More than two years after a failed dike led to flooding in his small Quebec community, Joel Godmer recalls the surreal sight of his home half-submerged in water.
“I was shaking,” he said in a recent interview. “I was in shock for sure.”
Godmer’s home in Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac, Que., west of Montreal, was one of many damaged by flooding in April 2019.
It has since been repaired and the nearby dike rebuilt, one-and-a-half metres higher than before. But this month’s flooding disaster in British Columbia brought back bad memories, he said.
“It’s a big warning for everyone,” Godmer said.
Time to overhaul infrastructure
Climate specialists say a major overhaul of infrastructure in communities across Canada is needed to make homes, buildings, roads and rail lines more resilient to extreme weather events, as climate change makes those events more likely.
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“Infrastructure decisions in Canada are not accounting for a changing climate,” said Ryan Ness, research director for adaptation at the Canadian Institute for Climate Choices.
An engineer, Ness is lead author of a recent report that found if there are not significant investments now to make infrastructure more resilient, Canada could see $13 billion in flooding damage yearly by the end of the century.
More than 2,000 homes were evacuated in Sainte-Marthe-sur-la-Lac, Que., after a dike failed in April 2019. (Ryan Remiorz/The Canadian Press)
What does adaptation look like?
Changes are necessary at the individual and government levels, Ness said, ranging from simple home retrofits ensuring functioning sump-pumps to regulations requiring disclosure of climate change risks for major projects.
Protecting the green space that acts as a natural defence against extreme weather is also crucial.
Wetlands, for instance, help keep down temperatures during heat waves and help drain runoff during intense periods of rain, said Joanna Eyquem, managing director of climate resilient infrastructure for the Intact Centre on Climate Adaptation at the University of Waterloo.
Adapting to climate change needs to be seen as a long-term investment, she said.
“We need to learn to learn to live with it more effectively and better,” she said. “So that people are not losing their lives and we don’t have the same amount of damage.”
A demolition crew removes the remains of a mobile home in Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac in August 2019, after the floods earlier that spring. (Graham Hughes/The Canadian Press)
Some communities have already taken steps
There are examples across the country of communities taking steps to adapt to more extreme weather.
Based on a climate impact report, the town of Selkirk, Man., built separate storm and septic sewers to better handle excess water and made wider boulevards that can hold more snow.
In Mississauga, Ont., a local conservation group installed walls of vegetation to slow down and clean storm water coming off a major roadway.
“We know how to build resilience into infrastructure because it’s being done,” said Darren Swanson, an associate with the International Institute for Sustainable Development, a think tank based in Winnipeg.
These kinds of projects need to be happening on a much wider scale, said Swanson.
WATCH | Report highlights top areas of climate-change risk for Canadian communities:
New report warns of climate change risks for Canadian communities
2 years ago
Buildings, coastlines and northern communities face the biggest threat from climate change in Canada. That’s according to a new report done for the federal government, which highlighted six top areas of risk for Canadian communities. 3:35
Political, financial and social hurdles
The federal government has funded some projects — including part of the new dike in Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac. —through its disaster adaptation fund.
Godmer said the higher dike makes him feel safer.
“If they did it the same way it was before, I wouldn’t be feeling safe,” he said.
But not everyone in the community likes it. Resident Serge Racette said his waterfront home used to have a view of the lake from his backyard, but it is now obstructed by the dike that runs for five kilometres along the shore.
Serge Racette says his home is now obstructed by the dike that runs for five kilometres along the shore in Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac. (Alison Northcott/CBC)
“I understand we have to be protected,” Racette said, standing atop the dike looking out over Lac des Deux-Montagnes. “But we have to be protected by the right construction.”
He and other homeowners argue the dike is higher than it needs to be and have launched a lawsuit against the municipality.
Beyond infrastructure improvements, other preparations are needed. Residents need to know how to prepare for emergencies, and that requires access to critical information like maps of flood zones and dikes, said Isabelle Thomas, a Université de Montréal professor who specializes in community disaster preparation.
“Whatever the risks, they need to know … so that it can be prepared,” she said.
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VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
