Ontario community action

The aim of this page is to recognise, celebrate and encourage the self-empowerment of community agency networks (CANs) and community groups' activism for climate, environment and many other sustainability topics across Ontario.
City Planning, Provincial Rulemaking Take a Snow Day, energymixweekender.substack.com (Dec 08, 2024) — Developers are consulted lavishly. Citizens get less than a week to respond, with city services and prime farmland hanging in the balance. What if cities started listening to the public? Lella Blumer
Court decision in youth climate lawsuit against Ontario government ignites hope, The Conversation (Jun 20, 2023)
- Ontario's 2017 Basic Income experiment was branded a failure by opponents - but the opposite is true, Mar 6, 2020...thealternative.org.uk
Networks and sustainability initiatives
- Green Drinks Ontario
- Plan It Green, Strathroy-Caradoc
- Transition Guelph
- TransitionKW, Kitchener-Waterloo
- Transition Perth
- Transition Town Peterborough
Food activism
Lanark Local Flavour - Perth Farmers' Market - The Table Community Food Centre - Windsor Essex County Community Garden Collective
The G-Spot in Ottawa
Everyone knows healthy food — be it meat, dairy products, or fresh vegetables — is usually expensive food. For university students, rushing from classes to low-wage jobs with or without family support and grabbing food wherever they can, eating healthy may fall by the wayside, often for financial reasons. The Garden Spot, better known as the G-Spot, is based at Carleton University in Ottawa. It's one of several student-organized kitchens across Canada that has been founded in response to a rising student cost of living. "Rising tuition and rent in Ottawa meant that average food budget took a nosedive. Many students literally live on rice and ketchup for weeks at a time, their energy and concentration faltering, and increasingly must rely on coffee and other stimulants to stave off hunger and keep them going," wrote Kelly Fritsch, an early member of the G-Spot collective, nearly a decade ago. The collective has been serving pay-what-you-can, vegan home-cooked meals weekly since 2001.[1] Carleton Food Collective
Community currencies activism
Climate action
Sustainable transport activism
- Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation
- Open Streets Hamilton
- Ottawa has been the site of Ciclovías-type street closures since 1970. Every Sunday morning during the summer over 50 kilometres of roads in the heart of Ottawa and nearby Gatineau Park are reserved for cyclists, in-line skaters, runners, and pedestrians. Alcatel-Lucent Sunday Bikedays.[2]
- Open Streets Uptown Waterloo
Towards sustainable economies
Ontario has announced plans to test a type of unconditional income guarantee; it is currently (Oct 2017) enrolling participants in three areas of the province, who will receive an income guarantee for up to three years.[3]
News and comment
2013-2017
- Resilience, Community Action and Societal Transformation: in Peterborough, Apr 20, 2017...[4]
- Ontario pilot project puts universal basic income to the test, Oct 28, 2016...[5]
- Ontario plans to trial universal basic income, Mar 7, 2016...[6]
- Windsor Youth Centre plans teaching garden to help build self-esteem and life skills, November 23, 2015...[7]
- Kitchener group builds community cob oven, August 31, 2015...[8]
- Picturesque Perth: a model of sustainable, independent living in Canada, By Jen Wilton, September, 2014...[9]
- Hamilton Getting a First-Class Bike Share, Hits the Road in April,[10] December 2, 2013.
References
About Ontario
Past events
- March 22 - 29, 2014, Transition Guelph Resilience Festival
Ontario is the southernmost province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it is home to 38.5 per cent of the country's population, and is the second-largest province by total area (after Quebec). Ontario is Canada's fourth-largest jurisdiction in total area of all the Canadian provinces and territories. It is home to the nation's capital, Ottawa, and its most populous city, Toronto, which is Ontario's provincial capital.
Ontario is bordered by the province of Manitoba to the west, Hudson Bay and James Bay to the north, and Quebec to the east and northeast. To the south, it is bordered by the U.S. states of (from west to east) Minnesota, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York. Almost all of Ontario's 2,700 km (1,700 mi) border with the United States follows rivers and lakes: from the westerly Lake of the Woods, eastward along the major rivers and lakes of the Great Lakes/Saint Lawrence River drainage system. There is only about 1 km (5⁄8 mi) of actual land border, made up of portages including Height of Land Portage on the Minnesota border.
The great majority of Ontario's population and arable land is in Southern Ontario, and while agriculture remains a significant industry, the region's economy depends highly on manufacturing. In contrast, Northern Ontario is sparsely populated with cold winters and heavy forestation, with mining and forestry making up the region's major industries.