This year our own Bob Jonkman (Kitchener—Conestoga) has been involved in organizing the annual Nonviolence Festival Day In the Park. This family friendly free festival is held in the cool shade of the Victoria Park island.
Building New Relations
The world is built through our relationships – each of us affecting the other, and being affected by our surroundings.
Building New Understanding
The way we understand the world (our personal values, beliefs, philosophies, etc.) guide what we do in the world.
A change in consciousness equals a change in the world.
Building New Strengths
As we continue to act in the spirit of nonviolence, we grow internally, developing new skills and comprehensions.
By working together in new ways we open the future to new personal and social possibilities.
History
The first Nonviolence Fair and Concert was held in 2005, in Waterloo Park. It was organized by volunteers to highlight the many positive activities in Waterloo region.
Wednesday, 6 July 2016 from 6 PM – 8 PM Trusted Clothes is hosting a clothing swap at 283 Duke Street West, Kitchener, Ontario Click here for a Map
Bring good quality clothes that you don’t want anymore and leave with the same amount of new stuff!
Event is completely free and is to raise awareness about textile waste and the environment.
Men’s, women’s, kid’s, baby’s, accessories and shoes – all are welcome.
We have partnered with the Kidney Foundation to collect any leftover clothes with proceeds going to research. Please feel free to bring any clothing you wish to donate as well.
— Trusted Clothes facebook event page
Although this is not a Green Party event, Trusted Clothes commitment to ethical, sustainable environmentally friendly (and health conscious!) endeavours will very likely appeal to green folk.
Did you know Cambridge Green Candidate Michele Braniff is CreateWaterloo’s Artist in Residence? You can spot some of her work inside Grand River Transit buses.
Michele Braniff
To celebrate Canada Day, join Michele this afternoon between 1 – 3 for Drop in urban sketching at the old Waterloo Train Station 10 Father David Bauer Dr, Waterloo, ON N2L 6M3 [directions here]
Michele promises a fun experience using pens on blank paper to produce your own highly personal & creative record of summer street scenes in Uptown Waterloo. There will be tips & coaching on selecting drawing sites, framing the sketch and using lines and shapes to suggest people, buildings and perspective. Bring your own tools and chair.
Then at 4:00pm Michele will be hosting a Story Telling Concert
In the tradition of campfires and listening together, Michele invites you to a storytelling event at the train station where she will use voice, expression and imagination to re-create the ancient tradition of storytelling. In celebration of Canada Day, Michele has created and collected stories to celebrate Waterloo County and Canada.
Artist At Work: Michele Braniff sketches Bob Jonkman at the KW Multicultural Festival
When we talk about climate action in Canada, the conversation often turns to fossil fuel subsidies — the billions of dollars our Federal and Provinical governments, as well as Export Development Canada, have been spending to support our oil & gas sector. The 2015 Paris climate agreement, signed last fall by the current Federal government, gives new urgency to keep global temperature rise below two degrees. To do that, we need to keep fossil fuels in the ground.
Fort McMurray. (Photo courtesy Flickr user sbamueller)
This week, the “Three Amigos” summit saw Canada, the U.S., and Mexico agree to common goals for transitioning to a low-carbon, clean energy future. Like the Paris agreement, it’s a generally positive committment that needs to be followed up — soon — with action.
The “North American Climate, Clean Energy, and Environment Partnership”, as it’s called, re-affirms Canada’s 2009 committment to phase out fossil fuel subsidies in the “medium term”. This week’s news sets a more specific goal — Canada, the U.S., and Mexico have agreed to a phase-out date of 2025.
So let’s get going. If Canada is serious about transitioning away from fossil fuels, we need to do much more than the Liberal election platform proposes (a modest scaling-down of one particular tax deduction). We still have a complex web of subsidies that benefit the oil & gas sector. They all need to go.
Deductible expenses
Tax deductions let corporations declare expenses to reduce their taxable income. These four programs directly encourage the expansion of fossil fuel operations at home and abroad:
10% deduction for Canadian Oil and Gas Property Expenses (e.g. buying oil sands rights, buying a well, leases, permits, and licenses)
30% deduction for Canadian Development Expenses (e.g. expanding a mine, building new haulage routes)
30% deduction for Foreign Resource Expenses (e.g. overseas exploration and drilling of fossil fuels)
100% deduction for Canadian Exploration Expenses (e.g. surveying land for new fossil fuel extraction opportunities, environmental studies, and community consultations before opening a mine)
Provincially, B.C. also offers a 20% tax break on coal mining expenses through the Mining Exploration Tax Credit.
