Op-ed by GVAT Climate Justice Team co-leads - CRD must push province to fund rapid bus instead of expanding highways

Attending GVAT meetings over the last couple of months has confirmed our intuition that the voices of our parishes would be a great fit for this group. The campaigns that GVAT endorses emerge through teams focused on three present crises: mental health and addiction, climate change, and affordable housing. All of these domains have been included in the conversations I have had with parishes about Transforming Futures and about the concerns they have for their communities.

As faith leaders, we have a reverence for nature and an obligation to respond to the climate emergency. We are highly concerned about new research issued by the Wilderness Committee showing that the BC government allowed a 43 per cent increase in the cutting of old-growth trees over the past year.

GVAT works to take on the toughest questions of our day: the need for affordable housing, lack of access to quality mental health and addictions care, and the looming threat of climate change. These three areas of common cause each have their own Action and Research Team (ART), shared study and campaign development groups composed of interested individuals from member organizations.