Environment Lethbridge pleased with climate plan

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman - Lethbridge Herald on July 16, 2024.

Herald photo by Alejandra Pulido-Guzman Environment Lethbridge says the City's climate adaptation strategy and action plan features key action areas, such as planting urban trees that are drought tolerant.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

The City of Lethbridge recently approved a climate adaptation strategy and action plan and Environment Lethbridge spoke about their involvement and what it means to the community.

Kathleen Sheppard, executive director with Environment Lethbridge, said that the plan gives the City a set of tools to better prepared for things like drought and extreme weather, while also providing a guide on how to develop the city in a way that is more environmentally conscious.

“There’s a lot in it as you can imagine, but there’s eight key action areas. There is one that’s all about emergency response, things that we should be doing so that if something happens in Lethbridge we’re well positioned to respond,” said Sheppard.

She added that there is one action area that is all about water and it highlights the plans and actions that the city should be taking in order to respond to future drought.

“There’s one about protecting nature and ecosystems, looking at things like invasive species and weeds that might be encroaching into our native ecosystems and how we can manage those,” added Sheppard.

She said there is also another action area about city design and the importance of planting urban trees and making sure they are tree species that are drought tolerant.

“So that if we get more droughts, we’re not trying to water species that need lots and lots of water. Those are just some of the different sections here in the report,” said Sheppard.

She said she was really lucky to be able to take part in the development of the plan and was happy with how the City had multiple sessions with multiple organizations from the community to be able to develop it.

“Everyone from Economic Development to ourselves, to the social service agencies, just a whole cross section so from my perspective I’m really excited to see such a comprehensive report and a document that was really created with such a broad cross section of the community because it’s one of those things where everybody needs to buy into it in order for it to work,” said Sheppard.

She said it is a real accomplishment for the city to have a document that can be a guide that can hopefully support some future action initiatives that they can take.

“The document it’s really focused at the city and aligning the different city priorities around climate adaptation, but there are actions in there that talks about things that individuals can do as well,” said Sheppard.

The climate plan can be found at lethbridge.ca