Listen, learn and lead: Peterborough’s environmentalists ready for 2019
The new year is a good time for more people to get personally involved
Opinion Jan 03, 2019 by ROSEMARY GANLEY SPECIAL TO THE EXAMINER
Peterborough-Kawartha MP Mary Monsef speaks to members of the Peterborough Alliance for Climate Action at her constituency office on Bethune Street on Monday, November 12, 2018 in Peterborough, Ont. She responded to a letter the group delivered during an October 26 rally. - Jason Bain , Examiner file photo
In our small city, we have four national-quality environmental thinkers/writers teachers/activists.
No, amend that: They are international-quality. They have acquired a vast education in ecology, biology, physics, and earth sciences. To say nothing of human psychology and behavior. They are always learning, paying attention to findings, reports and warnings, and at the same time noticing local manifestations of this great global change we are experiencing. Plus they can communicate with us at our grade-nine-level science capacity.
They both challenge us and hold our hands. We trust them because we know them, and they are civil.
I am naming them Peterborough's Heroes of 2018.
They are humble people, but assured at the same time. They feel a great responsibility to alert others to the need for urgent action, not by scaring us, but by patiently sharing what they know, putting it out for the public good, all the more persuasive because they do it voluntarily, without remuneration.
They are Prof. Alan Slavin, a retired physicist from Trent University and a founder of Sustainable Peterborough; Drew Monkman, a legendary teacher and now widely read columnist for the Examiner who co-authored The Book of Nature Activities; Kate Grierson, a retired high school literature teacher, grandmother of five and newly trained Climate Educator via the Al Gore Institute; and Prof. Bob Paelke, retired from Trent, who has greatly influenced hundreds of students, including my own son, since the '70s, and now makes powerful use of Facebook to continue teaching.
They are people whose inner strength does not let them give up. Nor does it let them throw up their hands at indifference, or at bad government policies, such as the recent Doug Ford proposal to let development into the Green Belt of Ontario.
So what's up that we need to know and act upon this new year?
I'd say personal resolutions for simpler living, but even more importantly, a resolution to join an environmentally active group here (the GreenUP Store can give you a list). Then to relentlessly pester, lobby, speak out and get political. It's a federal election year. We are behind on our promises from Paris in 2015 to reduce greenhouse gases. Ask MP Maryam Monsef to bring Minister Catherine McKenna here to strengthen her arm in all negotiations and show her how really informed and resolved we are in Peterborough.
Civility is key. We won't rant, accuse or scorn. She is an MP from Ottawa, our Minister of Environment and Climate Change. Her email is bilingual and quite complicated: minister.ec-minister.ec@canada.ca. I used it last week to thank her for what she was able to do in Poland. I reminded her that I met her this year at the G7 meetings. Then I argued as vigorously as I could for Canada to move faster, further.
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She needs the wisdom of Solomon on this crucial file. We are after all, a federation, and Alberta is heavily dependent on oil (and so are we!), whose revenues mightily help fund our budget and whose frustration at not getting pipelines to transport it to market is palpable, It must, in any fair solution, be taken in to account.
In Poland, ironically in a city in a coal-producing area, the UN convened COP 24 two weeks ago. COP stands for Conference of Parties, or countries. There were 186 countries there, galvanized by disturbing new reports of how quickly the world is moving to a tipping point.
There were desperate late-night negotiations. The U.S., as you know, is a complete outlier. They, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, all four oil-producing nations, refused to endorse the scientific report calling for a cap on global warming at 1.4 degrees Celsius. President Donald Trump has threatened to pull out entirely from the 2015 COP agreement in Paris, although a new administration could return in 30 days.
In co-operation with our local and national leaders, let's make 2019 the year we personally got involved. Any one of the grassroots four will speak to your group. Kate Grierson offers her contact through this newspaper: kagrierson555@gmail.com.
Rosemary Ganley is a writer, teacher and activist. Reach her at rganley2016@gmail.com
Rosemary Ganley is a writer, teacher and activist. Reach her at rganley2016@gmail.com
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Listen, learn and lead: Peterborough’s environmentalists ready for 2019
The new year is a good time for more people to get personally involved
Opinion Jan 03, 2019 by ROSEMARY GANLEY SPECIAL TO THE EXAMINER
Peterborough-Kawartha MP Mary Monsef speaks to members of the Peterborough Alliance for Climate Action at her constituency office on Bethune Street on Monday, November 12, 2018 in Peterborough, Ont. She responded to a letter the group delivered during an October 26 rally. - Jason Bain , Examiner file photo
In our small city, we have four national-quality environmental thinkers/writers teachers/activists.
