, Lakaki lake committee, Green Earth, etc.)

VI. Analysis and Key Issues and Concerns

Status of BD

• Forest status improved through soil and water conservation works carried out over … acres
• River status degraded over previous years, as measured through instances of pollution/ extent of pollution and decrease in number of freshwater fish species etc
• Lake status degraded over previous years, as measured through decrease in numbers of birds, and diversity/composition of migratory bird species
• Grassland status degraded as area of grassland decreased as it has been planted over by trees, or fire instances
• Gardens total area increased though number of exotic tree species planted increased
• Tree numbers went up or down as measured through tree-felling permissions granted less plantation (and survival) number
• Hot specks – 30 (or whatever) in number; x number were extinguished; y number were preserved and granted ‘PMC Hotspeck’ status (perhaps in the future)
• Rare species numbers/distribution – enhanced / went up or down

Comment on overall status of BD

Status of Institutional Aspects

• Policy and legislation gaps and issues of coordination between multiple authorities
• Data and information gaps
• Financial gaps

VII PMC Response planned
VIII Recommendations

Appendices

• Methodological and reliability aspects
• Where to report data year round

School Group - Minutes of 23 May 2008

23rd May 2008, University Canteen

Attendees: Mini Srinivasan, Lalita Agashe, Asim (Sakal Times), Sanskriti Menon, Avinash Madhale, Ranjit Gadgil, Mrs Waley, Anjali Bapat, Maitreyi Shankar (KKPKP)

1. Pilot infrastructure survey has been done in 12 schools (Doorstep School 3; CEE 3; Swadhar 3; Asha Kiran 2, ISC has not returned survey forms). Mini will get feedback from surveyors about changes to be made to forms. Janwani to computerize the data. Overall infrastructure seems ok. Schools reporting that maintenance requests seem to be getting better response. We still plan to conduct a more comprehensive survey when new school year begins. We may ask schools to do the survey, with our formats. Need to grade schools as A, B or C and ensure that 6 months later schools are improving.

2. Possibility of PMC setting up an Education Helpline discussed. This will allow parents/others to call a centralized helpdesk to register complaints/issues. Meher has already suggested the setting up of a website for schools. Ranjit will take this up with the PMC CIO, Anupam Saraph.

3. Learning Level Tests – these were the issues raised
a. Why have our own tests when schools are already testing?
b. What is the motivation for this? Do we not already know, as reported even by SSA, that children are not doing well in schools?
c. If we are saying that their testing is not good, on what basis are we saying that? If so, should we try and improve their testing rather than devise our own tests?
d. If children are already overtested and if we do not trust the teachers to conduct the tests fairly in the schools then how to administer the tests?
e. If we administer the tests externally how can we make the test results “official”?
f. How do we get children externally? If we use the NGOs that run study classes for our sample, will this not be biased?
g. Which standards and how many students will need to be tested? How long to administer the tests? What resources will be required?
We will meet with John Kurrien to discuss these issues.

4. There was discussion once more on the role of the school group. The name “Municipal School Watch” was thought to be appropriate. It emphasises the monitoring nature of the group. It was decided that we should, as far as possible, not get involved in the “reasons for the failure of the Municipal School system” and focus on demanding better education in the schools and improvement in the school environment. We will focus on creating more awareness in the public, creating pressure groups (like parents of children attending Municipal Schools through organizations like KKPKP), media attentions and lobbying with State and Central Govt. authorities. The thrust will be to demand that Municipal Schools, given the ample resources that are available, should be as good as and even better than private schools. How to achieve this, how to fix the million internal problems should be left to the administration. IF the school system requests help in certain matters or areas, then the MSW could provide assistance.

5. Some specific issues like issuing of books and uniforms and no. of teachers in schools and absentism should be looked at. Issue of corporal punishment in schools, cited as the no. 1 reason for dropout should also be highlighted by collaborating with organizations like Abhay (Bina Joshi).

6. PMC has already done a gradation of the schools and assigned grades to them. This data and the methodology and data used to assign grades to be obtained from PMC.

7. We should meet Commissioner, EO and Chairman of SB in a joint meeting to discuss the following issues
a. Emphasise that Municipal Schools should be excellent – School Dept. should possibly adopt an appropriate Mission, Vision and define Objectives.
b. Ask for results of the MLL tests
c. Infrastructure survey done and request new survey using our format for the new year
d. Raise issue of out-of-school children

Comments from Meher Gadekar
Thanks Ranjit for the minutes. You seem to have had a good meeting. A few remarks/observations: If we need support for lobbying/advocacy we may like to involve NCAS – National Centre for Advocacy Studies, who are specialists at lobbying and advocacy. I can put the School Group/MSW in touch with Amitabh Behar, who heads NCAS.

There is no need to lobby at the National level to improve education in PMC schools. We need to concentrate at the city level for this.

It might be a good idea to bring out, as a result of our work, a Citizen’s Report on the State of Edn in PMC schools. We can use the occasion to publish or broadcast the report, to create a noise about this issue, raise awareness and seek involvement of more citizens.

Certain things like contacting Bina Joshi and School Board of PCMC have been on our pending list for quite a long time now.

