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Erik Karlsen

    GEORGIA BASIN INTER-REGIONAL EDUCATIONAL INITIATIVE: “We had big goals. We had a lot of practitioners at the local government level who wanted to innovate, and we had a lot of political interest in how to do this,” stated Dale Wall, former Deputy Minister of Municipal Affairs


    “Moving into the 2000s, the Green Infrastructure Partnership was bringing practitioners together in Metro Vancouver to have conversations about innovation. It was the convening for action process that built confidence among practitioners to introduce these approaches. It was a peer learning network that the Partnership was building. And that was one of the strands to introduce infrastructure innovation and build more sustainable regions. It was a conversation between practitioners who said, I tried that and this is how it worked or did not work, or this is what I learned,” stated Dale Wall.

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    GEORGIA BASIN INTER-REGIONAL EDUCATIONAL INITIATIVE: “With the change of government in late 1991, all of a sudden land use planning and natural resource management was front and centre, and I really wanted something substantive to do,” stated Joan Sawicki, land and resource management champion, and former provincial cabinet minister


    “There was a clear understanding and consensus on the challenges – that the Georgia Basin was one of the most ecologically diverse regions and also one of the most threatened. There was trouble in paradise. All communities knew they were under intense pressures and that we had to do something about it. With a strong Minister of Municipal Affairs, Darlene Marzari, the ‘settlement side’ of land use planning went straight into regional planning and the Growth Strategies Act. We also had been given a clear vision along with sustainability principles,” stated Joan Sawicki.

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    GEORGIA BASIN INTER-REGIONAL EDUCATIONAL INITIATIVE: “A defining moment for me was the Salmon in the City Conference in 1998. It was a memorable event,” stated Susan Haid, career environmental and urban planner in BC local government, and adjunct assistant professor at the University of British Columbia


    “It is really heartening to observe the recent renewed interest in what I think of as ecosystem-based planning and is now often called green and blue systems in cities,” stated Susan Haid. “It sounds simple, but it is heartening because this has NOT really been a key theme in the public dialogue for some time. The pandemic has reminded us of the importance of green space and access to nature. It is even more important now because in 1997 we did not have the kind of weather extremes such as atmospheric rivers and heat domes that we are now regularly experiencing.”

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