“There is a special day-long session devoted to sustainable water management issues. Six panel sessions will address different aspects of water and provide a broad-brush picture of the innovation that is emerging in British Columbia,” announces Joanne deVries.
“The Rainwater Panel will present a series of ‘vignettes’ to showcase the experience of local governments that are BC leaders in innovation. These vignettes will be cascading in providing the audience with a picture of what ‘Sustainable Rainwater Management” looks like at three scales: watershed basin, watershed catchment and project site,” states Ted van der Gulik.
“The District of Sooke has exceeded provincial requirements for liquid waste management and created a rainwater management plan that makes protecting water quality a guiding principle in land use decisions,” states Laura Byrne. “Because our rainwater management plan is outcome-oriented, it has stayed true to Stormwater Planning: A Guidebook for British Columbia.”
“A number of tools, in particular the Water Balance Model, have been created to help municipalities adapt to climate change. The Okanagan Basin Water Board will be hosting a workshop to get these tools in the hands of the people that need them by bringing in the experts to answer questions and provide hands-on training,” announces Anna Warwick Sears
“As information and communication become more integrated (What was life like before the internet?), distributed networks are emerging as powerful components of our social system. Rather than Big Brother gathering data and taking top-down action, responsibility is shared,” states Anna Warwick Sears, Executive Director of the Okanagan Basin Water Board.
“We spent the last half a century trying to control runoff with dikes, storm sewers, curbs and gutters. Now, increased development and increased storm intensity from climate change are increasing peak flows and altering the rules of the game,” stated Anna Warwick Sears. “Rainwater management keeps water on-site, improving water quality by reducing runoff pollution, allowing the rain to infiltrate and recharge aquifers, and establishing ways to harvest water for other uses. Rainwater management complements management of larger storm events, and reduces infrastructure requirements overall.”
“The overall objective is to move municipal governments beyond conventional stormwater management, and inspire them to use rainwater as an integrated resource. The Rain to Resource workshop will bring together a wide cross-section of interested and knowledgeable individuals and provide an opportunity for them to share their knowledge and experiences. BCWWA is pleased to partner with the OBWB in this initiative,” stated Daisy Foster.
“The majority of the workshop presentations were delivered by members of the “convening for action” partnership network, and were about case studies that are featured in Beyond the Guidebook 2010,” reports Ted van der Gulik. “British Columbia made a conscious decision to follow an educational rather than prescriptive path to change the way that land is developed and water is used. A ‘design with nature’ policy framework enables local governments to build and/or rebuild communities in balance with ecology.”
“We probably all knew that rainwater is a resource, but when we start zeroing in on what we can do, we are going to see how valuable it is. But what about the other Q! It is amazing how many times we look at QUANTITY, and I am from the region that wants to talk about QUALITY. So when we get into rainwater as a resource, it is really important that we recognize the quality of the water that we are dealing with when we put it into our lakes and rivers,” stated Stu Wells.
During the period 2000-2001, the mantra in British Columbia was “overcoming fear and doubt” in order to move ahead with projects such as the East Clayton in the City of Surrey, and UniverCity on Burnaby Mountain in the City of Burnaby. it was Patrick Condon of UBC who said: ‘If we fail, it will be a generation before anyone will even have the opportunity to try again; so we must not fail’. Hard-fought successes have ultimately made it possible to change land development practices to capture rain where it falls.
