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Caring for our blue dot

May 12, 2017   ·   0 Comments

By Constance Scrafield

When does a government take on a serious, extensive, meaningful  initiative to protect the environment and to agree that it is the right of all people (and, by extension, every other living thing, I presume) to “breathe clean air; … drink and access clean water; … eat safe and healthy food; … access nature; … know about pollutants and contaminants released into the local environment; … participate in decision-making that will affect the environment, ..” plus a great deal more commitment to include the populace with information and invitation to comment; also to make every effort to deliver measured and considered policies in cooperation with other municipalities and the provincial/federal governments?

When does any governing body take arms against polluters and agree to return the environment to being safe and clean as a human right? When does this miracle take place? When the agreement is not binding; when it is “good PR”.

The name, Blue Dot, is a reflection of how the earth looks from space. It is, in many ways, at its most beautiful from a distance, as books by astronaut Chris Hadfield demonstrate. How the earth is a wondrous water-bearing and green planet shows where most of the scars are not visible.

It was great to watch Nancy Urekar, who ran as a candidate for the Green Party last election (and good on her for the effort), present the “Orangeville Proposed Municipal Declaration – The Right to a Healthy Environment” at the Town Council meeting on Monday this week. She addressed the councillors and a packed house of supporters, who applauded enthusiastically when she finished and again when, around the board, every councillor backed the initiative with a firm voice.

All well-intended and good.

However, it left me wondering. What does this acquiescence that people have the right to a clean environment, what does it all this mean? Will this unanimous agreement result in action, in compliance where there is no binding?

I wondered if it means anything concrete, like taking a look into this local community to see what should be shorn and what added; then, returning to Council with suggestions – nay, even proposals that would prove the seriousness of  this commitment.

Ms. Urekar maintains that there are two things which, as individuals or families, we should do: eat less meat in protest of the extremely environmentally harmful way in which our meat is raised and slaughtered; secondly, look at what we are driving.

She maintains the electric/hybrid cars are the way to go because electricity here is relatively clean. There is a large rebate on electric vehicles of $14,000, making a relatively expensive car a  moderately priced vehicle. Electric vehicles usually have small gas powered engines to make up for the distance a battery driven car can go.

Will the Blue Dot declaration the Town of Orangeville accepted prompt the municipality to pass a bylaw requiring installation of charging stations for electric cars, none of which are currently available here?

Will they come down on developers with new regulations about new buildings being environmentally efficient, relative to their waste and use of energy? Will there be initiatives to install solar panels as houses are built?

Can the issue of geothermal energy for  heating come under serious scrutiny?  This is already available in Orangeville but to what extent is it being considered as developers rush to install cramped little alcoves of townhouses where a single home used to stand or chew up another field for more housing?

If Council is well-motivated by this moving presentation and representation on the part of Ms. Urekar and the large number of folk sitting in the chambers on Monday, what will you, the citizens, the potential recipients of this good will, do to push such incentives along? Will you begin to care yourselves about the degenerating planet by doing your own bit in your own homes?

Back to Ms. Urekar, who said: “We need people to wake up and do more for the environment – stop using water bottles and reuse plastic bags, which go to landfills [and into the oceans] and never disintegrate. [We need] households with two cars, who trade one in for an electric car, then, use that one most of the time.”

The Blue Dot document, binding or not, is important. The goal is to spread agreement to it across the country to Ottawa. The goal is to weave these premises into the Charter of Rights and Freedoms: that the right to clean air, water, food, [survival of] nature; that governments design and execute policies to reduce pollution and protect the environment, assure that in building structures and infrastructure, the environment is protected. And much more.

Then a clean world, one we can pass on to our children with pride, becomes binding indeed. It becomes the law.

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