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“At a critical moment, members of the Partnership for Water Sustainability team would have an idea around a research theme that supported our hypotheses. And as often happened, I was the arm that had the energy and willingness to take on the research, apply new science in North Vancouver, and get the work done,” stated Richard Boase. The Partnership brought funding to the table, UBC’s Hans Schreier provided grad students and brought in other professors, and North Vancouver provided the case studies.

“There are so many different parts to EAP. And with each part you can go down a distinct pathway that helps local governments. And that is what Sam Gerrand has done in such a holistic way with his master’s thesis which moves EAP from a stream-by-stream approach to a regional scale. As we become more familiar with EAP and its applications, it is becoming increasingly apparent that it requires tailored communication to a variety of audiences to emphasize that this is one tool to increase and maintain the health of our stream systems,” stated Anna Lawrence.

“Delta urban areas are built out. This reality means there are limited opportunities for slowing, spreading and sinking rainwater. The municipality is effectively limited to retrofitting of rain gardens within road corridors in order to provide rainwater infiltration that protects stream health. Delta has some 500 kilometres of roadways. In 2005, the municipality embarked upon a long-term initiative to incrementally improve the urban landscape though streetscape revitalization. The corporate vision is to enhance community liveability by beautifying streets, one block at a time,” stated Hugh Fraser.

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.

“Given all that I have seen in BC over my 40-year career – recession in the 1980s, political instability in the 1990s, current crises in housing and food affordability, drug overdoses, health care system for an aging population, gang violence, etc., it will be difficult for water to receive sufficient and sustained attention from the BC government alone. Canada’s investment and collaboration, done in a spirit of enabling provincial and territorial capacity to manage water would allow us to keep moving forward,” stated Mike Wei in his testimony to a House of Commons Committee.

“What I learned from my students when I was a college instructor which has served me well in my career is the realization that people need to have hope, they need to have optimism, and they especially need to believe that they can make a difference. In the early 2000s, topics like climate change and sea level rise were only just emerging as really important issues. If an instructor only presents doom-and-gloom scenarios, your students get pretty discouraged and upset,” stated Zoe Norcross Nu’u.

“Instill a culture of continuous improvement and giving back to the community so that the community elects good, well-meaning people. It is a cycle. The community elects good people to council. And councillors rely on staff to come up with ideas. The council supports those ideas and is willing to fund them. Staff carries them out. The community notices those ideas being implemented, and they are happy. It is a cycle! The community becomes even more appreciative. If you keep that cycle going, there is no end to it. The cycle actually does work,” stated Pete Steblin.

“Many of the metaphors that we find in the 19th century literary and historical texts unfortunately harbour mastering visions. They saw oceans and waterways being there to serve human purposes. But the idea behind that mindset is that water and aquatic entities are inert, incapable of expressing themselves. They are seen as commodities. They are not seen as lively, agentic beings who can feel. We affect water, and we are affected by water. It is a two-fold process. When waterways are colonized by socio-political systems as commodities, they protest,” stated Serpil Oppermann.

The 2024 BC Land Summit potentially represents a seminal moment in what the Partnership anticipates will be an “awakening process” leading to a fundamental attitude change about use and conservation of both land and water in British Columbia. With an attitude change, anything is possible. “At the BC Land Summit, Paul Chapman and I will tag-team to present the local government and stewardship sector perspectives, respectively. He and I are working from different directions to bring about an attitude shift,” stated Richard Boase.

“Once a network is up and running and proves itself to be effective, it becomes the primary vehicle for change, rather than the individual organizations themselves. The leaders who work in this way are really competent in what they do. They have great people skills, they are good organizational managers, and they are good at seeing the big picture and identifying where they need to engage others and build the network to solve the problem. I have been studying people who have done this well and documented the patterns and themes from their work,” stated Jane Wei-Skillern.