The Haut-Pays Mobilized: Joint Sustainability Action Plans for Four Rimouski-Neigette Municipalities

The Community Futures Development Corporation of La Neigette (CFDC, SADC in French) will develop four joint sustainability action plans based on the resources and know-how of a group of four municipalities in Haut-Pays de la Neigette that are considered to be in need of revitalization. Located in the Lower St. Lawrence region, the municipalities are Saint-Eugène-de-Ladrière (430 residents), Saint-Marcellin (350 residents), La Trinité-des-Monts (259 residents) and Esprit-Saint (379 residents). These municipalities have very strong social ties; increasing interaction between the municipalities will encourage innovative, sustainable solutions, sharing and mutual support. This initiative is the only group planning process in the region. The goal of the project is to develop a transparent, bottom-up, participative process. To achieve this objective, all the key stakeholders who participate will be regularly informed and will contribute their knowledge by means of an email survey, information in local newspapers, citizen consultations and workshops. The process will be based on three key documents: the Quebec Sustainable Development Act, Agenda 21 and the Man-made Landscapes concept of the Ministry of Sustainable Development, Environment and the Fight against Climate Change (MDDELCC). The sustainability plans will reduce costs, maintain and improve services in the Haut-Pays community and provide economic stimulus. A series of measures will be considered to improve waste management (e.g., coordination of pick-up to reduce costs and GHG emissions), promote sustainable mobility (e.g., improvement of bicycle paths and walking trails), improve water management (e.g., creation of rain gardens on municipal properties) and reduce GHG emissions (e.g., elimination of bunker oil from municipal buildings). A feasibility study will also be done for each municipality to suggest behavioural and material solutions for reducing GHG emissions. Priorities will be set by analyzing a number of criteria to determine which actions contribute significantly to municipal sustainability and directly to the key issues. Each municipality will set up a working group that will learn the new know-how in workshops conducted by a sustainability professional. Each working group will appoint representatives to work on their sustainability plan and set realistic objectives with short, medium and long-term targets and appropriate performance indicators. The municipal councils will be kept informed of progress on a regular basis by the various working groups and will check and adopt the resulting plans. Inter-municipal meetings are planned to enable the municipalities to share information. The sustainability plans will be presented and adopted by the four municipal councils in June 2017. Sustainability planning is relatively new for the region and the proposed procedure may certainly serve as an example for other Canadian municipalities in need of revitalization. (Project description from original funding application)