Evidence of meeting #48 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was infrastructure.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:25 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Mark Warawa
There we go. Thank you so much. The time is expired.
Ms. Rempel, you will close it with the last five minutes.
October 24th, 2012 / 5:25 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
It's always great to have two rounds in one meeting.
We're in early days in this study, but we've already heard the impact of urban conservation on all Canadians. The statistics keep coming up from independent witness groups. Over 80% of Canadians live in cities. On the conversation we had about the tree canopy today, and even with regard to some of my colleagues' comments on climate change, it's very interesting to talk about trees as a climate change adaptation mechanism and to think about what that can mean in the cities.
You're being subject to something that's quite an interesting dynamic in that you have consensus around the table on the importance of this.
I will close my comments by asking, would any of you—and I would like to go down the row—characterize this study as a happy little make-work project?
5:25 p.m.
Director, Parks, City of Calgary
I'll start even though I'm not at one end or the other.
No, this is an important topic. This has been a significant piece of my professional career. People need to live in great places. This is about making cities great places to live.
5:25 p.m.
Conservative
5:25 p.m.
Natural Area Management Lead, Parks, City of Calgary
I would echo what my director just said for a variety of reasons, but the big one is that we need to think about cities as important ecological areas themselves. More than half of the planet is urban now. This is our future and we need to make these cities work better.
5:25 p.m.
President, Tree Canada
I'd like to put it in this perspective. When we were invited to appear before this committee, your sentiment about a make-work project did not occur to me. What I thought immediately was, “Wow. This is great news. This is wonderful news. Thank God this level of government is taking an interest in urban Canada.”
Too often we get told there are jurisdictional blockages, if you will, for why the national level of government would not be involved in urban areas. I'm glad you're taking an interest in it, and we want to help you with that.
5:25 p.m.
Past Chair, Board of Directors, Tree Canada
I think it's critically important, and I'm going to use an example from my area, from Winnipeg. You're probably familiar with The Forks and you're probably all familiar with the human rights museum that's going up on The Forks.
There was a great plan for somebody to build some sort of a waterslide there and the citizens were up in arms. They simply did not want that kind of development at The Forks. What we've come back with—I and the Manitoba Forestry Association—is a proposal for an urban forest at The Forks, a place where people can come out of the human rights museum and contemplate what they've seen and learn from it. There's nothing like getting back to the earth and back to nature to put things into perspective.
Just as I said, when I came out of politics, that was my healing place. I think it will be a healing place for a lot of people coming out of the human rights museum. I think this is an absolutely wonderful initiative that you have undertaken.
5:30 p.m.
Chair, Trees For Life, Urban Tree Coalition
I'll echo what was just said. The thought certainly never occurred to me that you were wasting anybody's time. I followed up with a phone call just to make sure it was legitimate, because I thought it was spam at first. After I spoke with Marie-France, I understood the importance of what you're doing.
Let me say that the importance of what you are contemplating here, and hopefully, the work that you end up producing at the end of your term with this committee is extremely well timed and it's never been more important.
5:30 p.m.
Executive Director, Association for Mountain Parks Protection and Enjoyment
I think considerations of balancing environment and sustainable development are probably going to be one of the foremost important questions of this century. The work that you're doing to try to connect urban conservation values with parks, through Rouge national park, I think will be very successful in the long run, and Canadians will appreciate the work this committee is doing.
5:30 p.m.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Thank you so much for coming here today and taking an interest in our study.
5:30 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Mark Warawa
The time has expired.
I want to thank each of the witnesses for being here. It's been very interesting. Silva cells are something I'm going to be talking to my local government about. It's a fast-growing area. That should be included in development instead of dealing with redevelopment.
Every spring I hand out 1,000 trees at a local Home Depot, so in eight years I have handed out 8,000 trees. Each of us can make a big difference. Native species grow really well if they're in good soil.
Thank you so much for your testimony.
The meeting is adjourned.