Look forward to attend the next meeting Cheers Meher

Draft ESR framework - Water

Pune and the Status of Water

Scope

River basin and water regime in which Pune is located
- Rivers and streams flowing through Pune and reservoirs on these
- Groundwater

Pune city uses surface and ground water, and in the process impacts the physical integrity of the resource, consumes energy and returns water of a certain quality and quantity back to the water regime. The ESR attempts to assess the impact of the city on three aspects related to water:

• Physical integrity of the water regimes (surface and ground) (local and regional impact)
• Physical and chemical quality of the water resource (local and regional impact)
• CO2 released to the atmosphere (global impact)

Why this is important to assess - Impacts on human health locally, regionally and globally

Policy and legislative framework

• Land records (for ecosystem integrity) administered by District Collector
• Water Act (for surface water quality) implemented by MPCB
• Ground water Act (for ground water quantity and quality) administered by GSDA
• BPMC Act (for municipal obligation to supply – linked to net consumption) by PMC
• Irrigation agreement (for water returned to regime and net consumption) by Irrigation dept

Key drivers or factors influencing Water

1. Population growth (for quantity abstracted)
2. Tapping of groundwater for home and commercial uses (for quantity abstracted)
3. Economic growth and pattern of economic activity (for quantity abstracted)
4. Pattern of settlement (for physical integrity of both surface and ground water regimes)
5. Amount of untreated or uncollected sewage and garbage (for quality)
6. Industrial effluents (for quality)
7. Technology used by PMC and private entities (for quality, quantity and energy efficiency)
8. Fiscal instruments (their role as regulatory instruments)
9. Extent of rain water harvesting (for quantity)
   

Status, Trends and Projections of Key Indicators

Primary indicators

1. Physical status of rivers, streams, reservoirs and aquifers (including channel integrity and ecosystem base flows)
2. Water quality in rivers, streams, reservoirs and aquifers
3. Net consumption and where released (supposed to be in Mutha right bank canal as per Irrigation Dept and PMC agreement)
4. Energy used for net consumption (municipal water supply, estimated spend in sump to overhead tank, bore well pumps) (yields global impact of CO2 related to water supply)

Secondary indicators (relate to social and economic aspects)

1. Coverage of households - municipal supply, private (tankers, bore wells – nothing wrong with private supply except bore well difficult to regulate)
2. Municipal spending
3. Technology used

Key Issues and Concerns

Against above selected indicators

1. Physical status of rivers, streams, reservoirs and aquifers channel integrity not maintained; no concept of ecosystem base flows; natural aquifer systems being dismantled and degraded due to construction, etc
2. Water quality in rivers, streams, reservoirs and aquifers is being degraded; toxicity in rivers and reservoirs reaching levels that will affect animal and human health;
3. Net consumption rising and where released (supposed to be in Mutha right bank canal as per agreement)
4. Energy used for net consumption (municipal water supply, estimated spend in sump to overhead tank, bore well pumps) (yields global impact of CO2 related to water supply) - CO2 footprint rising (energy used by water sector)

Secondary indicators (relate to social and economic aspects)

1. Coverage of households - municipal supply, private (tankers, bore wells – nothing wrong with private supply except bore well difficult to regulate)
2. Municipal spending

Concerns related to information, regulatory authority, technology etc

• Policy and legislation gaps and issues of coordination between multiple authorities
• Data and information gaps
• Financial gaps

Response

TBD

Recommendations

Primary

• Physical integrity related
• Quality related
• Consumption related
• CO2 / energy efficiency related

Secondary

• Data collection systems related
• Local policy related

Appendix: Data Sets Contributing to Water Indicators

Primary indicators

Physical status of rivers, streams, reservoirs and aquifers (including channel integrity and ecosystem base flows) and MPCB classification of River I, II, III, IV and A, B, C zones

Data needed
· Channel information
· Aquifer information
· Encroachment
· Base flows

Water quality in rivers, streams, reservoirs and aquifers
Data needed
BOD, COD, pH, turbidity measurements at appropriate locations and times
Proximate measures
- Waste water treatment
- Sewage not captured (informal settlement data)

Net consumption and where released (supposed to be in Mutha right bank canal as per Irrigation Dept and PMC agreement)
Data needed: Quantity measurements before and after (or use proximate measures – which ones?)

Energy used for net consumption (municipal water supply, estimated spend in sump to overhead tank, bore well pumps) (yields global impact of CO2 related to water supply)

Data needed
Municipal supply electricity units used and converted to CO2 equivalent
Number, type of sump and bore well and how long they run (alternatively MSEDCL records on domestic pumpsets – total units used and converted to CO2 equivalent)

Secondary indicators (relate to social and economic aspects)
Coverage of households - municipal supply, private (tankers, bore wells – nothing wrong with private supply except bore well difficult to regulate)

PCEF School Group Meeting – 28 Jan 2008

Agenda
Indicators for ESR / School Annual Report
Shala Sudhar Samiti
Proposed Meetings with School Board and Prinicipals

Present
Mini Shrinivasan, Shamita Kumar, Anjali Bapat, Lalita Agashe, Ranjit Gadgil, Avinash Madhale, Sanskriti Menon

Venue
University of Pune

1. Indicators for School Education for Annual Reporting

• The School Education Dept has its own Annual Report. We should develop the reporting framework for this. Such information need not go into the Environment Status Report.
• We can begin with the list of norms and requirements from Fundamental Right to Education Act, SSA, UNICEF. These are probably already applicable to the PMC schools.
• The annual report format of the individual school should be worked out and linked to the plan for the next year.
• The individual school reports are what is aggregated and presented as the high level indicators, perhaps as X schools in A cat (all norms are met); Y schools in B cat (non-negotiable norms met but shaky on others) etc
• Mini is to check with Meher about the suggested structure/ table of contents of the School Annual Report. If done, then post to all, else develop and post.
• Mini is to post the list of indicators / norms/ requirements from the FRE, SSA, UNICEF
• Ranjit is to ask Sachin to write the source of each indicator / norm/ requirement
• The Sapta Tarankit shala system developed in Yavatmal links norms to performance review and increments of teachers and this model would be a useful input for Pune.
• Shamita is to obtain more details on the Yavatmal accountability and increments related orders.
  

2. Mini to obtain the signatures of MC on the circular to schools permitting inspection by NGOs and initiate the corroboration study in 30 schools with ARC

3. Getting new schools allocated to an area is possible through the Development Plan. As preparatory work, Ranjit and Avinash to work with BVIEER / Dept of Geography UoP to create GIS map layers (and tables) indicating population, slum population and location of schools. Based on this, some suggestions may be possible about where new schools must be provided for in the new DP currently being prepared.

