On Saturday, at Mayor Yule’s sustainability fest, about 100 Hawke’s Bay sustainability buffs got a chance to discuss and promote their wish lists for the district and region. For helping to legitimize the issue politically, the Mayor deserves credit.
There was no shortage of ideas, reflecting the talent and experience in the room.
But two questions bug me as I reflect on the day.
First, isn’t there a more direct and efficient path to the concrete actions the Mayor said he was looking for?
As presenter Ann Magee from Auckland’s Regional Council amply illustrated, the world is awash in proven measures and models for reducing energy and water consumption, discouraging auto use, curbing waste, intelligently designing buildings and communities, and so forth. Other communities are doing these things, now.
Enormous progress toward sustainability could be made in HB simply by copying and adapting the success of others … then we could worry about inventing and innovating to deal with issues that might be unique to the Bay.
One dedicated, senior HDC employee — the Sustainability Advocate — reporting to the CEO, charged with systematically identifying and persistently advocating the methods and models of greatest utility to our region in the near term, would generate more change than a dozen sustainability forums. Of course the Advocate would tap local expertise, but the charge would be to find suitable best practices, wherever they might be.
An annual sustainability report documenting concrete accomplishments, presented and defended at an annual sustainability forum, would provide a basis for public accountability.
The second question that bugs me is the irony of the Mayor engaging the public in the quest for sustainability around issues like low-flow shower heads, even while championing sustainability-busters like the regional sports park, a wastewater treatment plant that will still pump sewage (under another name) into the Bay, and non-stop roadworks.
In other words, when it comes to the big issues affecting sustainability in the Bay, it seems to be business as usual.
What’s more important for the Mayor and HDC to do, for example, educate the public about shower heads … or demand that the Regional Council get serious about cleaning-up District rivers and cutting back on water allocations?
The latter won’t happen, because of the “you scratch my back; I’ll scratch yours” cronyism that plagues local government. If I as Mayor want an endorsement in principle for my sports park from the Regional Council, then I’d better not complain about their failing water stewardship.
So I’m all for low-flow shower heads, but to earn a passing grade in sustainability from most of those in the room on Saturday, the Mayor and his Councillors (only one of whom, Anne Wilson, bothered to attend)* will need to deliver a LOT more in the coming term.
The challenge isn’t finding actionable ideas and policies for nurturing a more sustainable region; the real challenge is finding the political will to embrace the tough and more meaningful ones.
Tom
*Regional Councillors McIntyre, Remmerswaal, Scott and von Dadelszen also attended.
Good to read your views on the Sustainability Forum.
As one of the HDC Councillors who was absent from the forum I am sorry to have missed it as I was attending my niece's wedding. I do however look forward to working with Lawrence to lead the team to embrace the meaningful challenges.
good point Tom ,but the councillors reflect the community and not a lot of private individuals have cancelled their winter holiday in fiji,installed solar hot water heating bought a bicycle and sold the SUV in favour of a fiat bambina. this is no excuse but as an illustration , a senior -ish staff member at HBRC said to me the other day "We re not going to pay to clean up your smelly rivers .thats your job " implying that the tukituki is a CHB problem and not a napier problem. And that is the issue .until some thing serious happens in our back yard ,it is easier to hate the japanese for klling whales than worry about the effects of my trip to wellington to see the arts festival. councils will change when community actions change.it was good to see 200 people at the tuki tuki meeting because that tells councillors that there is cocncern about that issue and eventually it gets translated ! into political action ,assuming we havent been annihilated before that great day comes.
kai te pai
tim g
There were also a bunch of chb councillors there- terry storey, maitland manning, terry ?….. maybe more?
A guest speaker from Waikato Uni (name?) said 'every environmental problem has a business solution' which I rejected at the time but on reflection see his point. Instead of pumping our shit into the rivers & sea it could be used to fertilise newly planted forests + carbon credits. Recycling all organic waste into compost, etc, but most issues would create business opportunities for some while reducing others. Eco-housing benefits the manufacturers of smart materials reducing electricity suppliers profits, efficent public transport reduces petrol suppliers profits, organic farming increases growers profits while wiping out the agro-chemical profits etc. Just thinking aloud here. As aside I did wonder if Lawence's hipster trousers were sustainable!