Montreal Gazette reporter Michelle Lalonde writes in the newspaper today that, “I like the new Blue Communities project launched last month by the Council of Canadians, the Eau Secours! Coalition and the Canadian Union of Public Employees.”
Lalonde explains that, “The idea (of the Blue Communities Project) is to get activists in as many communities across the country as possible to push their municipal governments to take a clear stand on water. To become a Blue Community, a city or town needs to do four things: officially recognize water as a human right; promote publicly financed, owned and operated water and waste water services; ban the sale of bottled water in public facilities and at municipal events; and oppose fluoridation of water.”
Lalonde asserts, “I don’t see why Montreal shouldn’t be the first Blue Community in Canada… the steps are almost achieved.”
1- “Montreal has never fluoridated its water…”
2- “Five years ago, Montreal declared access to clean drinking water a right for its citizens. In its Charter of Rights and Responsibilities, which came into force in January 2006, Montreal pledges to ‘provide citizens with access to sufficient quantities of quality drinking water,’ and to ‘ensure that no citizen is denied a supply of drinking water for economic reasons.’ Close enough. A quick motion at a city council meeting supporting water as a human right is all it would take.”
3- “Last summer, (Montreal) began a program called the ‘Blue Patrol’, where 20 young people went around promoting the importance of not wasting Montreal’s precious drinking water. We need to take this one step further, with a council declaration that Montreal supports the public management of water treatment and distribution.”
4- “Montreal has already pledged, in its Sustainable Development Plan 2010 to 2015, to ban the sale of bottled water from municipal buildings, and to ensure there are adequate water fountains available on city properties. The city has been gradually adding more water fountains to city parks, but so far only a few city institutions have stopped selling bottled water.”
“Perhaps a little encouragement is in order. For information on how to pressure your town or city to become a Blue Community, go to http://www.eausecours.org or http://canadians.org. You’ll find tools for organizing a Blue Community group, examples of what other cities are doing and cautionary tales about why privatizing water services is a bad idea.”
The Montreal Gazette has a circulation of 454,200 readers. This article is at http://www.montrealgazette.com/life/Just+with+flow/4234797/story.html.
More on the Blue Communities Project at http://canadians.org/Blue_Communities/.