4. Ranjit is to obtain and share information on the role and functioning of School Board

5. Ranjit is to obtain and share information on public disclosure law/ bill proposed under JNNURM and how it would be applicable to the School Ed Dept (what exactly would it be required to disclose)

6. Shala Sudhar Samiti: The idea is that apart from parents, interested NGOs can also be part of this Samiti and help schools improve their performance against agreed norms/ indicators. About 10 schools are to be selected by interested NGOs. KKPKP, India Sponsorship Committee (Yerwada), Swadhar (Bibwewadi), have already shown their keenness for this. These agencies and schools will also be part of the corroboration study.

7. One major difference in the classes run by NFE organizations and municipal schools may be the number of effective teaching days. Gyanshala staff in Ahmedabad cited this as a major reason. So, it might be a good idea for the School Group to look at the non-teaching / curricular work done by teachers and ways to reduce this such as by streamlining admin processes, proper computerization of record keeping etc.

8. Next meeting is planned for around 5th Feb after checking with Arthabodh and Meher and inviting them, as well as a few principals and school teachers who could provide inputs related to which type of records are already kept by schools, non-teaching tasks and ideas to streamline these, the data collected by Arthabodha and SSA if possible. The sequence of meetings was suggested as: small meeting next week to prepare the main areas of work for the School Group; School Board meeting with MC; School Principals consultation(s)

9. The main areas of work for School Group are emerging as: School Annual Report format and individual school report format; consultations with principals and teachers; Sudhar Sudhar Samiti in selected schools; streamlining admin and other processes of School Ed DEpt; enhanced public awareness of high level performance indicators of School Ed Dept.

Ride and Return Bicycle Program - Will it Work in Pune?

सैक्लिंग ग्रूपच्या नवीन प्रपोसल : राइड ऎंड रिटर्न - पुण्यात सफल होईल का?

The PCEF Cycling Group is preparing a proposal for Pune for a "ride and return" cycle program. The aim is to promote casual, short trip, cycling and make it a visible mode. The idea is to create 400 locations in the city where specially branded cycles can be picked up and returned.

Each location will have

• About 25 cycles
• A "caretaker" who will manage the cycles and do minor repairs and maintenance

10,000 cycles may need to be sponsored by various corporates, individual donors, PMC. Attrition in cycles is expected; fleet will need constant additions. After initial losses, it is expected that cycle fleet numbers will stabilize.

Watch a video made by Manisha Sheth-Gutman on Velib, the celebrated bicycle sharing programme in Paris http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDBfwU6zni8

Read an article on the bicyle sharing concept, Velib and other programmes http://www.alternet.org/story/72528/

What do you think about the 'Ride and Return' proposal for Pune: ... will it work? ... your suggestions for how to make it work ... can you help? Post your comments ...

Notes on School Group Meeting of 17th Jan 2008

1. Meher Gadekar spoke about the Gyanshala programme being carried out in Ahmedabad municipal schools. Information on this is to be posted by him to the group
2. Meher will post suggestions on how the Annual Report of the School Education Dept should be restructured to reflect the status clearly including critical indicators. The purpose of the annual report should be to help the city plan for improvements as required
3. A discussion is to be arranged with Arthabodha to check if the data they have on school education in Pune can be used to reveal critical indicators and be used in the annual report to be made for this year (2007-08)
4. The corroboration work undertaken by ARC for infrastructure facilities should be finished asap, so that the next steps can be planned
5. The strategy for the School Group is of engagement with the School Board and of consultations with principals, teachers, PTAs, interested NGOs in Pune etc as was discussed in the meeting of 10 Jan
6. Ranjit will gather information on the responsibilities of the state and local govt vis a vis education, and who are designated authorities for various aspects
7. The School Group should enquire about the budget allocation and details for the school ed dept for 2008-09
8. The School Group should also build up its linkages with national and state level organizations and networks related to improving basic education in India

(Meherram Gadekar, Ranjit Gadgil, Avinash Madhale, Melissa Thomas, Sanskriti Menon)

Draft Framework for 'Water' in Environment Status Report

Overview of Water in Pune

• Scope (e.g. rivers and streams flowing through Pune, groundwater, lakes in vicinity)
• Policy and legislative framework
• Key drivers or factors influencing Water (e.g. population and per capita consumption growth, amount of untreated or uncollected sewage and garbage, tapping of groundwater for home and commercial uses, industrial effluents, extent of rain water harvesting)

Status, Trends and Projections

(as per indicators and data sets we've chosen - see below)

Key Issues and Concerns

• (should focus on end issues not on data issues. Examples – Ground water levels and quality continuing to erode, Toxicity in rivers reaching levels that will affect animal and human health, Natural aquifer systems being dismantled and degraded due to construction, etc)
• GW not covered
• Multiple agencies
• Data related issues

Recommendations

• Water, waste water, ecosystems and hygiene related
• PMC functioning and organization related
• Data collection systems related
• Local policy related

Water Indicators and Data-sets

• Water quality on surface streams (whatever the std indicators are of BOD, COD, turbidity, acidity etc)
• Water quality of aquifers (as above)
• Ecological flows and critical stocks maintained?
• Reduction of waste water flows - % houses / units sewer connected; % sewers/ qty reaching waste water treatment plants
• Wastewater treatment
• Annual withdrawals of ground and surface water
• Surface and Aquifer flow quantities before and after city
• Net water consumption
• Energy consumption in water provision and waste water treatment (both in municipal pumping as well as household level pumping from sumps and bore wells if data can be gathered or estimated)

Notes on Meeting of 10 Jan 2008

Pune Citizens Environment Forum

Agenda
1. Introductions
2. Introduction to PCEF and RCE and report of activities
3. Work Discussions (2 hours)
a. PCEF theme groups work status, related research and studies TBD
b. (BD, Schools, DC Rules, Ecohousing, Traffic/ cycling) = 1 hour
c. Framework of ESR/ Pune Sustainability Report = 1.5 hour
4. Governance for PCEF