Accelerated Capital Cost Allowance
Capital Cost Allowance (CCA) is a way for all kinds of businesses to deduct the cost of equipment over several years.
Accelerated Capital Cost Allowance (ACCA) speeds that process up, putting money back into the hands of fossil-fuel companies faster and reducing their taxes.
While the ACCA no longer applies for oil sands projects, it was recently introduced for liquified natural gas (LNG) projects.
In 2014, Canada eliminated duty fees for offshore oil and gas drilling equipment. This makes it more affordable for Canadian companies to drill for fossil fuels in our vulnerable Atlantic and Arctic waters.
Flow-through share deductions
Normally, tax deductions can only be claimed by the business that actually incurs the eligible expense. However, flow-through shares let corporations pass on the deductions directly to investors, whose income gets taxed as capital gains, at half the rate of regular income.
Canada allows flow-through shares for qualifying Canadian Development Expenses and Canadian Exploration Expenses – a sweet kickback for both corporations and their individual investors.
Royalty credits
In Canada, natural resources such as minerals, oil, gas, and groundwater are owned by the Provinces. They charge royalties to companies that extract these resources.
B.C. offers a Deep Drilling Credit that waives royalty fees between $444,000 and $2.81 million per well for new fossil-fuel drilling projects.
B.C. also offers up to 50% discount on royalites for oil & gas companies to build new roads and pipelines through the Infrastructure Royalty Credit Program. The purpose of the program is to boost oil & gas exploration, and extend the drilling season year-round.
Reduced sales tax
Both Manitoba and B.C. don’t charge provincial sales tax on machienry and equipment involved in oil, gas, and mining. This includes prototyping equipment, surveying and exploration equipment, and even drill bits. There’s also a discount on the electricity required to operate the machinery.
Where do we go from here?
This week’s “Three Amigos” agreement needs to be followed up with aggressive action.
If we are to keep the planet from spilling over that 2-degree threshold, we can’t continue funding dirty fuels.
If we’re going to encourage clean energy development, we can’t keep incentivizing oil & gas exploration.
As we move forward, remember that there is a lot of work to be undone. It starts with dismantling these subsidies.
Candidates Nick Wendler (#KitCen) and Bob Jonkman (#KitCon) the K~W Multicultural Festival WRGreens Info Booth (2015)Candidate Richard Walsh (#Waterloo) dispenses Green Party buttons at the 2015 K~W Multicultural FestivalLaurel & Laura “We Can Do It”Bob Jonkman (Kitchener-Conestoga)WRGreens were selling Heritage Tomato seedlings last year.WRGreens are always happy to talk about Green issues.2015 #GPC Candidates Bob Jonkman and Richard Walsh
Drummers opened the Film Festival at the Waterloo Library.
The month of June is National Aboriginal History Month. This year marks the 20th annual National Aboriginal Day in Canada, a celebration of the history, culture and contributions of the First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples of Canada on the Summer solstice, June 21st.
There is a lot of interesting stuff in Waterloo Library’s National Aboriginal History Month display. North America is known as “Turtle Island” among Canada’s Indigenous population.
When explorers and then settlers arrived in the already occupied “new world,” instead of learning from and co-existing with the indigenous peoples, they intended to (and did) take the place over. The settlers made treaties with the inhabitants, who were happy to share their world and trade with the newcomers. And so treaties were made.
But the North American native population didn’t realize who they were dealing with, and so they took the Europeans at their word.
The map below shows the area promised by the Haldimand Treaty October 25th, 1784:
“…Six miles deep from each side of the river beginning at Lake Erie, and extending in the proportion to the head of said river, which Them and Their Posterity are to enjoy forever.”
On the the 2015 side of the map you can see that “forever” didn’t mean what we think it means. For the Indigenous inhabitants, dealing with the Europeans was like dealing with Darth Vader… the deal kept changing and nothing could be done.
Last night I had the privilege of attending indigiNATE Now, the National Aboriginal Day Film Festival put on by Create Waterloo and imagineNATIVE. The program consisted of a powerful series of award winning short films made by Aboriginal filmmakers from around the world.
