MALE VOICEOVER: This is Climate in Focus, a video series helping regions and municipalities on a journey to climate resilience.
Integrating a climate lens to fuel local climate action involves incorporating experts and their knowledge;
Identifying impacts on diverse needs in your community;
And communicating the shared economic, social, and environmental benefits of your climate plan.
KEVIN BEHAN: I think a climate lens is a really simple way for municipalities to start examining
what climate change means for their operations on two levels.
First of all, is whatever decision we're making going to have a greenhouse gas emission associated with it?
And if so, what can we do about it?
And also, is whatever decision we’re about to make - can it be affected by climate similarly,
in terms of protecting our assets and protecting our programming.
It will allow municipal staff who aren't ordinarily accustomed
to asking these questions to ask the climate question.
ON-SCREEN TEXT: Incorporating Expertise and Knowledge
ADRIAN PRADO: Unfortunately, the impacts of climate change will be experienced in every sector, be it
health, safety, agriculture, forestry, vulnerable people, etc.
So, we started very early on in the process to build relationships with a number of partners.
MALE VOICEOVER: Sharing knowledge provided by the experts in your community provides local stakeholders
and partners with tools to advance the climate action plan.
BERRY VRBANOVIC: I think we're seeing local climate action playing out in various ways in our community,
not just for the city and the region to show a leadership role,
but look for the whole community to show a leadership role.
So our academic institutions, the private sector, the not for profit sector.
CLAIRE BENNETT: You can build the greenest building in the world,
but if the occupants aren't engaged and educated, then it's not going to actually achieve those
goals and those energy reduction or greenhouse gas reduction goals.
ON-SCREEN TEXT: Identifying Diverse Needs
MALE VOICEOVER: Municipalities also need to look through a climate lens as they consider the impacts
of climate action on diverse populations, even as those requirements change and evolve over time.
ISABELLE CHARRON: Climate change, to many municipalities, is still something that's fairly far away
into the future for them. To build that resiliency, they need to start looking at small steps
right now that they can take to help them bridge that- that broader, longer term transformative
solutions into the future.
ALLISON ASHCROFT: We need to be designing our programs to be universal from its outset,
and to do so means that we need to see who are the most underserved and marginalized,
the people with the least amount of influence that are also going to be the most impacted
by climate change or by high energy costs.
And we target the programs to meet their needs, recognizing that when you can reach the needs
of those who are most underserved, then by and large
that those programs will be accessible to everyone else.
SHEILA FITZGERALD: And what will that look like five years now, 10 years from now, 15 years from now, given
the implications of climate change and the impact of our changing weather?
So while we're making, I guess, choices for today, we're also starting to look at:
What is it we need to start thinking about and planning for tomorrow?
TRISHA HENDERSON: So I think getting your own house in order and learning about some of these problems
that could arise and the best ways that you can conserve and be more efficient with your
energy before maybe you go out to the community.
MALE VOICEOVER: Casting a wide net also allows a municipality to lead by example, and influences change
in organizations in the community.
DEVIN CAUSLEY: Working with residents, working with businesses, developers, other stakeholders such as universities,
institutions around the community to help enable them to take action about changing
those municipal policies or plans that help shape their community.
AMELIA CLARKE: We can't transition to green mobility if you don't also have electric cars available or
you don't have electric buses available or you don't have bicycles available. Right?
Who provides those products?
It’s business.
So you needed the business aspects to be there both addressing their own emissions, but also
through the products and services they offer.
MALE VOICEOVER: FCM and its partners provide a broad variety of tools and resources for municipalities
at any stage in the process.
ON-SCREEN TEXT: Communicating Shared Benefits
KEVIN BEHAN: Climate change poses a great economic development opportunity.
The leading municipalities are seizing on this and realizing that, right, to encourage
business and a particular type of business to our municipality, we have to do that in new ways.
JEAN-FRANÇOIS MORISSETTE: So, it's really by taking very, very concrete actions that affect people on a daily basis,
that have a direct impact on their lives, on the way they operate.
It’s through these really specific actions that we manage to integrate new ideas.
MALE VOICEOVER: This video examined how looking through a local climate lens ensures a municipal climate
action plan responds and adapts to the unique needs of a community.
Visit FCM's website for links to each of the the tools and resources mentioned in this video,
as well as other helpful resources.
In the next video, it’s time to move from planning to action, and explore how
a climate lens can provide insight into the best places to start, and the most effective path forward.