Free webinar to focus on air quality concerns, aiming to spark political action

Windsor-Essex On Watch (WOW) is sponsoring a free virtual hour-long public discussion on air quality concerns in the wake of a summer that saw recording-breaking heat, storms and wildfire smoke.

The group said smoke-filled skies earlier this year across the Windsor-Essex region re-triggered decades’ old concerns about the health impacts air pollution has, hoping the webinar will spark political action.

“For decades, toxic air pollution and its consequences for our health have been known,” Randy Emerson, WOW spokesperson, said in a release. “We can’t be lulled into accepting the persistent daily poor air quality, which impacts all of us, especially poorer and more racialized communities and First Nations reserves.”

“The recent pollution caused by a record number of climate-change-fuelled wildfires has reignited the need to implement immediate community protections and strong regulatory action.”

The event will host an array of speakers, each of whom will present a brief summary of their particular concerns and perspectives in a rapid-fire panel discussion. A conversation about what can be done locally and beyond will follow.

“We want to give a snapshot here of the wide range of concerns,” said WOW member Jim Brophy. “Hopefully that will act as a stimulant to further discussions and to actions to demand regulatory controls.”

“I think what happened when we saw that Detroit was listed as ‘the most polluted city in the world,’ it should have been really, focused our mind that we're in the center of this thing too.”

“We're not going to get a pass and we need to take action. We need remedial action. And we're not hearing that from governments,” Brophy told CTV News.

“We thought again, like everyone else who could smell and see it that something really needed to be said because these decades long efforts have, by and large, have produced not the kind of regulatory controls and pollution abatement that we had all thought was coming.”

Jane McArthur, with the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) is among the several local, national and international speakers taking part. McArthur hopes solutions can be discussed to then be brought forward to local political leadership for consideration and implementation.

“The events of this past summer really crystallized for a lot of people that the air that we're breathing is potentially harmful to our health and well being,” McArthur said. “It's really a shocking revelation when you think I can't go outside and breathe air which is fundamental to life without putting myself at risk.”

According to McArthur, “We can't continue to go this way and expect that we're going to be living healthy lives or in a region that sustains our health and well being.”

“We don't get that action from municipal, provincial or federal governments on these issues unless we're really pushing them and I know that there's been a lot of energy in this community for a long time around things like active transportation and so forth,” McArthur continued.

“We need to keep pushing. We need our leaders to hear us that we care. We need them to see that these are real things that will matter to the lives of the people living in this region today and in the future.”

Meanwhile, Ward 9 city Coun. Kieran McKenzie said a progress report about Windsor’s Climate Change Adaptation plan was expected to be presented at council on Monday.

“We have a plan and we have a good plan,” McKenzie said. “The question always comes down to implementation.”

McKenzie applauded the city’s recent tree planting efforts as a good step towards improving local air quality but suggests there’s more to do with active and public transportation, creating future sustainable development and implementing a deep energy retrofit program for residents.

McKenzie said, “I think, if I'm not mistaken that over the last term of council, over the last four years of council, the City of Windsor planted more trees in those four years than any other four year period in its history.”

“So not only do we identify it as a priority, but we walk the walk on that, and people would probably notice in all of their neighborhoods across the entire city, and we're continuing that work.”

“There's some things that are in progress, some things that could be accelerated, and some other aspects that will require a council decision and frankly, the political will for us to implement those decisions, they're not going to be easy ones.”

The webinar event takes place Tuesday, Oct. 17 from 7 p.m. – 8 p.m.