Inverloch beach. Photo: BC CAN By Michael Nugent
YOU’VE installed solar roof panels, you avoid heavily packaged goods, you leave the car at home and walk or bike, you take your own cup for takeaway coffee …
But while you and I are trying to reduce our carbon footprints and to live more sustainably, individual actions alone won’t save us from climate change’s most severe effects.
We also need collective action from federal, state and local governments to reduce emissions, i.e. climate change mitigation. Collective action is also needed for climate change adaptation, i.e., to help communities adapt to the inevitable effects of climate change, including those already upon us in Bass Coast, such as increased coastal erosion.
YOU’VE installed solar roof panels, you avoid heavily packaged goods, you leave the car at home and walk or bike, you take your own cup for takeaway coffee …
But while you and I are trying to reduce our carbon footprints and to live more sustainably, individual actions alone won’t save us from climate change’s most severe effects.
We also need collective action from federal, state and local governments to reduce emissions, i.e. climate change mitigation. Collective action is also needed for climate change adaptation, i.e., to help communities adapt to the inevitable effects of climate change, including those already upon us in Bass Coast, such as increased coastal erosion.
And while we all know it’s a global problem, we also know that tackling climate change requires local action. That’s why locals are joining the newly formed Bass Coast CAN (Climate Action Network).
CAN’s goal is “A just transition to a safe climate future for all people, all species, and all generations”. We operate primarily within the municipality of Bass Coast, but also promote and become engaged in activities with a state, national or global focus. We seek to galvanise action at the local level through:
We also call for strong leadership and decisive action on climate change mitigation and adaptation from all levels of government to respond to the current climate emergency.
Bass Coast CAN has run two events to date: in May, our screening of Accelerate attracted over 60 attendees. In June, more than 140 people took part in a panel discussion focused on the extraordinary erosion at Inverloch beach, with input from two internationally renowned scientists and local citizen scientist Aileen Vening.
We recently held a forum of core members to identify what activities the group will take on in future. Many wonderful ideas were brought up that you will hear more about soon.
CAN’s goal is “A just transition to a safe climate future for all people, all species, and all generations”. We operate primarily within the municipality of Bass Coast, but also promote and become engaged in activities with a state, national or global focus. We seek to galvanise action at the local level through:
- generating, gathering and delivering information,
- facilitating community action, and
- influencing decision-makers.
We also call for strong leadership and decisive action on climate change mitigation and adaptation from all levels of government to respond to the current climate emergency.
Bass Coast CAN has run two events to date: in May, our screening of Accelerate attracted over 60 attendees. In June, more than 140 people took part in a panel discussion focused on the extraordinary erosion at Inverloch beach, with input from two internationally renowned scientists and local citizen scientist Aileen Vening.
We recently held a forum of core members to identify what activities the group will take on in future. Many wonderful ideas were brought up that you will hear more about soon.
Bass Coast Climate Emergency Petition – we need your signature by August 7. For now our most significant action, and it is a very important action, is the launch of a Climate Emergency petition to make sure Bass Coast Shire Council understands that its community demands serious and immediate action on climate change.
It’s a growing movement. Already, over 800 councils and governments, including Melbourne, Sydney and New York, in 17 countries and covering more than 140 million citizens, have declared a climate emergency (up from 700 just a month ago). They acknowledge that dangerous climate change is happening now, and accelerating. They are acting on their citizen’s concerns that current policies and actions are seriously inadequate, exposing current and future generations to unacceptable risk. Declaring a climate emergency recognises that the window of opportunity for effective action is rapidly closing.
If our council accepts the science, then it needs to take a leadership role in the community and declare a climate emergency. A public declaration would signal its acceptance of the need to act with urgency and its intention to do so.
It would change how the community at large views this issue and help normalise discussion of climate change as THE issue of our day; one that demands action at a pace far beyond business and politics as usual.
Importantly, it would also put upward pressure on state and federal governments to do likewise.
We need you
To succeed, we need to demonstrate widespread support for emergency action.
Every single signature counts, so please print and sign the petition, ask your friends, family and colleagues to sign, put it on Facebook, ask your local shopkeepers if you can leave it for customers to sign, and take it to clubs and organisations you belong to.
Return each page, even if it has only one or two signatures (they all count) by August 7.
It’s a growing movement. Already, over 800 councils and governments, including Melbourne, Sydney and New York, in 17 countries and covering more than 140 million citizens, have declared a climate emergency (up from 700 just a month ago). They acknowledge that dangerous climate change is happening now, and accelerating. They are acting on their citizen’s concerns that current policies and actions are seriously inadequate, exposing current and future generations to unacceptable risk. Declaring a climate emergency recognises that the window of opportunity for effective action is rapidly closing.
If our council accepts the science, then it needs to take a leadership role in the community and declare a climate emergency. A public declaration would signal its acceptance of the need to act with urgency and its intention to do so.
It would change how the community at large views this issue and help normalise discussion of climate change as THE issue of our day; one that demands action at a pace far beyond business and politics as usual.
Importantly, it would also put upward pressure on state and federal governments to do likewise.
We need you
To succeed, we need to demonstrate widespread support for emergency action.
Every single signature counts, so please print and sign the petition, ask your friends, family and colleagues to sign, put it on Facebook, ask your local shopkeepers if you can leave it for customers to sign, and take it to clubs and organisations you belong to.
Return each page, even if it has only one or two signatures (they all count) by August 7.
- Drop off at the Bunurong Environment Centre in Inverloch (10am-4pm every day except Tuesdays)
- Drop off at Mitchell House in Wonthaggi (9.30am-4pm Monday to Friday)
- Give to any of the organising group: Aileen Vening, Dan Rosen, Erinn Harnden, Jessica Harrison, Maddy Harford, Mat Morgan, Michael Nugent, Naomi Coleman, Peter Mckenzie, or Richard Kentwell
- Mail to the South Gippsland Conservation Society, P.O. Box 60, Inverloch, VIC 3996.