I learned about the Film Festival from CreateWaterloo’s Artist In Residence, Michele Braniff, an incredibly versatile and talented woman who Waterloo Greens remember as the Cambridge Green Party Candidate in the 2015 federal election.
My Story
9:15 minutes, 2013 | Directed by Shania Tabobondung
Using simple, yet clever whiteboard animation, a young woman’s personal journey of struggles and courage through her early life are poignantly and artistically depicted in this impressive film debut.
Shania Tabobondung is a 17-year-old Anishinabekwe from Wasauksing First Nation. Her passion for the written word and visual arts has led her to seek future academic studies in journalism and/or media arts. My Story was the 2013 imagineNATIVE Tour Video Contest winner, which had over 40 films in contention.
Like any 16-year-old, Alyssa desperately wants to fit in with the crowd. But will her dreams crumble as her deepest secret is revealed?
Danis Goulet (Cree/Métis) is an award-winning writer and director. Her short film Wakening played before the opening night film at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival.
Liar
7:48min, 2012 | Directed by Adam Garnet Jones
A young man`s secret fuels a twisted vendetta for revenge in this powerful examination of intolerance.
Adam Garnet Jones (Cree/Métis) is a queer filmmaker originally from Edmonton, Alberta. His short films have been broadcast on television and screened widely at film festivals, including ImagineNATIVE. He is currently in post production on his first feature film, Fire Song.
Woodcarver
5:44, 2011 | Directed by Ehren (Bear) Witness
This innovative tribute in response to the murder of totem carver John Williams by a Seattle police officer in 2010 employs image mixing, documentary footage, and an ingenious soundscape to commemorate a tragedy not to be forgotten.
Bear Witness (Cayuga) is an Ottawa-based media artist who has been producing short experimental videos for over eight years. Bear is a member of the award-winning DJ collective, A Tribe Called Red.
This docudrama short film is an interpretation of an interview and performance of Buffy Sainte-Marie that originally aired on CBC TV’s program TBA with host John O’Leary in 1966.
Actress, filmmaker and singer-songwriter, Tara (Beier) Browne (Cree) won the Best Experimental award for this film at imagineNATIVE in 2014.
Evocative and haunting, director Lisa Jackson crafts a stunning performance-based piece that captures the brutality of violence against Indigenous women, yet celebrates hope for a future illuminated through advocacy and understanding.
Named one of Playback Magazine’s 10 to Watch in 2012, Lisa Jackson’s (Anishinaabe) genre-bending films span documentary, animation and fiction. Her work has also garnered numerous awards and her film, Savage won the Genie award for Best Short Film in 2010.
Acclaimed playwright Yvette Nolan voices her personal experience in this beautifully poetic and intimate exploration of the multigenerational effects of Canada’s residential school system.
Shane Belcourt (Metis) is an award-winning filmmaker, writer and musician based in Toronto. His debut feature film, Tkaronto closed imagineNATIVE in 2007 and has screened at film festivals worldwide.
Apikiwiyak (Coming Home)
12:46min, 2014 | Directed by Shane Belcourt and Maria Campbell
In this collaborative work, originally presented as a live reading and visual accompaniment, Maria Campbell, an acclaimed Métis author from Saskatchewan sets out to hold a mirror out for Indigenous non-Indigenous people to peer into the never-ending legacy of colonial violence.
Maria Campbell (Cree/French/Scottish) is a community worker, storyteller and filmmaker whose bestselling autobiography Halfbreed – an important document on ethnic relations in Canada – encouraged many First Nations people to become writers. In addition to her many other publications, she has also written or directed stage plays, films and videos.
On April 24, 2007, Environmental Commissioner Gord Miller released a report in which he warned that “funding cuts spanning 15 years have left Ontario vulnerable to a catastrophe similar to the Walkerton tainted water tragedy.” (Guelph Mercury, April 25, 2007). The Mercury reported that Miller also told a press conference in Sudbury that, “Our present course puts our ecosystems, our biodiversity, our health and parts of our economy at serious risk of deterioration and catastrophic events.”
In 2007, residents were challenging Nestlé’s Water Taking in Aberfoyle, citing the disconnect between MPP Liz Sandalls claim the “The Clean Water Act focuses on source water protection” while effectively allowing Nestlé to take whatever water it likes absent independent data on the impact to local aquifers.
