This is the sixth in a series of columns previewing presenters at the Imagine – Learn/Inspire/Act Conference being held on Saturday, May 6 at the Almonte Civitan Hall. The What Now Lanark County committee is pleased to share the biography of Susan Brandum whose talk will be Is Lanark County Ready to Pull its Weight on the Climate Crisis?
Sue says “There is no more urgent fight for women right now than that of climate. The crisis will affect women more than everything else in the world – more than abortion roll-backs, more than oppressive governments, more than lower pay grades. Already 80% of people displaced by the climate crisis globally are women. Climate justice is a global feminist issue. “ There is no greater feminist cause today than saving the planet and each other” said Fatima Bhutto in a recent article in the Guardian.
While Lanark County has not seen the devastation wrought on our southern sisters, we have seen more harmful ice storms, floods and tree damage and certainly can expect more. Sue will describe the recent and near term pathways and obstacles for climate action in this leading Eastern Ontario county.
Biography
Susan is a co-founder and a Director of Climate Network Lanark and Chair of its Local Government and Communications Working Groups. She recognized the need for an organization focused on climate action in her geopolitical area and, with Gord Harrison, founded Climate Network Lanark. She wrote Tay Valley Township’s Climate Action Plan for FCM (Federation of Canadian Municipalities) and led CNL’s contributions to Lanark County’s Climate Action Tables.
Before moving to Port Elmsley 25 years ago, she was a specialist energy reporter and writer working in energy market publications, for the natural gas industry and for the Ontario government. In her volunteer time, she managed the Coalition for Green Economic Recovery. She co-authored, with senior writer Wayne Roberts, the underground bestseller “Get a Life! How to make a good buck, dance around the dinosaurs and save the world while you’re at it!
Susan became the general manager of REAL, the Rideau Environmental Action League, based in Smiths Falls. She led REAL through a transition from being a wholly volunteer organization to a professional one which employed local professionals in helping resident throughout Lanark, Leeds and Grenville counties learn and implement practices that reduced their environmental impact. Always aspiring to more for a small organization, she lead REAL when it contributed, as one of six organizations in the nation, to test and develop the original EnerGuide for Houses program and subsequent home energy efficiency programs; when it initiated a Well and Septic program that was picked up across Ontario and other provinces and won a national award, when it developed the first shoreline naturalization programs in the region and when it developed the largest used goods store in the region, The REAL Deal Reuse Store.
This presentation is sponsored by The Hub/Rebound, which has been in business in Almonte for 49 years. One of the cornerstone tenets of The Hub/Rebound is to recycle clothing and household goods for reuse. In this way the organization serves both social and environmental needs. As an estimate, probably more than 100 tons of goods are kept out of landfills each year.
Conference tickets are $40 (includes lunch and snacks) and are available at www.ticketsplease.ca. You can also purchase tickets at Baker Bob’s in Almonte. Thanks to some generous individuals, there are some free tickets available. For more information email www.whatnowlanarkcounty@gmail.com.
