Approximately 35 residents, including members of the Jasper Sustainability Club for Youth, attended the evening meeting to discuss their vision for the municipality’s green building policy.
“I’m glad my students are here to see the development of this policy because they’re going to be the ones who end up following the policy and they’ll be the ones building in the future,” said Adam Robb, Jasper Junior/Senior High School teacher and creator of the sustainability club and class. “I want them to feel a sense of ownership by following this because they helped create it.”
Also on hand was Mike Mellross, senior environmental project manager for the City of Edmonton, who shared details about Edmonton’s green building policy.
Afterwards, people divided into groups and brainstormed what key elements should be included in Jasper’s green building policy and how these elements will be best implemented.
Some of the ideas involved developing an independent standard for green building, similar to how Whistler outlined its own standards in its sustainable resort-municipality plan.
Multiple groups agreed that more community members, especially homeowners, should be engaged in the building policy and Jasper’s sustainable efforts. It was suggested that an effective social marketing campaign would reach more Jasperites.
Ensuring that green building is accessible for everyone was another repeated concern. Easy-to-read policy documents, plus financially reasonable materials and projects would add incentives to green building.
Since Jasper is a unique municipality—given that it’s located in a national park—there will be more renovating rather than erecting brand new buildings, so it’s imperative that the policy thoroughly addresses renovations. To assist with green renovations, a rebuild-it centre was proposed. This is a place where building materials can go and be repurposed for another project, instead of being thrown away.
Achieving systemic sustainability is the ultimate goal, and the sustainability club is evidence that education should begin young. School trustee Betsy DeClercq noted that once complete, the SEED classroom will be an important education tool for children.
Sustainability and “going green” is obviously resonating with the community because the sustainability club received a $5,000 cheque from Servus Credit Union at the evening discussion. This is in addition to another $5,000 also donated by United Water.
Moving forward, “we’ll take everything back from these workshops to the committee and start to hammer out where we’re going to go next,” said Janet Cooper, environmental stewardship coordinator.
All information from the green building policy discussions will be available on the municipality’s website.
“We really got the ball rolling now and we are going to have a good green building policy at the end of the day. Something will come of this because that’s our goal.”
