Toronto Election 2010
Housing and transit are not just the biggest infrastructure issues facing cities today, they are also the biggest social, economic, and equity issues. A healthy city must be able to house people of all income levels in a stable way, allowing them to build social capital in neighbourhoods and live close to where they work, play, and shop. The ability to move around the city easily, to work, to worship, to play, and to buy things, weaves relationships throughout the city, creating a strong civic fabric.
The 2010 municipal elections will see other important issues raised. Many, like immigrant settlement, waterfront development, or anti-poverty initiatives, will relate to housing and transit. They will have significant “city building” aspects to them that will respond to the demands that the large numbers of new city residents will make over the coming four years. Other issues will have more to do with the processes of running the city – whether work is done by city employees or contracted out, for example.
The question of municipal finances will be hotly debated – whether the city has been saddled with limited revenue tools which will never meet its needs or is simply spendthrift and wasteful. Within that debate will be the old chestnut of residential versus business property taxes. Property tax has an uncanny way of inflaming passions among normally civil people. Also within the financial realm will be the consideration of whether the city should sell some of its assets, and to what purpose the proceeds should be put.
Substance and process will intertwine during the 2010 municipal campaigns, thrown into relief by the receding recession and torqued up by political rhetoric. *The Mark* has invited a number of writers to comment on various issues as the campaigns unfold in cities across Ontario.
Green Jobs and Toronto
by Chris Lowry
Award-winning Toronto-based writer and producer.
- First Posted: Apr 08 2010 09:04 AM
- Updated: almost 2 years ago
What do mayoral candidates mean by “green jobs,” and what do they plan do to about them?
Green jobs have become a new priority in Ontario these days, particularly for funders like the Trillium Foundation, with its vast lottery revenues. This is good news because it’s stimulating all kinds of community agencies to make the connection between green issues and their traditional focus on social issues.
In the last two years, we’ve witnessed many agencies reframing their work as “green.” Whether or not they have been winners in the scramble for grants, they have been pushed to integrate environmental concerns with social justice. While the Ontario government is beginning to invest in companies that can create jobs in clean technology, energy-efficient construction, and renewable energy, the foundations are starting to invest in greening up the workforce through community-based programs.
Green jobs, or “green-collar jobs,” involve environment-friendly products or services. Construction work on a green building, organic farming, solar panel manufacturing, bicycle repair – all are considered green jobs. The green-collar economy is big money, and it's booming. With renewable energy and clean technology included, “green” is the fifth-largest market sector in the U.S.
Green-collar industry sectors include renewable energy, green buildings, clean transportation, water management, waste management, and land management. The food sector is often overlooked as perhaps the most important green-collar sector of all, if the predicted expensive energy, constrained resources, and climate change come to pass.
The green industry still includes traditional environmental jobs such as waste management, remediation, and engineering to reduce environmental impacts – the clean up side of things – but also a range of renewable energy technologies, components for the growing electric vehicle industry, high-tech products and services in pollution prevention, intelligent transportation systems, and energy-use monitoring technology. Green jobs in the service sector include installation and maintenance of all forms of clean technology, green building design and retrofitting, and energy auditing services.
Where are the green jobs? That depends on whether you mean new jobs or existing jobs. From the perspective of large industrial employers, green responses to climate change will not create many new jobs in their companies, but will require that their employees acquire new skills. So most green jobs involve additional training for existing workers and staff. New green jobs are likely to come from small- and medium-sized businesses as they grow to meet new demand for green goods and services needed to meet the challenges of climate change and the rising cost of energy (which will make all imports more expensive).
What we need to understand is that all jobs can be green jobs. Leaders need to help change the story about green jobs so that businesses will be compelled to mobilize workers to take aggressive measures to maximize energy and resource efficiencies while eliminating toxic emissions, particularly carbon emissions that contribute to climate change. This includes every kind of job, from bank executive to doctor, steelworker to daycare worker, taxi driver to farmer.
But it’s important to note that a green job is not necessarily a good job. The conversion of the old grey economy to a green one will require leaders, including our mayor, to champion green-collar jobs with equity, good wages and benefits, and job security.
Here are just a few questions for Toronto mayoral candidates to answer when it comes to green jobs:
- Do you understand and support the agenda of Toronto’s community and labour coalition, “Good Green Jobs for All?”
- What will you do to ensure that new jobs in Toronto are good green jobs that are accessible and available to underserved populations?
- What will you do to ensure that Toronto’s transit system moves away from dependence on fossil fuels and internal combustion engines toward an integrated, clean public transit system for the city region?
- Recognizing that the domestic market is vital for local manufacturers and businesses to create green jobs, that locally produced goods and services mean less transportation, and that a vibrant local economy protects against energy-related risks, will you review the city’s procurement rules across the board to give preference to sourcing from local Ontario manufacturers and businesses in the city?
- What else will you do to encourage the growth of green manufacturing in the Toronto region?
This is one of a series of essays on the big issues in Toronto's upcoming election.
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