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Title: Create clean, green cities
Description: Municipal solid waste services are fundamental to the quality of life in our communities, our health and our environmental future. The challenge is to continue to reduce the amount of residential waste we create, and to capture the value of any waste created as a public resource. We must also extend waste reduction and recycling practices to all commercial and industrial activity. We cannot keep digging and filling up holes with our garbage or releasing toxins from its disposal into our air and water. In order to meet these challenges municipalities must retain accountability, flexibility and control over their solid waste services. Contracting out garbage services means municipalities lose control and flexibility to implement waste diversion programs like recycling and composting.
Identifier: solid_waste_en.pdf
Identifier (PID): yul:1156043

Title: Towards a Progressive Labor Vision for Climate Justice and Energy Transition in the Time of Trump
Description: This memorandum proposes an analysis and provisional framework around which to construct an ambitious and effective agenda for progressive labor to respond to the converging environmental crises, and to pursue a rapid, inclusive approach to energy transition and social justice. Such an agenda could serve to bring a much-needed independent union voice to policy and programmatic debates on climate change and energy within Our Revolution spaces and processes. Labor's voice in these debates frequently echoes the large energy companies on one side, or the large mainstream environmental NGOs on the other.
Identifier: Towards-a-Progressive-Vision-TUED.pdf
Identifier (PID): yul:1156039

Title: Public infrastructure builds a sustainable, equitable future
Description: Public infrastructure is an excellent investment. It provides valuable public services that improve the quality of life in our communities, and also has important short-term and long‑term economic impacts. Over the short term, public investment in infrastructure provides one of the strongest economic boosts to the economy in terms of stimulating growth and creating jobs. Over the long term, public infrastructure improves life for everyone, increases productivity, reduces costs for business and helps stimulate increased business investment. Canada's infrastructure deficit is over $150 billion. The Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) estimates that municipally-controlled water and wastewater facilities alone need an injection of over $50 billion to renew infrastructure in poor or very poor condition. Local governments also bear much of the additional infrastructure costs for climate change mitigation and adaptation. The 2013 floods cost the Province of Alberta and City of Toronto $3 billion. The annual costs of natural catastrophes are forecast to rise to $5 billion annually by 2020 and to over $20 billion annually in 2050.
Identifier: infrastructure_en_0.pdf
Identifier (PID): yul:1156037

Title: Buy Clean: How Public Construction Dollars Can Create Jobs and Cut Pollution
Description: Construction materials— including aluminum, cement, steel, and wood— are in nearly everything we build and a vital economic backbone for Canada. Given the scale of our built infrastructure and how long we expect our roads, bridges and wastewater systems to last, what we build with matters. Our buildings account for 13% of Canada's greenhouse gas emissions and when you add in our built infrastructure, you get a hefty portion of our carbon footprint. How we spend on public construction can create jobs and help to cut pollution. This crucial part of our Canada's economic recovery is detailed in Blue Green Canada's latest report. The good news for us: when it comes to the carbon footprint of these construction materials, Canada has a unique advantage. Thanks in large part to our country's clean electricity grid (which is now 82% emissions-free), goods produced here often have a smaller carbon footprint than those produced elsewhere. When you combine this with the efficiency of our manufacturers and the fact that it's less polluting to ship materials across a land border than across an ocean, it becomes clear that Canada's advantage is also its opportunity. Canada's target of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050 requires substantial carbon reductions across all economic sectors. Changing the way we look at public infrastructure can unlock previously overlooked pollution reduction opportunities while simultaneously supporting Canadian manufacturers and creating the conditions for them to thrive in the low-carbon global marketplace.
Identifier: Buy-Clean-How-Public-Construction-Dollars-Can-Create-Jobs-and-Cut-Pollution-Eng-2-1.pdf
Identifier (PID): yul:1156021