The Futurology Exchange by Okanagan Life Magazine

Big Ideas We Need Now — #7

Inspired by This Magazine's feature "40 ideas We Need Now," we invited some of Okanagan Life's regular contributors, along with other notable Valley residents to give us a big idea whose time has come, for the Okanagan and for the world. Sadly, more than 90 per cent of those we invited said they were simply too busy. Perhaps, then, the first big idea is that we should all slow down so that we actually have the time to contemplate how to collectively make a better future. Still, we managed to receive a diverse array of ideas that are sure to make you think, make you laugh, make you angry or even make you want to put in your own two cents. Well, here's your chance. Comment on these ideas, or add your own by emailing us. In the meantime…

Green Roofs — Is Farming’s Future Over Our Heads?
by David Madison

I look down from my small airplane on a tidal flood of new subdivisions washing up our hillsides. I see miles of fresh pavement covering the earth to prevent us from getting dust on the shiny chrome of massive off-road SUVs that ply their way from these new homes to supermarkets, soccer fields and schools so that our obese offspring can be fed, exercised and educated in controlled, supervised and sanitized ways.

My view from above is mostly grey; the grey of shingle or tar rooftops, cement driveways, multi-lane highways and huge parking lots. In the summer this great heat-collecting mass sends violent thermals into the afternoon sky and creates its own microclimate. If I were blindfolded I could tell when I’m flying over the city because of the sudden roughness of the air. In winter the reverse is true and the inversion holds the millions of molecules from our burned hydrocarbons close to the surface cloaking the entire valley in a choking, monochromatic depressing grey. It’s the Okanagan’s own version of a fart in a phone booth.

Big Ideas We Need Now — #8

Inspired by This Magazine's feature "40 ideas We Need Now," we invited some of Okanagan Life's regular contributors, along with other notable Valley residents to give us a big idea whose time has come, for the Okanagan and for the world. Sadly, more than 90 per cent of those we invited said they were simply too busy. Perhaps, then, the first big idea is that we should all slow down so that we actually have the time to contemplate how to collectively make a better future. Still, we managed to receive a diverse array of ideas that are sure to make you think, make you laugh, make you angry or even make you want to put in your own two cents. Well, here's your chance. Comment on these ideas, or add your own by emailing us. In the meantime…

A Space of Our Own
by Bruce Kemp

When the Great and Powerful Oz gave the Tin Man a heart, he admonished the clanking character to be careful because the heart is a fragile thing. Like the heart of a Tin Man, the heart of a city is very delicate as well and if you don’t believe a city has a heart then the magic of Paris is lost on you bub.

Right now, with this mania for developing and redeveloping every square inch of land, Kelowna has to be very careful not to lose its heart.

What Kelowna’s citizens need right now is a space to call their own. Not a space tailored to the tourist trade or the Shadow population who drift in for two weeks out of the year and leave nothing of substance behind when they take off, but a livable space that preserves our city’s sense of self.

Big Ideas We Need Now — #10 & 11

Inspired by This Magazine's feature "40 ideas We Need Now," we invited some of Okanagan Life's regular contributors, along with other notable Valley residents to give us a big idea whose time has come, for the Okanagan and for the world. Sadly, more than 90 per cent of those we invited said they were simply too busy. Perhaps, then, the first big idea is that we should all slow down so that we actually have the time to contemplate how to collectively make a better future. Still, we managed to receive a diverse array of ideas that are sure to make you think, make you laugh, make you angry or even make you want to put in your own two cents. Well, here's your chance. Comment on these ideas, or add your own by emailing us. In the meantime…

Do It Yourself
by Jennifer Cockrall-King & Florian Maurer

Big ideas for the Okanagan? This conjures up the image of Gary Larson’s cartoon of a sheep in the middle of a herd shouting: “I want to be me!” When it comes to needing BIG ideas, we’re in it together with the rest of the world. Let’s cut out the “I am special” silliness.

Some BIG ideas have been around forever. It is more a case of picking them up again when needed, and that’s what our submission is about: DIY. Do it yourself! It’s what an architect and a food writer can agree on. It offers ways to confront grim problems: shortage of food and shelter, abundance of unrealistic expectations. Here is our take on it.

When Community Growth Causes Personal Pain

This past Friday (February 8) I attended a forum in Kelowna co-sponsored by the City of Kelowna and the John Howard Society of the Central Okanagan. The program was titled: Crime Prevention and Sustaining Healthy Communities.

From that, I was inclined to expect something on the theme of law and order, so the message I heard was quite a surprise.

The keynote speaker Craig Jones, a Phd, criminologist, researcher and executive director of the John Howard Society of Canada, worked from the premise that "rapid economic growth does not benefit everyone equally. Some people - for a complex variety of reasons - suffer severe psycho-social dislocation. Traditional criminal justice responses usually exacerbate such situations."

Well then, certainly Kelowna qualifies under the heading of rapid economic growth. And according to statistics presented in a pre-session handout by the Poverty and Homelessness Action Team of the Central Okanagan, nearly 300 people – men, women, families with children and seniors – sleep outside and in shelters; last year the Kelowna food bank distributed nearly 30,000 hampers to low income families helping nearly 10,000 children; close to 40 per cent of the city’s homeless people are over 50 years of age; and surprisingly, 27 per cent of homeless people work full or part time.

