The City of Tacoma is one of 12 government entities from across the nation recognized for outstanding electronics stewardship in 2011 by the State Electronics Challenge. Tacoma and three other governments earned Bronze level awards, four achieved Gold status and three received Silver honors. The State Electronics Challenge encourages state, regional and local governments to provide leadership in environmentally sound and cost-effective management of electronic assets. The Challenge is a voluntary program that promotes purchasing greener products, reducing the effects of electronics during use, and managing obsolete electronics in an environmentally safe way.

Tacoma’s award represents the first time a program on the west coast has achieved recognition through the four-year-old State Electronics Challenge program.

“Through a demonstrated commitment to power and paper conservation and ‘green’ purchasing, the City achieved measurable results, and in recognition of these achievements the City has been awarded Bronze recognition,” said Lynn Rubinstein, State Electronics Challenge program manager.

Tacoma achieved these results by purchasing computer equipment qualified by the Electronic Procurement Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT) standard, implementing power management strategies on the City’s computers, and installing double-sided printing defaults on its printers and copiers. EPEAT is an internationally recognized system that identifies computer desktops, monitors and notebook computers that meet specific environmental performance criteria. Currently, 90 state, regional and local government agencies, in 32 states, collectively employing more than 130,000 people, have joined the State Electronics Challenge as partners. More information is online at http://www.stateelectronicschallenge.net and http://www.cityoftacoma.org/sustainability .

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Tacoma becomes more sustainable, reducing both costs and carbon footprint (05/11/12) — http://www.cityoftacoma.org/Page.aspx?hid=18216

Free electronics recycling in Tacoma March 11 (02/24/12) — http://tacomadailyindex.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=88&cat=23&id=2121130&more=0

Wash. residents recycle 100M pounds of electronics (07/20/11) — http://tacomadailyindex.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=88&cat=23&id=2009721&more=0

E-Cycle program diverts record electronics from landfill (01/13/11) — http://tacomadailyindex.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=88&cat=23&id=1907299&more=0