Notes

Introduction to PCEF and RCE

Reference Documents

• Note on PCEF
• Note on RCE Pune

Discussion on PCEF and RCE work areas and possible merging

1. Considering the overlapping scope of work of the PCEF and RCE, there was a suggestion that the two groups could be merged
2. It was pointed out the focus of the RCE is ‘Education’ and so the school and public education groups of the PCEF could be part of the RCE; if however the focus of the RCE was ‘Sustainable Development’ then the PCEF could be the RCE
3. Since each theme group also has needs of outreach, participation and education/ communication, the individual members may be part of the RCE, or the PCEF would work with RCE for those aspects
4. There was a suggestion that the jurisdiction of the RCE should be the entire state of Maharashtra and the focus of work should be rural development as well.
5. However others suggested that the jurisdiction has to be kept manageable and human-scale (meaning one should be able to leave home in the morning, participate in a meeting and be home the same evening, while not traveling by air)
6. It was also suggested that the RCE jurisdiction should be the jurisdiction of the University of Pune i.e. the districts of Pune, Nasik and Ahmednagar.

Decisions

1. The School Education and Public Education groups of the PCEF could be part of the RCE
2. PCEF and RCE members should have the flexibility to be part of both or ither groups
3. The RCE and PCEF would complement each other’s work
   

DC Rules

Reference Document: Ppt by Anagha Paranjape

The view of the PCEF DC Rules group was that the Circular Resolutions have complicated the DC Rules, and it is difficult to understand them. They are not easily available, and the general public and even professionals find it difficult to understand and apply them since some Circulars are conflicting; some Circulars dilute the DC Rules in specific cases.

The Municipal Commissioner brought another point of view that the Circulars serve to clarify the Rules and add specificity according to the actual site of construction.

Decisions

1. PMC to make circulars available (A Pawaskar)
2. The DC Rules group would take up the tasks of
   - codification of the circulars
   - inventorization
   - facilitate uploading on PMC website
   - analysis of the circulars to identify contradictory circulars and those that can be deleted
   - outlining the process for changing rules
   - articulating the spirit of the DC Rules in the form of Directive Principles
3. The PCEF DC Rules group would become the DP sub-group on DC Rules. Additional members would be Vidyadhar Deshpande, Mr.Gohad, new staff in PMC DP Cell should be part of the DC Rules sub-group, Arvind Shinde, Bidkar, Ujwal Keskar. The group would be convened and coordinated by A Pawaskar

Eco Housing

Reference document: Ppt by Veena Dharmaraj, presented by Anagha

Decisions

1. The Eco-housing Norms should be applicable to commercial, institutional and other typologies of building not just ‘housing’
2. The Science and Technology Park is facilitating an eco-housing centre and MC suggested that they be invited to join the PCEF

School Education

Reference document: Ppt by Mini Shrinivasan

Decisions

1. PMC to issue circular on allowing corroboration inspections
2. The School group may help to evolve some mechanism for how to manage external assistance and ensure it is effective – temp teachers, DEd students, home learning opportunities etc
3. School group to organize workshop / consultation with Principals and teachers for broad based support on indicators and benchmarks, more insights into how teachers can be more effective (perhaps reduce un-necessary admin tasks) etc
4. Work towards a system of decentralized accountability through working with and facilitating PTAs/ Shala Sudhar Samitis
5. Implementation of the above to be first piloted in 30 schools through ARC members and other interested grassroots groups

Traffic and Transport

Reference documents: Note on Cycling Group report, Pune-Velib proposal and Traffic Indicators

Decisions

1. PMC to issue notice for elimination of parking charges for cycles from the PMC offices
2. Cycling Group to prepare a proposal for the Hire and Ride for which PMC can invite bids
3. Dinesh to make available the map of existing and proposed cycle tracks using which the missing links can be identified and budgeted for the next year
4. New signage is to be designed so as to be more visible (Anagha has offered that BNCA students would be able to help in this)
5. MC informed that Bhubaneswar has a well-developed cycling infrastructure. CEE to obtain pictures of tracks, signage etc
6. Cycle-track Helpline number to be allocated by PMC, and budgeted in the current budget
7. The helpline no. is to be well publicized on the cycle track itself and other locations

Biodiversity

Reference document: Report by Anchal Sondhi

Information shared by PMC

1. There is approval from the CM to notify the Biodiversity Reserve
2. However there is court stay in favour of the Chinchwad Deosthan Trust; about 50 ha out of 89 ha is privately owned at this location (Survey No. 7 Baner)
3. PMC has petitioned the High Court

Decisions

1. Interested citizens may attach/ add their petitions to the existing PMC petition as well as make a petition to the Divisional Commissioner
2. Anchal and Laxmikant to follow up with Garden Dept to obtain documents; and further discussion with Aneeta and Sujit as well as citizens groups in Baner and Pashan
3. It was suggested that a film on Pune’s biodiversity be made with the help of students from the film institute; Sanskriti and Anchal to coordinate

Environment Status Report

Reference documents

1. Extract from 6 Oct 07 PCEF meeting on ESR
2. CEROI indicator set
3. Prelim thinking on indicators for housing, water, traffic and schools

Decisions

1. PCEF may develop the framework
2. Some chapters to be done by PCEF (focus on Environmental aspects rather than all)
3. Data collection by AQM cell
4. Analysis by PCEF group
5. Collect data at the electoral ward level
6. A note outlining the process (above points) and timeline is to be prepared by PCEF Sectt and sent to MC
7. The PCEF process should link up with the AQM Cell which has the responsibility of making the Annual ESR.
8. Sanskriti and Piyush from AQM Cell are to brief Ajay
9. Aneeta to send 1998 ward level data list

Ecohousing ppt text 10 Jan

PCEF Eco-housing Activities

The group has deliberated on the individual focus areas of the Eco-housing Assessment criteria in relation to the D C Rules

Even though the criteria is applicable only to residential construction, its applicability to other buildings have been studied
n Commercial Buildings (malls, multiplexes, offices, IT parks)
n Institutional Buildings (public buildings, hospitals, educational institutions)

