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        <Name>Alexandria, Virginia is Cool -- That's What the Sierra Club Said</Name>
        <Summary>City of Alexandria outline steps to remain a "green" city</Summary>
        <Description>&lt;h2 style="MARGIN-TOP: 2px"&gt;&lt;img title="Alexandria is a "Cool City" -- Green!" height="249" alt="Alexandria is a "Cool City" -- Green!" hspace="10" src="http://activerain.com/image_store/uploads/1/9/3/8/1/ar120311847018391.jpg" width="332" align="right" vspace="5" /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Hot of the heels of finding out that Alexandria, Virginia&lt;/strong&gt; was ranked as the &lt;strong&gt;&lt;a title="Alexandria is the Most Romantic City" href="http://activerain.com/blogsview/357802/Proud-to-Be-the" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;Most Romantic City in the United States&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt; (just in time for Valentine's Day), I've now learned that &lt;strong&gt;Alexandria is a &amp;quot;Cool City!&amp;quot;&lt;/strong&gt;&amp;nbsp; Yes, I've known for a while that Alexandria is a cool place to live with its great restaurants, exciting nightlife, historic Old Town homes, varied housing options, the Potomac River, and the new environmentally friendly T.C. Williams High School.&lt;/h2&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;In November 2005, the &lt;a href="http://www.sierraclub.org/" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;Sierra Club&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/a&gt; recognized the City of Alexandria as a &amp;quot;Cool City,&amp;quot;&lt;/strong&gt; due to its commitment of environmental sustainability and other efforts of keeping green.&amp;nbsp; According to the Sierra Club, a &amp;quot;Cool City&amp;quot; is a city that has made a commitment &amp;quot;to stopping global warming by signing the &lt;a href="http://www.seattle.gov/mayor/climate/" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;U.S. Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/a&gt;. Begun in 2005, the Cool Cities campaign empowers city residents and local leaders to join and encourage their cities to implement smart energy solutions to save money and build a cleaner, safer future.&amp;quot;&amp;nbsp; &lt;a href="http://coolcities.us/cityProfiles.php?city=1003&amp;state=VA" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a href="http://coolcities.us/cityProfiles.php?city=1003&amp;state=VA" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;Alexandria made the list of 278 &amp;quot;Cool Cities&amp;quot;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt; around the country.&amp;nbsp; &lt;a href="http://coolcities.us/" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;Check if your city is on the list.&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;&lt;img title="Recycle in Alexandria" height="208" alt="Recycle in Alexandria" hspace="12" src="http://activerain.com/image_store/uploads/7/0/7/1/8/ar120311862681707.jpg" width="247" align="left" vspace="2" /&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;While this news is a few years old, it was reiterated this week and highlighted by the City of Alexandria in their official resident newsletter sent to all residents of the City, &lt;strong&gt;&amp;quot;FYI Alexandria.&amp;quot;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/strong&gt; The article details &lt;em&gt;&lt;strong&gt;some of the City's efforts to keep Alexandria &amp;quot;green&amp;quot;:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;replacement of old vehicles with low-emission vehicles including hybrids in the City's fleet&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;new multi-family residential and business recycling program in 2006&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;green roof at the new Health Department Building and at Duncan Library&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;municipal waste-to-energy facility operated by COVANTA generates 25 megawatts of electric power from municipal waste&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;promotion of sustainable transportation options &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;T.C. Williams High School's green features &lt;/li&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Not to mention, that the City of Alexandria government and police department was very responsive to &lt;strong&gt;&lt;a href="http://activerain.com/blogsview/352260/Dear-Mr-Mayor-Clean" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;my call to remove graffiti from a building in the West End of Alexandria&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt; several weeks ago.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Alexandria: Romantic, Cool &amp;amp; a Great Place to Live &amp;amp; Work!&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.searchhomesbyemail.com/" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;font color="#0000ff"&gt;CLICK HERE TO START YOUR SEARCH FOR A HOME IN ALEXANDRIA&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</Description>
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