Category:

…2018

OP-ED ARTICLE: Province must halt the decline of its biodiversity – Waterway restoration key to helping British Columbia deal with climate change (published in the Vancouver Sun in September 2018)


“2018 is a teachable year. This past summer, if you wanted to know what climate change will mean to your future, all you had to do was be outside to see what is to come. The entire Northern Hemisphere was impacted by extreme weather – drought, forest fires or flooding,” stated Bob Sandford. “Prominent scientists say 2018 marks a turning point in human history. We may have crossed an invisible threshold into a new climate regime. But it is not the end of the world; just the beginning of another.”

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GUIDANCE DOCUMENT: “Too Small to Fail – How Communities Can Prepare for Bigger Storms” (Intact Centre, November 2018)


“In recent years we have seen a dramatic rise in insurable losses related to extreme weather events in Canada, and we have seen insurance payouts average $1.8 billion over the past nine years, up from an average of $400 million just a decade prior,” stated Dr. Blair Feltmate. “The lesson of this report rests with its focus on the utility of small-scale, local flood mitigation projects. Attention is often directed to large-scale initiatives that are deemed ‘too large to fail’, meaning that their collapse would cause catastrophic and irreparable damage.”

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OP-ED ARTICLE: Celebrating a Decade of Living Water Smart in B.C. – Where To From Here?(Asset Management BC Newsletter, June 2018)


“A game-changer flowing from Living Water Smart is ‘Asset Management for Sustainable Service Delivery: A BC Framework’. Led by Asset Management BC, the BC Framework sets a strategic direction for local government service delivery,” stated Kim Stephens. “Hydrology is the engine that powers ecological services. Thus, integration of the Partnership’s work within the BC Framework should accelerate implementation of the whole-system, water balance approach at the heart of the ‘Sustainable Watershed Systems, through Asset Management’ program.”

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OP-ED ARTICLE: Kim Stephens – Celebrating a decade of living water smart in B.C., but where to from here? (published in the Vancouver Sun in June 2018)


“The hard work of hope has resulted in a policy, program and regulatory framework that enables community-based action to adapt to the New Normal. Living Water Smart successes are defined by collaboration and a “top-down / bottom-up” approach. This brings together decision-makers and community advocates,” stated Kim Stephens. “The legislative piece is the Water Sustainability Act, one of several game-changers. A historic achievement, the Act recognizes the connections between land and water – what happens on the land matters!”

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DOWNLOADABLE RESOURCE: Assessing the Worth of Ecological Services Using the Ecological Accounting Process for Watershed Assessment – Demonstration Applications on Vancouver Island (April 2018)


“The focus of EAP is on watershed hydrological conditions and the dependent ecological services provided, and which sustain natural systems and human settlement. EAP is not about engineering practices as the analytical starting point. Neither is it about managing hydrology through a land use, transportation, or other human settlement framework,” stated Tim Pringle.

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DOWNLOADABLE RESOURCE:  Water Stewardship in a Changing Climate: Convening for Action at the 2018 Nanaimo Water Symposium – Sharing & Learning from Collaboration Success Stories (April 2018)


“Two decades, and in partnership with the City of Nanaimo, NALT launched Project 2000 to catalyze neighbourhood stewardship of city waterways. NALT held many community meetings to grow awareness of what living in a watershed means. Nowadays, groups come to NALT to tell us about their stewardship activities and to seek ways to expand those activities. We are working together to grow our network and activities across the region,” stated Paul Chapman.

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DOWNLOADABLE RESOURCE: The Partnership for Water Sustainability in British Columbia – Our Story (March 2018)


“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.

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GUIDANCE DOCUMENT: “Water Balance Approach on Vancouver Island” (#7 in the Watershed Case Profile Series, released January 2018)


The storyline is built around three regional Water Balance Methodology demonstration applications. “To be useful…the simulation model must be physically based and deterministic, and it must be designed to simulate the entire hydrological cycle…hence it must be a water balance model,” wrote Ray Linsley (1917-1990). He pioneered development of continuous hydrologic simulation as the foundation for water balance modelling. The Water Balance Methodology is a synthesis of watershed hydrology and stream dynamics.

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