Preliminary analysis includes
n Applicability of the criteria to the D C Rules
n Measures to ensure compliance in case of specific criteria
n Supporting documentation to be developed and studies that need to be carried out for implementation eg. Guidelines for bio diversity conservation, case studies for appropriate ground coverage

PCEF Eco-housing Activities
Recommendations cover the Eco-housing focus areas of
n Site Planning
n Water Conservation
n Solid Waste Management
n Use of Renewable Energy for water heating application

Activities Planned
n Prepare a detailed report of recommendations.
n Study applicability of criteria to existing housing societies
n Training programs for end users and architects/ developers to be held in Feb/ March

Environment Status Report extract

EXTRACT ON ESR FROM PCEF MINUTES 6 Oct 2007

Environment Status Report

As decided in the inception meeting of the PCEF, one of the tasks that the Forum should take up is the development of a framework for the Environment Status Report ESR). This is a mandatory annual report that municipalities in Maharashtra are required to produce.

The process agreed upon at the meeting is:

1. A core group consisting of Aneeta Benninger, Ranjit Gadgil, Himanshu Kulkarni, Sanskriti Menon, Laxmi Narayan, Ajay Ojha, Vijay Paranjpye (and expandable as per needs) should be set up, to
develop an overall framework for the report and for individual chapters
work with the PCEF theme groups and additional groups/ individuals to take up responsibilities for the development of various sections of the ESR, including Indicators for each theme
review and edit the drafts submitted by each group
submit a budget to the PMC for developing the framework and content

2. The minutes of this meeting are to be considered as the formal communication to PCEF from PMC to begin work on the ESR

3. Decisions related to content and framework:
a. Currently ESR focuses on PMC’s contribution to environment management. However, achievements by NGOs, Corporates, Citizens Forums and their best practices should be a part of the ESR.
b. The ESR should report on ecological carrying capacity and the footprint of the city and not only sectoral environmental status. This paradigm of environmental status reporting can take into account the impacts of Pune such as due to the sourcing of water from catchments outside Pune and releasing effluents without treatment.
c. A document containing the framework and benchmarks for various sectors of the ESR is one deliverable. This would help to standardize the future ESRs and make them comparable and over time to reveal the changing status of environment
d. Methods for collecting and reviewing data should be standardized; thus data gaps in current data collection systems should also be identified
e. ESR should be based on ‘spatial and temporal’ approach because environmental changes do not happen in sectors. Performance of each municipal ward must be reviewed, ranked and linked to budget allocation. ESR should have two components – status of municipal services offered and status of ambient environment.
f. An ongoing data compilation process may be developed so that data and information from diverse sources can be gathered at one location (online and as a repository)
g. The ESR should be uploaded on the PMC website
h. ESR should have relevant indicators from the Human Development Index (HDI).


ESR - Possible Reporting Framework

See CEROI – City Environment Reports on the Internet http://ceroi.net/index.htm

Environment Status Rerport extract

EXTRACT ON ESR FROM PCEF MINUTES 6 Oct 2007

Environment Status Report
As decided in the inception meeting of the PCEF, one of the tasks that the Forum should take up is the development of a framework for the Environment Status Report ESR). This is a mandatory annual report that municipalities in Maharashtra are required to produce.

The process agreed upon at the meeting is:

1. A core group consisting of Aneeta Benninger, Ranjit Gadgil, Himanshu Kulkarni, Sanskriti Menon, Laxmi Narayan, Ajay Ojha, Vijay Paranjpye (and expandable as per needs) should be set up, to
develop an overall framework for the report and for individual chapters
work with the PCEF theme groups and additional groups/ individuals to take up responsibilities for the development of various sections of the ESR, including Indicators for each theme
review and edit the drafts submitted by each group
submit a budget to the PMC for developing the framework and content

2. The minutes of this meeting are to be considered as the formal communication to PCEF from PMC to begin work on the ESR

3. Decisions related to content and framework:
a. Currently ESR focuses on PMC’s contribution to environment management. However, achievements by NGOs, Corporates, Citizens Forums and their best practices should be a part of the ESR.
b. The ESR should report on ecological carrying capacity and the footprint of the city and not only sectoral environmental status. This paradigm of environmental status reporting can take into account the impacts of Pune such as due to the sourcing of water from catchments outside Pune and releasing effluents without treatment.
c. A document containing the framework and benchmarks for various sectors of the ESR is one deliverable. This would help to standardize the future ESRs and make them comparable and over time to reveal the changing status of environment
d. Methods for collecting and reviewing data should be standardized; thus data gaps in current data collection systems should also be identified
e. ESR should be based on ‘spatial and temporal’ approach because environmental changes do not happen in sectors. Performance of each municipal ward must be reviewed, ranked and linked to budget allocation. ESR should have two components – status of municipal services offered and status of ambient environment.
f. An ongoing data compilation process may be developed so that data and information from diverse sources can be gathered at one location (online and as a repository)
g. The ESR should be uploaded on the PMC website
h. ESR should have relevant indicators from the Human Development Index (HDI).
ESR - Possible Reporting Framework

(From CEROI – City Environment Reports on the Internet http://ceroi.net/index.htm)

