MAPLETON – Township council has directed staff to take action to reduce the municipality’s climate impact and adapt to environmental changes.
On March 22 council directed CAO Manny Baron to work with Cima consulting engineers to create a plan “allowing Mapleton to transition towards a sustainable way of doing business and develop a plan to combat climate change.”
Among the objectives of a greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory is to better understand the emission situation of different activities in the community, explained Cima project manager Julie Hardy.
The inventory would allow the township to:
- establish a base year GHG emissions inventory;
- set GHG reduction targets and track performance;
- ensure consistent and transparent measurement and reporting of GHG emissions;
- provide data for benchmarking purposes of comparable GHG data with other Canadian municipalities.
Once the inventory is completed Hardy said workshops could be held to identify GHG reduction targets and strategies and research applicable grant and incentive programs.
“After that, with our teams, we can look at the GHG reduction measures and their associated costs and develop this preliminary action plan to put into place over so many years to determine do we want to achieve a certain carbon neutrality (target) by a certain date, for example,” Hardy explained.
“Where does the community involvement come into place? Where do we invite people from the community to come and have their say in this?” asked Mayor Gregg Davidson.
“I know there are a number of members of the community that would be excited to be part of this process.”
Hardy said interested community members could be brought in at the work plan development stage.
The cost of the project, which involves creating a GHG inventory for the township and developing an action plan, is projected at just over $67,000, with funds slated to come from municipal reserves.
Baron had suggested the unbudgeted project could be funded by delaying the hiring of an executive assistant, which had been approved in the 2022 budget.
However councillor Michael Martin opposed delaying the hire.
“The only trouble I have with this report is using the executive assistant as a sacrificial lamb for 2022,” Martin said.
“I think that position was valued in this particular budget and I’m just wondering if we could have some other potential options as a funding source for this study.”
“We’re firm believers in leading by example,” said Baron.
“And if that’s what it takes, that sacrifice that you speak of, for the better good of Mapleton, that’s what we’re willing to do.”
“I believe we could use some of our reserves to pay for this,” said finance director John Morrison, when asked by Martin for other options to fund the project.
Council approved a motion to proceed with the project using funds from reserves to cover the cost.
