Councillor Don Palmer Providing Local Leadership & Working for You

In a blog post back in December I wrote it is time to create a clever climate action plan. A plan to better track, manage and reduce Council’s operational carbon and energy footprint.

The plan I refer to is one that we budgeted for this time last year. A plan to develop during the current financial year. A plan not only conceived a year ago but a plan that needs to be developed as part of our membership of the Global Covenant for Mayors for Climate and Energy.

Council’s corporate greenhouse gas emissions is the focus of the plan. A plan designed to make us carbon neutral by 2030. A plan focused on us rather than the community.

Our focus is on ourselves because we can only have a direct impact on carbon neutrality on our own emissions. We are restricted to an advocacy role to reduce, let alone, eliminate emissions that are the result of other levels of government. Or what you, our ratepayers do or do not do. Beyond that, what the many people outside our community that commute through or come to our region.

The clever climate action plan is available on the Council website here. Please check it out and provide us your thoughts. You can do this up to May 10, 2021.

Respond to the Your Say webpage, send the council an email at [email protected], or the old-fashioned write a letter method. If you do use the latter, I encourage you to hand-deliver it to the Civic Centre. Doing this will avoid it being lost in the Australia Post system.

Council will receive a report outlining the feedback received following community consultation. An updated Climate and Energy Plan resulting from this will also be presented to Council for endorsement. This plan will include a 10-year implementation plan.