DPSIR
Driving forces
Pressures
State
Impact
Response

PCEF Biodiversity Group 10 Jan report

PCEF Biodiversity Group

1) A Pune Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan is proposed (TBD)
a) Dr. Bharucha stressed on need to establish linkages between theme groups of PCEF; especially among biodiversity, public and school education, water and DC Rules as these issues are closely interlinked.
b) It was agreed by all that the PBSAP process needs to be conducted in PCMC, Cantonments and other privately owned areas instead of just PMC limits. Pune University, NCL, NIA, Tata campus, MIDC, MIT, BVIEER, Sindh Society, Automobile Research Institute, Joseph school, Loyola school, Agriculture College, Ferguson college, Law College, Koregaon Park were some of the areas suggested for this process.
c) Mr. Khaire suggested that monitoring biodiversity should be first step of this process. He suggested that the group should decide methodology for this survey and PBR Process might be a good option for this.
d) Dr. Bharucha suggested that a list of organizations be made that can involve themselves in PBSAP process. A grid of factors to be surveyed, survey methods and partners may be made as starting point. Dr. Bharucha and Mr. Khaire suggested a period of 6 months for making the grid and survey of biodiversity. Raghu Velankar will make framework for this grid and it will be finalized after incorporation of suggestions made by the group members.
e) Sanskriti Menon suggested additional factors like ownership of biodiversity rich areas; their legal status (contentious issues) should be covered in this grid so that PBSAP process can be comprehensive. She added that PMC could initiate dialogue within PMC and with other controlling authorities, departments to generate support for the PBSAP process. Mr. Khaire agreed for this
f) Dr. Bharucha expressed need for a 'Biodiversity Vision' for Pune city. He said while changes in Pune's landscape, habitats, ecosystems and bio-diversity are discussed, the city also need to decide future course of action. The vision is important part of this process. It was agreed that partner organizations would draft their vision, which will be discussed later to evolve a common vision. (This is in fact part of the PBSAP process)
g) The document on the suggested process for PBSAP is available at www.pcef.blogspot.com

2) Dr. Bharucha suggested widening base of Biodiversity group to make the process participatory and comprehensive. He suggested that Dr. Sanjeev Nalavade, Dr. Anil Mahabal and Retired Forest Officers Organization should be invited to be part of PCEF. Others added Dr. Gole so that UoP can be covered along with Environment studies, zoology and botany courses. He offered support of BVIEER students to do surveys of biodiversity. He informed that assessment of various thesis reports is being done by Ms. Ruby to gather available baseline data. Similar exercise can be done with other academic institutes. Ms. Anchal expressed willingness to contact Pune University departments for the same purpose.
(some done and other contacts underway)

3) Discussions on Baner Biodiversity Reserve (see attached table) – need to convert to management plan and to address issue of ownership

4) Dr. Bharucha suggested that the biodiversity group should make a booklet on parks. It may include existing data, objectives of parks, contribution by different stakeholders etc. This will help to evoke more participation and publicize efforts by the PCEF. A timeline of 3 months has been decided. Mr. Khaire informed that the PMC would support printing of these booklets if the biodiversity group develops its content and design.

5) Dr. Bharucha raised issue of strategy for nature interpretation centre and awareness activities.
a) A note on this will be circulated by BVIEER, which can be discussed further.
b) Mr. Khaire suggested that biodiversity group should make one-year module containing different education activities for various social sectors.
c) Need to revive Tree Walks (conducted by CEE, INTACH, RANWA) was expressed by Dr. Bharucha. It was agreed that a common framework and suggested content be developed under these modules so that uniform message would be spread by the PCEF. Mr. Khaire said that he is already thinking of printing "Rare trees of Pune" Marthi book of CEE with few more introductions of species and has spoken to Kiran Purandare about it.

6) Dr. Bharucha enquired if PMC has adequate number of saplings of indigenous species required for plantation purpose across city. He suggested that many private nurseries might be assigned this task based on assessment of requirement conducted by the PMC. Mr Khaire mentioned that Garden dep't has two nurseries and he has already instructed them to start building up stock of indigenous species based on demand by citizens.

PCEF Traffic and Transportation Group 10 Jan docs

Pune Traffic and Transportation
Framework for Environment Status Report


Policy and legislative framework
National Urban Transport Policy
Report on the Working Group for the 11th Five Year Plan on Urban Transport including MRTS (not yet passed into law)
Draft concept note on Pune’s transport vision pending legislative approval for two years
Committee recently appointed by State Government to ‘look into Pune’s transport problems’. Unclear what their mandate/role is.
No other known policy or body.

Responsible agencies
PMC: Road building, maintenance; signals; footpaths; cycle tracks; parks; parking lots; deciding on one-ways, no-entry roads etc. including IRDP roads, flyovers etc.
PCMC and the cantonment boards: Similar roles within their areas?
Traffic Police: Enforcing traffic rules (signals, parking, driving without license); fining offenders; dealing with accidents etc.
RTO: Issuing licenses to people, vehicles to ply.

Indicators
Three kinds of indicators:
Economic indicators: To reflect economic impact of transportation
Social indicators: To reflect impact of transportation on equity, community, human issues
Environmental indicators: To reflect environmental impacts.

Ideally, these indicators should be used in an environment where there are specific goals to be achieved, targets to be met – in other words, the city has a vision with respect to these issues. Today in Pune, we do not have the luxury of such a vision, but it will still be a useful thing to benchmark where we are even if we are not sure where we want to go.

The list of indicators can be much more elaborate than what is listed here, but it may be good to begin with a small set of indicators while being aware that other indicators also should be considered in future. Such indicators are listed in the final section.

Economic indicators
Average time to commute
Average distance commuted
Modal shares of different transport modes (mainly walking, cycling, bus, two-wheeler, four-wheeler, three-wheeler, train)
Number of vehicles registered, and the number plying on roads; both by vehicle type
Amount of goods / cargo traffic in the city
Quantity of goods / cargo
Number / type of vehicles
Inter-city transport
Number of vehicles and people boarding / disembarking
By type (ST, private bus, train)
Total road length

Social indicators
% of road length safe, convenient, usable for pedestrians
% of road length safe, convenient, usable for cyclists
% of road length safe, convenient, usable for senior citizens
% of road length safe, convenient, usable for children
Total road length with dedicated, usable cycle tracks (and perhaps total road length with cycle tracks as on official records)
Percentage of family budget spent on travel – classified by economic category
Accidents
Classified by type (fatal, serious, minor)
Classified by victim type (pedestrian, cyclist, …)
Classified by time (early hours, morning, afternoon …)
Classified by region
Public transport indicators
How easy is it to access?
How reliable is it?
How frequent is it?
How ‘consumer-friendly’ is it?
How expensive is it?
How viable is it (earning / expense relationship)?