Bottling and selling our water is hugely profitable for Nestlé, and yet the multinational isn’t even paying its way as the result costs Ontario money.
Mike Schreiner writes:
“Several industries get a total free ride when it comes to taking our water, an explosive new report from Ontario’s Environment Commissioner revealed. Those who do pay for taking water — “phase one” industrial and commercial users that include bottled water producers; vegetable and fruit canning facilities; and certain types of chemical manufacturers — are charged a paltry $3.71 per million litres used.
This is not a typo.
This nominal fee works out to less than $10 for enough water to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool. That works out to $0.00000371 per litre. After the ECO report I walked down to the basement in Queen’s Park to double check that a 500ml bottle of water was still selling for $2. That’s right, you can buy a litre of bottled water at Queen’s Park for more than it costs a company to take 1 million litres of our water.
This absurd system enables the provincial government to recover only 1.2 per cent of the money it spends on water quantity management programs. Since the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MOECC) receives less money today than it did in 1992, the budget it has for water management is not enough to make it an effective steward of our water resources. Yet, the province is essentially giving away our water.
And yet it goes on. Nestlé continues to pump water out of Ontario Aquifers and sell it back to us, reaping enormous profits. Or worse, shipping it elsewhere, which has permanently lowers the supply of water available to us in our aquifers.
The water Nestle is taking comes from municipal water supply– the drinking water our municipal governments filter and treat to make sure is safe for us to drink. To offset the costs of cleaning, storing and delivering water to our taps, Ontario citizens pay our local public utilities about $1.50 for 1,000 litres of water for our personal use. The reason we pay so little for the water we consume is because the taxes we pay subsidizes the cost. This is how public utilities work, and the reason they exist: by sharing the infrastructure investment, the costs can be kept down to ensure the public has equal and reasonably affordable access to a necessity.
But the Provincial Government gives Nestlé a sweetheart deal.
We pay $3.00 per 1,000 litres
Nestlé pays $3.70 per 1,000,000 litres
The multinational company pays pays a miniscule fraction of what we pay, which allows it to realize enormous profits when bottling our water and selling it back to us. Do they employ some Canadians? Sure thing. Does the company pay its fair share of taxes? Truthfully, I don’t know. What I do know is that this company is paying too little for the refined natural resource it sells at a profit. Ontario taxpayers are subsidizing this rich and powerful multinational, so we know Nestlé is perfectly happy to not pay its fair share. And companies are shameless: they exist to make as much profit as possible, so of course they take what they get.
Basic Income Waterloo advocates meet with Richard Walsh & Bob Jonkman at the WRGreens Office [2015]Guaranteed Liveable Income is part of Green Party of Canada policy. During the 2015 it was a integral piece of the GPC’s integrated plan to eliminate poverty in conjunction with a renewed commitment to Universal Health Care, introduction of Pharmacare, a National Housing Strategy, and the elimination of Post Secondary tuition and debt relied for those struggling under enormous student debt loads.
Oddly enough, this is not at all a new thing. The Canadian Government partnered with the Manitoba Government to run a guaranteed annual income pilot project they called Mincome in Dauphin ~ A Town Without Poverty? ~ back in the 1970s. As often happens with long term projects in countries using winner-take-all voting systems, the government changed and the new lot boxed up all the data and stored it away.
This is becoming a hot topic worldwide, and here at home we’re hearing about this from all levels of government:
The Waterloo Green Party had is hosting the second Guaranteed Livable Income Green Learning Community event on Saturday to help get a handle on what this social policy is all about.
Announcing the GLI Learning Community @KPL
As a learning community, we’ve met once already to develop a set of questions we’d like to explore. When we meet on the 18th, we’ll dig deeper, sharing what we’ve learned and discussing more. All are welcome, no need to have attended our first session.
The Waterloo Region Greens invite you to drop by and say “hi!” at our first ever Open Streets information booth! Grab a WRGreens sticker and sign Elizabeth’s electoral reform petition!’
Walk
bike
scoot
skateboard
or fly down to check it out!
There’s always lots to do
see
and listen to!
If you’ve never been to an Open Streets before you’re in for a treat!
Wednesday, 6 July 2016 from 6 PM – 8 PM 
There’s lots to do to celebrate 
Mike Schreiner writes:
