Sleepy BC Sunshine Coast town chooses climate ‘crisis’ over ‘emergency’

Anyone who’s been to Sechelt, BC lately could be forgiven for thinking the sky is falling.That’s because the normally sleepy and picturesque town has opted to declare a climate ‘crisis’ — as opposed to ‘emergency’ — that warrants immediate attention from the local town council..On February 22, the Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD) voted 6-2 to raise the status of its previously declared climate ‘emergency’ to a full blown ‘crisis’ and schedule a special meeting to consider a so-called ‘Community Climate Action Plan’ to provide the board with a list of “meaningful actions” that can be taken before the end of June.The SCRD administration had previously presented a draft plan last year but it was never formally adopted. The council justified the drastic undertaking under Section 185 (d) of BC’s Local Government Act that specifies the duty of council to foster “the current and future economic, social and environmental well-being of its community.”.“BE IT RESOLVED: That the Sunshine Coast Regional District officially declare a climate crisis for the purpose of formalizing and deepening our commitment to protecting our community, ecosystems and economy from global warming,”Sunshine Coast Regional District.“AND WHEREAS each decade since the 1980s has been warmer than the previous one, with 2023 deemed the hottest year on record, showing a clear trajectory of increase in global warming;”“AND WHEREAS the impacts of a warming climate on the Sunshine Coast — including drought, sea level rise, wildfire risk, severe storms and extreme precipitation — are significant and increasing in frequency and affect the financial, physical and mental health of our residents;”“AND WHEREAS urgent, meaningful and just climate action is needed from all levels of government in order to foster a healthy, equitable and livable future for current residents and the next seven generations;”“BE IT RESOLVED: That the Sunshine Coast Regional District officially declare a climate crisis for the purpose of formalizing and deepening our commitment to protecting our community, ecosystems and economy from global warming,” it said..Although the two councillors who voted against the motion were supportive of declaring an ‘emergency’ one of them, Leonard Lee, said he took “offence to being told I need to deepen my commitment” to climate change action, according to the Sunshine Coast Reporter.The other, Justine Gabias, said she’d heard from local residents that the term ‘crisis’ is alarmist and might have a negative effect.Although the two are often used interchangeably, the term ‘climate crisis’ didn’t take off in Google searches until the 2006 release of Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth and surged again in 2018 when the term ‘global warming’ began to fall out of favour with activists for not conveying a sense of urgency.According to a 2020 article in the scientific journal BioScience the term ‘crisis’ is used by those who "believe it evokes the gravity of the threats the planet faces from continued greenhouse gas emissions and can help spur the kind of political willpower that has long been missing from climate advocacy."The first official climate change declaration by a local government was made in Darebin, Australia in 2016. Edmonton followed suit in 2019.Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek declared a climate 'emergency' in November 2021, immediately after being elected. That eventually resulted in Calgary’s hugely unpopular single-use serviette and bag bylaw.

Sleepy BC Sunshine Coast town chooses climate ‘crisis’ over ‘emergency’

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