Environmental indicators
Number of trees cut for road related activities and number planted elsewhere (including details of where cut and where planted)
Air pollution (particulate, non-particulate etc.)
Preferably broken down by region to facilitate impact of proximity to main roads, big parks, wooded sections etc.
No. of vehicles plying with / without PUCs
Fossil fuel consumption (by type, preferably by vehicle also)
Total number and size of public (unpaved) open spaces, gardens and their per-capita values

Some other possible indicators
Employment accessibility (job opportunities within walking distance)
Service accessibility (basic services such as schools, shops, government offices within walking distance)
Vehicle-km travelled per capita per day
Per capita congestion delay
Transport investments (City’s investment into different transport infrastructures)
Transport services for non-drivers, disabled etc.
Noise pollution
Habitat protection / destruction
Mix of fuel shares, % using CNG, % using electric vehicles etc.

PCEF DC Rules Group 10 Jan ppt text

10 Jan 2008
PCEF DC Rules Theme Group

Summary of Discussions
1) We initiated a broad discussion in which members generally spoke and discussed issues facing Pune’s development

2) This broad discussion helped us streamline our first thoughts towards addressing the Gaps / shortcomings in the existing DC Rules

3) The next level of discussions were to be based on deeper understanding and analysis of the existing DC Rules and their interpretations in practice
Circulars, main issue which is making the understanding and interpretation of the DC Rule mechanism very complex

4) A few more meetings and discussions revealed that a Focused Working Group will have to emerge for any value added suggestions towards changing / modifying the existing DC Rule
The issue faced here is time commitment and isolation of this group from the DP Process Committee

5) The last meeting held on January 3, 2008 decided that:
Our Group may not be able to work on actually framing the DC Rules, which will require serious and sustained time commitment and effort much larger than the Group can handle
We may come up with a DIRECTIVE POLICY for DC Rules, which may be used as a guiding principle for further work


Update on Proposed Working

Next meeting – January 12, 2008

We propose to hold a day long workshop in this month to:
–Have focused discussions and debates on the DC Rules
–Identify gaps and data requirements in a more focused way
–Come out with a Draft DIRECTIVE POLICY which can be then taken up for further work

(Aneeta Benninger, Sujit Patwardhan, Ujwal Keskar, Poorva Keskar, Zigisha Mhaskar
Rajiv Raje, Pushkar Kanvinde, Dinesh Girolla, Subhash Ghaisas, Pratima Kisloskar
Shantanu Roy, Anagha Paranjape – Purohit)

PCEF School Group 10 Jan ppt text

10 Jan 2008
PCEF Schools Group

The Schools Group is concerned with the Learning Environment for Children of Pune, with a focus on PMC Schools

The framework of the chapter on schools in the ESR is as below:

The Numbers
Number of PMC schools: 320
Number of children enrolled: 130000
Around 35% of the children in Pune attend PMC elementary schools.

What the law promises
The right to good quality elementary education is guaranteed by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, of which India is a signatory.
Free and compulsory education from age 6-14 is a fundamental right enshrined in the Constitution of India.
Municipal Corporations, councils, ZPs are responsible for elementary education

Implications for PMC Education Dept
The PMC must provide, free of cost, elementary education that is of good quality to each child in the local area.
The schools run by the PMC must provide easy access, enabling environment, opportunity for all-round development to each child.

Major problem areas in PMC schools as seen by child rights activists
1) Access
a) Physical access is often blocked by busy roads, flyovers, rail tracks, digging, parked buses
b) Access is also blocked by lack of relevant documents, language.
2) Enabling environment: Physical environment is usually dismal. Attitude of adults in the school is often equally dismal, discouraging, disparaging.
3) Opportunity for development:
a) Teaching methods remain for the most part uninteresting and irrelevant. As a result, most poor children do not actually learn what they are supposed to be learning.
b) Evaluation methods reward rote learning
c) Absence of facilities and people for anything except ‘covering the syllabus’ and taking exams.

Problems expressed by teachers
1) Complete absence of any sort of autonomy on when and how to teach and evaluate
2) Overload of meaningless clerical jobs
3) Absence of academic leadership from supervisors

Problems expressed by parents
1) Children do not learn even to read and write properly
2) Teachers and principals do not treat parents with respect
3) They are not welcome in the school
4) Children’s progress or lack of it is not communicated properly
5) Children are beaten

Problems expressed by children
1) Teachers beat them and shout at them
2) They are asked to sweep, fetch water and tea
3) They are scolded if they do not understand or ask questions
4) They are scared of exams, especially the scholarship exam
5) Teachers are often absent from the class and then expect them to do unit tests without teaching the lesson properly

Problem areas arising out of administrative matters
1) Funds for elementary education come from: Municipal Corporation, State Government, Centrally Sponsored Schemes (e.g.SSA).
2) Staff appointment and therefore accountability is divided between: State Government, Municipal Corporation Education Dept and other departments (eg cleaning and maintenance)
3) Centrally Sponsored Schemes have to be implemented without questioning and without local adaptation
4) Decisions regarding even simple procedural matters are apparently controlled at state level, leaving PMC Ed Dept seemingly rather powerless, going against the 74th amendment
5) The role and power of the Education Board (Shikshan Mandal) is rather unclear.