In a city where housing prices have doubled in the last five years, the action team’s figures indicate that 5,000 households spend more than half their income on housing and 22,000 people are at risk of becoming homeless. With a zero rental vacancy rate, the city needs an additional 8,000 affordable housing units.

So I could easily buy a case for severe psycho-social dislocation.

The Future of the Okanagan: A Round Table Discussion Worth Responding To

Compelling conversations don't get much better than this one (available as a text transcript or audio recording), held at the Rotary Centre for the Arts this past November. Okanagan Life Magazine invited some of the Okanagan's best minds and important players to sit down and talk about the Valley's future, as well as options for its sustainability. What we heard at this discussion left us determined to learn more about the issues and with a new mandate to help get the Okanagan's residents involved and participating in a broad exchange of ideas.

Listening to this discussion, it becomes very clear that our shared future is being shaped right now, and if we all go along with the status quo, we may be in for a great deal of unpleasant consequences. Now is not the time to be apathetic.

Hear what a development manager, a wine industry consultant, an organic farmer, an aquatic biologist, a technology expert, a registered architect, a business consultant to First Nations, and three UBC-O professors (from the schools of economics, engineering and sociology) have to say on issues such as the impacts of global factors on the Okanagan, growth and development questions, and the impacts that absentee homeowners have on our communities.

This blog has been set up to share news, views, reviews and interviews on the subject of the Okanagan's future and it's sustainability. I encourage everyone to make comments on anything we post here, beginning with your thoughts and reactions to this round table discussion. Don't leave the important ideas and debates to back room meetings. Get involved and voice your opinions so that our leaders cannot ignore you.

Fresh Outlook Foundation CEO, Joanne de Vries: Sustainability in the Okanagan

When we were doing background research to prepare for the round table discussion that would become the backbone of our Okanagan Life magazine feature story, A Jolt From the Blue ... The Future of Our Valley (January/February 2008), we came across word of a conference that was to be held in Kelowna (November 2007) - the Building Sustainable Communities Conference. We immediately signed up and were bowled over by the quality of the presentations we attended.

This was the second annual conference, hosted by an Okanagan NGO called the Fresh Outlook Foundation, a social marketing organization dedicated to the "development and delivery of programs that enable and encourage sustainable behaviors in people’s home, workplaces, and recreational activities throughout British Columbia."

Fresh Outlook was founded by Joanne de Vries, who describes herself as a communications consultant who has worked 15 years "helping local governments in BC educate and consult with their publics, primarily about sustainability issues such as water use efficiency, solid waste management, energy efficiency, transportation demand management also some strategic and official community planning."

In an interview about the conference, we asked her some of the questions that we planned to pose at our round table discussion. Here's what Joanne had to say.

Aquatic Biologist Darryl Arsenault on Sustainability in the Okanagan

As an engineering consultant and also director of the BC Lake Stewardship Society, sustainability issues are part of Darryl's everyday life. When we interviewed him for a sidebar in Okanagan Life's feature story A Jolt From the Blue...the Future of Our Valley (Jan/Feb 2008), we wanted to hear his thoughts on some of the questions posed at the round table discussion that was the core of the feature. Here's what Darryl said:

Green Builder Andrew Gaucher on Sustainability in the Okanagan

When we interviewed Andrew Gaucher, owner of Green Solutions Inc, for a sidebar in Okanagan Life's feature story A Jolt From the Blue...the Future of Our Valley (Jan/Feb 2008), we also asked him some of the questions posed at the round table discussion that was the core of the feature. Here's what Andrew had to say.

Inspired Ideas for a Sustainable Future

Alex Steffen, founder of WorldChanging.com, gives an upbeat presentation of possible solutions to global challenges. Check out the straw that purifies water as you drink it, or my favourite — flowers that change colours where landmines are present below them. He also offers up Vancouver as a city that is implementing some progressive ideas. While some of the answers in his presentation seem irrelevant to us in the Okanagan, I think the message is clear. We need to think differently about how we approach living here. And, we should be very capable of finding innovative solutions to the issues we are facing in this region if we have the willingness to do so.

Cradle to Cradle Design: An Idea Whose Time Has Come

William McDonough, co-author of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things, gives a humourous presentation about the need for, and very real capabilities of, designing the products we consume to be fully sustainable and ecologically-friendly — without ending up in a landfill or a "slow motion waste" recycling stream in which the material recycled cannot be used to re-create a product of the same quality as the original.

McDonough also presents plans for an entire sustainable city to be built in China (yes — China!). It's an amazing concept, and should it be pulled off, will give the rest of the world a great template to build on or use as inspiration.

This presentation offers some reasons to remain optimistic about the possibilities for our future. Wouldn't it be great if the Okanagan's new economy could be built with companies and practices with these ideas at their core?

I must give credit to Ethan Andrews, my good friend from Denver, Colorado for passing McDonough's book on to me as a gift. Ethan does some amazing work in the way of environmental art and design with his company Leap Year.