RIDING CLIMATE ACTIVISTS HAVE ‘CORDIAL’ SIT-DOWN WITH MINISTER SMITH ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING
Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com
BRACEBRIDGE — Months of protests and requests for a sit-down with MPP Graydon Smith finally paid off for climate activists in Parry Sound-Muskoka last week.
After more than a year of public protests and demonstrations across the district — including outside his constituency office in Bracebridge, Climate Action Muskoka (CAM) members Linda Mathers and Sue McKenzie met with Smith in that office Thursday, Jan. 19.
Joining them was Landon French, an assistant to the MPP.
They were there to confront and press the government over their concerns on climate change and re-enforce their weekly messages on its impacts on the riding of Parry Sound-Muskoka.
They “face-to-face” with the minister of natural resources and forestry follows an unsuccessful attempt in December.
McKenzie says in a release yesterday that the meeting was “cordial and covered a wide range of issues related to Bill 23 and its climate implications.”
Four representatives from Climate Action Muskoka (CAM), Almaguin Climate Action (ACA) and Climate Action Parry Sound (CAPS) told Smith they represent constituents across the riding he represents.
They raised concerns about Bill 23’s impact on delivery of municipal Climate Action Plans; the importance of “protecting what protects us” through preservation of wetland systems, forest ecosystems, natural infrastructure; and the importance of shoreline site control protections to the future of our lakes and our drinking water.
He also heard from them about food security and the Greenbelt “offset”; the inadequacy of the “80 per cent of market value” equation to determine “affordability”; and the appalling climate and economic choice of expanding gas plants and infrastructure in the riding and across Ontario.
The MPP was left with a list of questions to which they have requested answers; and a list of solutions that will address the housing crisis and the climate crisis together, without reverting to urban and rural sprawl and highways.
Smith heard the group out and said he would take the concerns back to Queen’s Park for discussion by his Conservative party’s caucus and suggested a future meeting with the climate groups.
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