Each campaign is driven by a particular action group. The lead action group defines the demands and targets for the campaign in its regular meetings and develops the tactics to achieve its goals.

If you’d like to participate in any of these campaigns, we’d love to hear from you!  

All action group meetings are open to the public via Zoom (schedule and online link available in Upcoming Events). You don’t need to be an expert in the subject matter—we all started from scratch. Simply tune in and observe if that’s your preference.

But if you would like to get more involved, let us know by filling in the form on the Contact Us page and we’ll be in touch.

Getting Off Gas

Lead action group: Fossil Fuel Resistance

In Hamilton, the biggest polluter is Enbridge Gas, the primary target of our Getting Off Gas campaign. Hand-in-hand with Doug Ford’s provincial Conservative government, they are looking to increase utility bills in a brazen effort to force existing customers to subsidize the construction of gas lines to new housing developments.

These homes will be locked in to gas furnaces, their owners paying ever-increasing gas prices, when they should have the option of installing heat pumps. The fossil fuel infrastructure that supports them will have a lifespan of 50 to 60 years and will be redundant long before then as the world moves to renewable energy.

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Divesting from Fossil Fuels

Lead action group: Elders for Climate Sanity Fossil fuel divestment is an attempt to address the climate crisis by exerting social, political, and economic pressure on institutions in order to stem the flow of funding to companies involved in extracting fossil fuels. While all the major Canadian banks, pension funds, academic institutions and so on are culpable to various degrees, we’re focusing primarily on the Royal Bank of Canada (the biggest culprit), the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (representing all of us), and McMaster University (local).

RBC logo     CPPIB logo   

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Fighting Urban Sprawl

Lead action group: Conservation Matters

Doug Ford’s backtracking on the Greenbelt give-away means that in Hamilton, about 2000 acres of foodlands, forests, and wetlands should be safe from destruction.

But 5400 acres are still exposed because of the Ford government’s forced expansion of Hamilton’s urban area despite overwhelming opposition from City Council and the public.

The effort to protect our irreplaceable foodlands, forests, and wetlands has only been partly achieved. We’re still facing massive sprawl development—not least in the Airport Employment Growth District (AEGD)—that will greatly increase climate-wrecking greenhouse gas emissions while eliminating the very areas that can cushion us from climatic consequences.

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Transit for All

Lead action group: Transit Matters

HSR busesIf the HSR (the Hamilton Street Railway, as it is still called 150 years after its founding) were to be free, frequent and clean, it would have a big impact not only on the environment but on low-income Hamiltonians who depend on it to get around.

Drivers would also benefit through fewer cars on the road resulting in less congestion, relief from high gas prices, better access to parking spaces, and a viable option to downsize to one car with all of the savings that would entail.

This is not a new idea. Hamilton would not be breaking new ground in implementing this. As reported in The New York Times, around 100 cities worldwide have already implemented free transit.

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