ASU partners with Sam’s Club to strengthen regional sustainability efforts

As part of Sam’s Club’s commitment to give back to the communities it serves, company executives presented Arizona State University with a $60,000 grant for its Sustainable Cities Network. The contribution is a market grant, with money pooled from 13 Sam’s Club stores in the Phoenix, Tucson and Prescott areas.

“The Sustainable Cities Network represents the cities we serve, and it works to promote sustainability, which is one of the major focuses of our grants,” says Keith Lowe, the club manager for the Gilbert store.

“We want to be a partner in making the Sustainable Cities Network a better organization and offering our expertise as a large company in cooperation with what ASU is doing as a large university,” he says. “Sam’s Club’s sustainability goals include creating zero waste and operating with 100 percent renewable energy.”

Designed to be a bridge between ASU’s research and technical capabilities in sustainability and the front-line challenges facing cities, the Sustainable Cities Network’s membership now includes 25 Arizona cities and towns, three Native American communities, Maricopa County, the Maricopa Association of Governments, and ASU’s Global Institute of Sustainability as a leader and a convener.

Working together, the network partners plan to make sustainability a core value in city planning, policy and operations. In addition, they will systematically share knowledge and explore innovative practices to aid in accelerating the Valley toward national leadership on sustainability.

“Sam’s Club will add a very valuable business perspective to the Sustainable Cities Network,” says Rob Melnick, the executive dean of ASU’s Global Institute of Sustainability. “This will strengthen our collective efforts to make sustainability central to our choices and will help Arizona become known for its innovative, ‘green’ cities.”

Sam’s Club is a division of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., (NYSE:WMT). For more information about Sam’s Club, visit the Web site www.samsclub.com.

More information about the Global Institute of Sustainability, the hub of ASU’s sustainability initiatives, is available online at http://sustainability.asu.edu. GIOS also can be followed on Twitter at asuSOS.

For more information on the Sustainable Cities Network, visit the Web site http://sustainablecities.asu.edu.

Karen Leland, karen.leland@asu.edu
(480) 965-0013
Global Institute of Sustainability

Michelle Schwartz, michelle.schwartz@asu.edu
(480) 965-9008
Global Institute of Sustainability

Susan Koehler, susan.koehler@samsclub.com
(479) 277-8066
Sam’s Club