WATER BALANCE FORUM HOSTED BY CITY OF SURREY: Curriculum built around a regional team approach to “Living Water Smart and Making Green Choices in the Metro Vancouver Region” (March 2009)
Note to Reader:
In March 2009, the Metro Vancouver Water Balance Model Forum was held in Council Chambers at Surrey City Hall. The morning session commenced at 9:00am; the afternoon session ended at 4:30pm.
To download a copy of the Agenda, click on Lesson Plan – Draft Outline of What We Want to Achieve.
Convening for Action in the Metro Vancouver Region
How do we simultaneously work together as staff within a municipality and as a region AND externally with developers and other private sector players, to ensure we implement sustainable approaches to development?
City of Surrey hosts Water Balance Model Forum
The foregoing challenge provided context for advancing a ‘regional team approach’ at the Metro Vancouver Water Balance Model Forum on March 12, 2009. Hosted by the City of Surrey, this learning event was co-sponsored by the Water Balance Model Inter-Governmental Partnership and the Green Infrastructure Partnership.
Regional Team Approach
The Surrey Forum is a first step in advancing a regional team approach to rainwater management and green infrastructure that will align local actions in Metro Vancouver with provincial goals as stated in Living Water Smart, BC’s Water Plan. “We are adapting the experience gained and the lessons learned from the Vancouver Island pilot program,” states Raymond Fung, Chair of the Green Infrastructure Partnership.
Story of the Surrey Forum
The Forum program was built around the HOW question as it pertains to green infrastructure: HOW will the City of Surrey ensure it gets built right; HOW will a consistent regional approach be achieved in Metro Vancouver?
Downloadable Documents
Leading up to the Forum, a series of downloadable documents were published on Water Bucket. They progressively described the elements of the Forum program in order to establish participant expectations. Briefly:
On February 2nd, Story #1 titled Living Water Smart and Making Green Choices to Create Liveable Communities and Protect Stream Health introduced what will be covered in the morning and afternoon sessions.
On February 11th, Story #2 titled Making Green Choices: Opportunities for Law and Policy to Effect Change on the Groundintroduced the shared responsibility theme, and is the bridge from the morning to the afternoon.
On February 18th, Story #3 titled Green Infrastructure in the City of Surrey: “Getting it built right”elaborated on the learning outcomes for the Forum morning session.
On February 25th, Story #4 titled Making Green Choices: Use the Water Balance Model to Inform Land Development Strategies foreshadowed how regulators and designers can apply the Water Balance Model to facilitate implementation of green infrastructure solutions.
On March 4th, Story #5 titled Provincial Context: Today’s Expectations are Tomorrow’s Standards for Green Infrastructure elaborated on the provincial and regional context that will inform local actions.
“We envision that the Surrey Forum will be a transformational event and a catalyst for action. One of our goals is to implement an educational program in Metro Vancouver that would be modelled on the Vancouver Island Learning Lunch Series,” stated Raymond Fung in foreshadowing what to expect.
Waterbucket Online Versions
The downloadable documents are complemented by online versions that are complete with embedded links to other resources on the Waterbucket Website. To access the online versions, click on 2009 Metro Vancouver Water Balance Model Forum.
