The DoD Partners With the City of Flagstaff and Coconino County to Protect Dark Skies

In January of 2019, Coconino County adopted the Joint Land Use Study (JLUS) as an amendment to the County’s Comprehensive Plan. The JLUS was an 18-month DoD funded study intended to identify cooperative land use planning efforts between local governments and military installations, particularly the Naval Observatory Flagstaff Station and Army National Guard base Camp Navajo. It seeks to ensure the lasting compatibility of the installations and their neighboring communities. The JLUS creates a policy framework that recommends strategies to assist safeguard the installations’ missions. The strategies associated with protecting dark skies for the NOFS mission include:

·creating a dark sky lighting code

·creating a joint-funded Dark Sky Specialist for lighting permits, education and enforcement

·establish an outdoor lighting committee

The County and City implemented all of these strategies.

Following the adoption of the JLUS, County staff applied for another grant through the DoD called a Mission Installation Sustainability (MIS). This grant was awarded and is nearing completion. The program was formerly called a JLUS implementation grant and is to ensure the implementation of the JLUS strategies. Strategies associated with protecting dark skies for the NOFS mission include:

·creating a dark sky mobile database application for tracking inventory and non-compliance

·create a non-compliant lighting outreach campaign with educational brochures

·create an installation resiliency report