Thank you Northern Life for the coverage of the May 3 Fridays For Future climate strike in Greater Sudbury and Shandel Valiquette's recent letter to the editor that supports the youth strikers.
The October 2018 IPCC Special Report on 1.5 C shows that limiting the global temperature rise to 1.5 C is achievable, but will require unprecedented transformation in all aspects of our society.
The youth are literally fighting to save their future and they know it.
For the third time this year, on Friday, May 24, thousands of students from across Canada will again be participating in a national day of climate action. At least 80 Fridays For Future Climate Strike events will take place in every province and territory in Canada, including in Greater Sudbury.
We are in a climate emergency. Currently, over 10 million Canadians live in cities and municipalities that have declared climate emergencies. As well, parliamentary motions have been introduced in Ottawa in the House of Commons and by the New Democratic Party of Ontario at Queen’s Park for Canada and Ontario respectively to declare climate emergencies.
Greater Sudbury has a special place in the Fridays For Future movement. Canada was the first country in the Americas to conduct a Fridays For Future strike in solidarity with Greta Thunberg on Friday, Nov. 2, 2018, and it took place here in Greater Sudbury when my daughter Sophia Mathur skipped school and sat in Memorial Park.
On their Feb. 1 strike, the Fridays For Future youth asked adults to get our city to declare a climate emergency and two grandmothers, Jane Cox and Carole Lavallee went straight to work. For their March 1 strike, they asked Laurentian University scientists to endorse their strikes and Adam Kirkwood and Dr. Brett Buchanan received over 100 signatures from scientists supporting their strikes.
Mayor Brian Bigger, MP Paul Lefebvre, MPP Jamie West, MP Marc Serré and MPP France Gélinas have listened intently to the pleas of Greater Sudbury's Fridays For Future youth and that has empowered them to keep fighting for their future.
Now they need your help.
On Tuesday, May 28 at 6 p.m., join these brave youth in council chambers at City Hall. Two grandmothers and Fridays For Future youth will be presenting a petition with over 2,000 signatures urging city council to declare that Greater Sudbury is in a state of climate emergency. Come take part in history.
Cathy Orlando
Sudbury, ON