As the head of Concord’s environmental club, Myrick Oxnard wanted to see city leaders go beyond patting themselves on the back for earth-friendly work already underway.

She wanted signs that the city and schools where she grew up would charge ahead towards a more sustainable future, even against a changing tide from the federal government.

“As seniors, my classmates and I often find ourselves talking about what our futures might hold — but more often than not, I’ve found not excitement and hope, but shared anxiety and fear,” Oxnard said to a room of about 50 city residents, including Mayor Byron Champlin, Congresswoman Maggie Goodlander and a slew of city councilors and other city officials. “We can and we should celebrate our wins as a community, but we must not forget that there is an enormous amount of progress to be made.”

When it comes to those wins, Concord has plenty to applaud: the city’s enrollment in the community power program, all but a few dozen street lights being converted to LED bulbs, bicycle lessons in elementary gym classes, an initiative by NHTI students to eradicate invasive species at the college, the solar array at the Hall Street wastewater facility, and the trash reduction observed under the city’s purple bag system, to name a few highlighted Tuesday.

City staff and officials on various committees, who spoke at a panel Tuesday evening, pointed to several other things on the horizon, including food and textile waste collection, further efficiency upgrades to city government buildings and vehicles and further expansion of the Merrimack River Greenway Trail.

There were other efforts Oxnard said she hopes the city and her school district can keep their eyes on. She highlighted in particular that she wants Concord to reconsider a previously abandoned idea to remodel of Loudon Road for pedestrian safety, that she wants the district to commit to solar panels and geothermal heat at the new middle school and to get its facilities net-zero, and for the lights at Keach Park, if they are installed, to be energy efficient.

Catherine McLaughlin can be reached at cmclaughlin@cmonitor.com. You can subscribe to her Concord newsletter The City Beat at concordmonitor.com.