Our version of Sustainability

February 14th to 16th in Canada's capital city of Ottawa municipal leaders from around the country gathered to discuss the latest successes and challenges of municipal sustainability. The sessions covered sustainable planning, climate change activities, local sustainability initiatives, Sustainable transportation, transforming brownfields and water management. These sessions were very well attended and contained many councillors and experts from around the country. The many examples of communities striving for sustainability provided an inspiration for other.

As the 'sustainability arm' of MNL the I was present along with President Letto to study the examples from around the country and determine what might work here in Newfoundland and Labrador. Once the sessions and discussions began it was obvious that the majority of attendees were using the environmental definition of sustainability. Delegates were surprised to here of the capacity issues that we face in NL and that for our communities we use a very broad definition of sustainability that almost equates to survival. This of course includes an environmental component but has a broad focus of long term community sustainability. While there were delegates present from rural areas of other provinces the vast majority of people were from municipalities that would be considered very urban in the NL perspective. Even the national definition of rural is considerably different from our own. All this means is that we have to work all that much harder to find the appropriate examples or to adapt the more urban initiatives to suit our situation.

To highlight the importance of municipal sustainability there was speaking time allotted to the National leaders of the Green party, the New Democratic Party, The Liberal Party and the Bloc Quebecois along with the Federal Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. Each of these leaders along with other keynote speakers focused on the need for sustainable development and leadership at the municipal level. As with many important issues the sustainable movement is coming from the grassroots level and it's the role of municipalities to manage this development with future generations in mind.