MQ

Yesterday at the Gaining Ground/Resilient Cities conference Mayor Gregor Robertson welcomed over 750 participants and took the opportunity to give them a sneak peek at Vancouver 2020:  A Bright Green Future, the 10-year plan which is the result of almost a year’s work by the Mayor’s Greenest City Action Team (GCAT).  The report includes 10 goals with specific targets for 2020.  The high level list is:

1.  Green Economy Capital

2.  Climate Leadership

3.  Green Buildings

4.  Green Mobility

5.  Zero WAste

6.  Easy Access to Nature

7.  Lighter Footprint

8.  Clean Water

9.  Clean Air

10.  Local Food.

I am particularly interested in the GCAT process — and that is what we’ll be discussing this afternoon at the Gaining Ground/Resilient Cities conference.  We are doing a workshop on GCAT — the “we” is Gord Price (SFU City Program and former City Councillor); Rob Safrata (CEO of Novex Couriers); Melina Scholefield (Director of Sustainability at City of Vancouver).  We’ll be reflecting on the process and what opportunities and challenges A Bright Green Future presents for us.

This is a very busy week — yesterday alone I attended parts of Gaining Ground (including a workshop on The Bold New Economy (future blog), the BC Business Council’s Chapter 3 of the Outlook 2020 series (future blog), the celebratory Board of Trade lunch for the CEO of the Canada Line, Jane Bird, and a reception hosted jointly by the UBC Centre for Sustainability and Social Innovation and the University of Oregon’s Centre for Sustainable Business Practice — both of these centres are located in their respective business schools.  This week we are also hosting a delegation from Portland led by Mayor Sam Adams.  Yesterday we set up a session to share some of UBC’s sustainability initiatives (future blog).

And today promises to be equally busy.  To find the full GCAT report — here is the link:

http://vancouver.ca/greenestcity/PDF/Vancouver%202020%20A%20Bright%20Green%20Future.pdf