Performance Indicators for PMC Schools
1) Learning Environment
2) Staff and Administration
3) Learning Process
4) Learning Outcomes
a) These have been detailed on the basis of norms set by SSA, Unicef, etc
b) These will also include figures on school drop outs or transfer to private schools
5) Financial Efficiency

Learning Environment Indicators are about..
1) Number and quality of classrooms
2) Number and quality of toilets
3) Drinking water
4) Play area
5) Access and safety
6) Cleanliness and maintenance


Staff and Admin Indicators are about..
1) Teacher-pupil ratio
2) Teacher-pupil contact time
3) Availability of other resource persons
4) Supervision/on-site training
5) Performance reviews of teachers and supervisors
6) Role of school Board

Learning Process Indicators are about..
1) Availability of learning materials
2) Availability of facilities for sports, art etc.
3) Classroom processes, including evaluation


Learning Outcomes Indicators
Findings of annual review done by independent body for basic literacy skills
•Class 2
•Class 4
•Class 7

Financial Efficiency Indicators
1) We are studying ways in which indicators can be framed so that budgets are not cut but used more efficiently.
2) The focus for creating indicators will be on inputs planned and outputs delivered within the planned budgetary framework

Progress so far
· Except Financial Indicators, others have been detailed
· SSA has done a detailed review of school infrastructure of all school buildings.
· Data has been made available to us
· SSA/PMC has initiated repair work in a number of schools, data has been made available
· MC has taken a few important decisions regarding cleaning and maintenance of schools, e.g that a separate team be made available for school maintenance work from the ward office, that school cleaning be outsourced to a private firm.
· ARC has not been able to corroborate data on infrastructure as permission needs to be taken in writing

Tasks in hand
1) Gather and cross-check complete information against physical environment indicators along with PMC staff
2) Gather information about status against other indicators
3) Understand financing and budgeting and create financial indicators
4) Jointly with PMC create and publish first report card
5) At all levels, involve existing or newly formed ward level committees, including PMC school user community

RCE Pune

About the UNU-IAS Regional Centre of Expertise in Pune

The United Nations Universities – Institute of Advanced Studies (UNU-IAS) has initiated the concept of Regional Centre of Expertise (RCEs) on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). The UNU-IAS invited Centre for Environment Education (CEE) to initiate identification of partners and help set up RCEs in India. We are in the process of initiating one such RCE in Pune and are exploring possible partnerships under this network.

Tentatively, the RCE in Pune aims to function with the following goals and objectives:

Goal
Promote Education for Sustainable Development in Pune through schools, university and forums for citizens

The objectives are:
1. To contextualize ESD in university education, by enhancing linkages among university departments and those working on urban environment and development issues
2. To improve access to school education in Pune addressing direct and in-direct causes of non-accessibility (such as lack of schools, inadequate water and sanitation, other reasons for drop-outs) as well as quality aspects (content, transaction methods, support material, teacher training etc)
3. To enhance public understanding and engagement in governance, and a variety of social and environmental issues, in the context of sustainable development
4. To evolve a method of networking and governance amongst various actors of the RCE itself in order to help us work together effectively

This RCE is seeking membership of:
- University departments, colleges and specialized higher learning institutes
- Agencies such as local citizens' groups and NGOs concerned with social and environmental issues of the city and access to and quality of school education
- Local and regional government authorities

Proposed / Suggested Activities
Studies and research in the areas of:
School education: access and quality
Slum housing
Waste management
Water management
Biodiversity conservation
Governance
Energy conservation
Climate change mitigation, vulnerability and adaptation
Urban-rural linkages
RCE Pune
Education for Sustainable Urban Development

Report of Activities (July 2006 – Dec 2007

· Proposal to UNU IAS based on prelim discussions with various institutions, NGOs and municipality (July 2006)
· RCE Pune on Sustainable Urban Development received its formal communication about recognition from UNU IAS in January 2007.
· RCE Pune meeting (July 2007)
· In parallel, the Pune Citizens Environment Forum was set up in June 2007

Report on Meeting of July 2007
A meeting of existing partners and potential partners was done in July 2007, at the Dept of Environmental Sciences, University of Pune. An overview of developmental issues in Pune was provided by the Chair, including of existing networks of civil society organizations. A presentation of the RCE concept was done, including of the application process. The focus on Education in the RCE initiative was appreciated, with the observation that long-term sustained educational efforts are often missing in our work. Partners provided their views about the nature of education for sustainable development.

Access and Quality of Basic Education
There was a detailed discussion on working with school curricula. It was felt that externally provided inputs in the form of eco-clubs which reach limited numbers of students are important, but there is a greater need for improving infrastructure and assessing the entire curriculum with a view to enhancing the quality.

The Dept of Education, University of Pune and the Bharati Vidyapeeth Institute of Environment Education and Research have expressed their interest in looking at school curricula. Science and Technology Park, and the Dept of Environmental Science are working with the Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation and their inputs would be useful too. Janwani and Centre for Learning Resources have taken up an initiative to develop performance measures for various aspects of the school system. This work would be complemented by a discussion on the quality aspects.

A School Education working group is envisaged to take up more detailed discussions on access and quality to basic education.

Higher Education
On the topic of formal research and study courses at the university level, the earlier experience of offering a credit course at the post graduate level was discussed. It was felt that while the Dept of Environmental Sciences could take this up as a core course, for other faculty, it may be better to develop a lecture series more suited to the needs of their disciplines. The Centre for Development Studies and Activities, which is an autonomous organization affiliated to the University of Pune offers post graduate programmes in development planning and architecture. The content of some of these courses may be helpful in designing the lecture series.

Student projects and internships were discussed very briefly. Students from Geography Dept would be able to take up local projects.

A product on internship and post-graduate research for local sustainability issues may be developed to help orient higher education to sustainability issues. For more detailed study and research it was felt that one to one discussions would be required with the various departments and institute of higher learning.


Public Education
There wasn’t much discussion on the nature and form of public education that could be taken up through the RCE. The Indira School of Communication and the Film and Television Institute Community Radio described their programmes and interest in taking up local issues.

The constraints related to the use of micro-credit in cities described by the representative from the College of Agricultural Banking. The nature of the informal economy is Pune requires a separate and more detailed discussion, and is to be taken up in a subsequent meeting.


Governance
It was felt that CEE should continue to function as the secretariat. Some more discussions and strengthening of the network are needed before a more formal governance mechanism is worked out. The work already initiated should continue, as should one-to-one discussions with the various local organizations to acquaint them of the RCE concept and to develop work programmes within the RCE framework provided by the UNU.