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Speaking at United Nations Headquarters
19th Annual Global Forum on Human Settlements

On October 24, I spoke at the Global Forum on Human Settlement in New York at the invitation of the Urban Economy Forum who recently named Richmond Hill the first Frontrunner City in Canada. I was asked to share the local perspective on topics related to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and discuss the approach we are taking in Richmond HIll.

Of course, it was an honour to be asked and I was proud our city has achieved this level of global recognition for the hard work that our City staff, committed residents, and community groups continue to do. While I listened to other delegates, I realized that Richmond Hill has really important knowledge to share – I was one of the representatives who spoke about reinforcing local actions, while many presenters were focused on high level policy.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities has always recognized the importance of municipalities when addressing climate change -“In Canada, municipalities have influence over roughly 50 percent of the nation’s Green House Gas emissions and the ways we live, work and play can have a huge impact. By matching the federal government’s emissions reduction targets of 40 to 45 percent below 2005 levels by 2030, municipalities alone could get us halfway to Canada’s emissions reduction target of net zero by 2050.” (Municipalities for Climate Innovation Program)

This reinforces how critical our individual and collective efforts are and as I talked about our growing tree canopy, our recycling and waste diversion, our HERO education webinars, and our goal of Net Zero by 2050, what I was most excited to share was our resident engagement, our fantastic volunteerism for the annual Clean up Green Up, and the many small but important grass roots actions that our community undertakes, everyday.