Convening for Action in British Columbia

“Convening for Action is a provincial initiative that supports innovation on-the-ground. From the perspective of those leading and/or participating in regional programs, having this community-of-interest provides the opportunity to ‘tell our story’ and ‘record our history’ as a work-in-progress,” states Ray Fung. “It will turn ideas into action by building capacity and understanding regarding integration of long-term, strategic planning and the implementation of physical infrastructure.”

“Future planners, engineers, scientists, politicians and citizens alike will be called upon to demonstrate both vision and pragmatism, working as a team towards consensus, commitment and collaboration for the common good. Such collaboration is essential and must cross all political and community boundaries given that climate change is no respecter of such creations. The Partnership has accepted this challenge and its implementation,” stated Eric Bonham.

In his 1969 book, Design With Nature, Ian McHarg pioneered the concept of environmental planning. “So, I commend Design with Nature to your sympathetic consideration. The title contains a gradient of meaning. It can be interpreted as simply descriptive of a planning method, deferential to places and peoples, it can invoke the Grand Design, it can emphasize the conjunction with and, finally it can be read as an imperative. DESIGN WITH NATURE!,” wrote Ian McHarg.

Nine cascading factors that must be in alignment to implement a course correction. At the top of the list of cascading factors is political leadership and commitment to the shared vision. Leadership boils down to a willingness to act and bring together other champions willing to provide the type of energy and organizational drive that overcomes inertia. “The current reality is that you have to build new political commitment and basically start all over again in a new crucible phase…where you coalition-build to develop a new shared vision, etc.,” stated Ray Fung.

“Re-set means implement a course correction so that governments would maintain and manage engineered and natural assets as interconnected components within a system that includes the people who live there. What would success look like? At a high level, the community writ large would buy-in to the need and financial case for funding SOLUTIONS THAT ARE AFFORDABLE, EFFECTIVE AND PRAGMATIC. That is the point of departure for setting in motion changes that are for the common good,” stated Kim Stephens.

“Like it or not we live in interesting times. They are times of danger and uncertainty; but they are also more open to the creative energy of men than any other time in history. And everyone here will ultimately be judged – will ultimately judge himself – on the effort he has contributed to building a new world society and the extent to which his ideals and goals have shaped that effort,” stated Robert Kennedy in 1966. Considered his greatest speech, it popularized the phrase ”may you live in interesting times”. The phrase is ironic because “interesting” times are usually times of trouble.

We share our world view through our stories and storytelling This is how we pass on our oral history. Storytelling is the way we share intergenerational knowledge, experience and wisdom. “Storytelling is the commonality of all human beings, in all places, in all times,” stated Professor Rives Collins, Northwestern University, author of “The Power of Story: Teaching Through Storytelling”.

“The fertile Fraser Valley is some of the best farmland in Canada and can grow a lot of the food that we need. To get to food security in BC, we need to increase the irrigated area from 200,000 to 300,000 hectares. If we invest in the infrastructure needed to supply water from the Fraser River, one-third of the additional 100,000 could be provided in the Fraser Valley. But we are slowly losing our land base for growing food. And it is not because land is coming out of the Agricultural Land Reserve. Rather, it is all about what is happening on the land within the ALR,” stated Ted van der Gulik.

“How do we manage the number of people that are moving into the Georgia Basin when we have a very tough geography where the urban space is pretty limited by the sea and the mountains, and by rivers and agricultural land and park wilderness. When you take all that out, there is not a lot of land for urban development and an urban population. Cities are all about choices. much will depend upon getting the choices right,” stated Mike Harcourt.

“The question we asked was, how do you find that number? Well, we can treat a stream as a land use because we have the Riparian Areas Protection Regulation and we have BC Assessment for land values. The rest of it is the methodology that does the right calculation. Local governments have a spatial way of looking at land use. EAP, the Ecological Accounting Process, is a spatial view because the methodology is keyed to parcels which is as spatial as you can get. EAP allows local governments to explore the financial impact of land development choices,” stated Tim Pringle.

“With an update underway in early 2023, Metro Vancouver staff reached out to me for historical perspective on the ‘streams and trees’ component of the region’s Liquid Waste Management Plan. Because I had been the chair of the advisory panel for the region’s second LWMP in 2010, this evolved into a knowledge-sharing process. What did you learn along the way, they would ask, and where did that lead each time. Because of their questions, what started out as a chronology of events grew into something much bigger in scope. The Chronicle is a tome,” stated Kim Stephens.

Susan Haid has played a leadership role in trailblazing an ecosystem-based approach to community planning in British Columbia, first with the City of Burnaby and then with Metro Vancouver. This approach also took root in her subsequent experience in the District of North Vancouver and the City of Vancouver. “In many ways, what I am teaching comes back to the same kind of framework around ecosystem-based planning which Erik Karlsen and others were advancing in the 1990s, and which is synonymous with watershed-based planning,” stated Susan Haid.

Ted van der Gulik was ahead of his time when he spearheaded development of the Agriculture Water Demand Model almost two decades ago. With this tool, British Columbia has been able to quantify what the province has versus what the province needs with respect to land and water for food security. “In the Fraser Valley, we are losing some of the best agricultural land in Canada and without even knowing it is happening.. All of us need to care about what happens on the land. That will require a mind-set change,” stated Ted van der Gulik.