Green Jobs Forum Informs and Inspires

A Green Jobs BC forum on construction and retrofitting brought together more than 100 green jobs advocates from across British Columbia last week. Green Jobs BC formed in 2011 as an alliance between BC’s labour and environmental movements, to build a strong, sustainable economy for British Columbia.

"Green Jobs BC is really about organized labour and the environment movement taking the lead on modernizing our economy, and doing so in a way that values the environment, and good, family-supporting jobs,” said B.C. Federation of Labour President Jim Sinclair.

On the eve of the forum, Sinclair said he expected participants to learn about real, practical approaches to reducing energy consumption, while creating good jobs, by starting with where we live.

Among the forum participants were city planners, construction and building trades workers, labour leaders, environmental activists, first nations leaders and business people. Forum organizers said that the diversity of interests represented at the forum were key to the outcome.

Rob Fleming, MLA for Victoria Swan Lake and NDP environment critic attended sessions with the T’Sou-ke First Nation and with Clean Energy Works, an Oregon based organization that had retrofitted more than 1,000 homes.

The forum is an exciting agenda about how we create high quality jobs in British Columbia that will help reduce greenhouse gas production and do the right thing by the environment,” said Fleming. “All of the major players at the conference have real experience in doing these things, and are looking for leadership from government.”

Fleming said he found the example of BC Hydro working with the T’Sou-ke nations was particularly inspiring. “Some of the most economically challenged communities in our province are First Nations. Where we can advance sustainability and create social justice and training opportunities, that’s a real green jobs agenda and one government should be pursuing.”

The Clean Energy Works program is designed to assist homeowners in retrofitting their homes through low-interest financing, and utilizes Community Workforce Agreements to ensure jobs created through the program are well paid and include training opportunities. Project coordinator Kelly Haines said that the program typically reduced home energy use by thirty per cent.

BCGEU President Darryl Walker said he found the forum to be cause for excitement, as it showed that not only are labour and environment together on the green jobs agenda, but that with business people, first nations and community organizations in the room.

“We’ve been working for a long time to bring labour and environment groups together to start talking about what it means to create green jobs and to start to change the economy of our province while still maintaining jobs for working people,” said Walker.

Brian Hayashi, representing the Canadian Home Builders Association central interior also attended the forum. He said that with their focus on energy efficient building it was encouraging to see so many different interests coming together. “The level of commitment we see at this forum means that we are well on our way, and that it’s not going to die off or peter out.”

B.C. Federation of Labour Secretary-Treasurer Irene Lanzinger, who moderated panels throughout the day called the forum a success. “We are leaving here with innovative ideas and concrete actions to move the green jobs agenda forward, and that’s what we set out to do.”

For more information:

Visit the GreenJobsBC  website

View GreenJobsBC retrofits forum pictures on Flickr

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This article was originally printed in the BC Federationist.