No, amend that: They are international-quality. They have acquired a vast education in ecology, biology, physics, and earth sciences. To say nothing of human psychology and behavior. They are always learning, paying attention to findings, reports and warnings, and at the same time noticing local manifestations of this great global change we are experiencing. Plus they can communicate with us at our grade-nine-level science capacity.
They both challenge us and hold our hands. We trust them because we know them, and they are civil.
I am naming them Peterborough's Heroes of 2018.
They are humble people, but assured at the same time. They feel a great responsibility to alert others to the need for urgent action, not by scaring us, but by patiently sharing what they know, putting it out for the public good, all the more persuasive because they do it voluntarily, without remuneration.
They are Prof. Alan Slavin, a retired physicist from Trent University and a founder of Sustainable Peterborough; Drew Monkman, a legendary teacher and now widely read columnist for the Examiner who co-authored The Book of Nature Activities; Kate Grierson, a retired high school literature teacher, grandmother of five and newly trained Climate Educator via the Al Gore Institute; and Prof. Bob Paelke, retired from Trent, who has greatly influenced hundreds of students, including my own son, since the '70s, and now makes powerful use of Facebook to continue teaching.
They are people whose inner strength does not let them give up. Nor does it let them throw up their hands at indifference, or at bad government policies, such as the recent Doug Ford proposal to let development into the Green Belt of Ontario.
So what's up that we need to know and act upon this new year?
I'd say personal resolutions for simpler living, but even more importantly, a resolution to join an environmentally active group here (the GreenUP Store can give you a list). Then to relentlessly pester, lobby, speak out and get political. It's a federal election year. We are behind on our promises from Paris in 2015 to reduce greenhouse gases. Ask MP Maryam Monsef to bring Minister Catherine McKenna here to strengthen her arm in all negotiations and show her how really informed and resolved we are in Peterborough.
Civility is key. We won't rant, accuse or scorn. She is an MP from Ottawa, our Minister of Environment and Climate Change. Her email is bilingual and quite complicated: minister.ec-minister.ec@canada.ca. I used it last week to thank her for what she was able to do in Poland. I reminded her that I met her this year at the G7 meetings. Then I argued as vigorously as I could for Canada to move faster, further.
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She needs the wisdom of Solomon on this crucial file. We are after all, a federation, and Alberta is heavily dependent on oil (and so are we!), whose revenues mightily help fund our budget and whose frustration at not getting pipelines to transport it to market is palpable, It must, in any fair solution, be taken in to account.
In Poland, ironically in a city in a coal-producing area, the UN convened COP 24 two weeks ago. COP stands for Conference of Parties, or countries. There were 186 countries there, galvanized by disturbing new reports of how quickly the world is moving to a tipping point.
There were desperate late-night negotiations. The U.S., as you know, is a complete outlier. They, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, all four oil-producing nations, refused to endorse the scientific report calling for a cap on global warming at 1.4 degrees Celsius. President Donald Trump has threatened to pull out entirely from the 2015 COP agreement in Paris, although a new administration could return in 30 days.
In co-operation with our local and national leaders, let's make 2019 the year we personally got involved. Any one of the grassroots four will speak to your group. Kate Grierson offers her contact through this newspaper: kagrierson555@gmail.com.
Rosemary Ganley is a writer, teacher and activist. Reach her at rganley2016@gmail.com
Rosemary Ganley is a writer, teacher and activist. Reach her at rganley2016@gmail.com
Tags:
HEADLINES NEWSLETTER
TOP STORIES, delivered to your inbox.
Top Stories
Opinion Jan 06, 2019
Horoscopes for Sunday, January 6, 2019
Opinion Jan 05, 2019
EDITORIAL: Hefty Peterborough County council pay hike was a necessary...
Opinion 06:40 AM
Sarah Huckabee Sanders: Valuing life is 'what sets America apart from every...
Opinion Jan 05, 2019
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