‘Take care of where you live’: Earth Day recognized across New Brunswick

All ages were encouraged to take part in Earth Day events.

Katie Hamilton’s kindergarten classroom at Forest Glen School in Moncton, N.B., learned a big lesson on Tuesday.

“I just think it’s important, even from a really young age, to understand that you have to take care of where you live, that we need to participate in giving back to the earth as it’s giving to us, so that’s something you can learn even before school but especially at five and six,” said Hamilton.

Throughout the day, her class took part in a number of Earth Day specific activities including drawing and hanging posters, doing a human impact walk, picking up garbage and reading stories about the day.

“They really get the idea when it’s an area they play in, like their playground and they’re walking around and they find trash there, they recognize how that’s really not beneficial and helpful to them and it’d be better to clean it up,” she said.

The hope is that this significant lesson, taught at a young age, will last a lifetime.

“Earth Day is about not littering,” said five-year-old Eliana George.

“I picked up actually I think about six pieces of garbage, I mean seven.”

Six-year-old Sadie Mullin says Earth Day is about recognizing how special the earth is.

“I picked up trash from the beach because it was on the sand and we didn’t want nature to be dying, so that’s pretty much why,” she said.

“As I grow up, I’m going to keep doing that.”

Across New Brunswick, Earth Day initiatives were front and centre.

The Town of Salisbury, Municipality of Tantramar, Town of Riverview and City of Moncton had supplies for people to pick up and participate in community-wide garbage cleanups.

Inside Moncton City Hall, a new interactive display was also unveiled to mark the day.

“We’re putting out a lot of green house gases, about 14 tonnes a year, per person, in Canada,” said environmental planning and management director Tim Moerman.

“That’s a big kind of abstract number; how do you get your head around that? So, what we’ve done is we’ve kind of broken that down to something that you would see on a daily basis. How much are you putting out every single day and from what activities because some things matter more than others.”

The booth will stay on display at City Hall for six weeks before being moved around the city to really help capture the impact.

The idea is to give Monctonians a chance to lift weights that would be equivalent to the amount of green house gas they put out every single day.

“It gives it a reality that no PowerPoint slide or number on a website is going to drive home,” Moerman said.

“I would hope that people would look at this and really understand where their impact is coming from because if we’re going to make the changes we need to make, and I mean we do need to make them, people really need to understand where their impact is really coming from and understand on a visceral level.”

The booth points to four main areas: transportation, housing, consumer goods and food.

Moerman says there is still time to “turn things around” but people have to get serious about it if it’s going to make a difference in time.

Looking to encourage people to use public transportation and reduce transportation emissions, Codiac Transpo offered free rides to residents in Moncton, Riverview and Dieppe on Tuesday.

It’s an initiative that has taken place for a number of years.

City officials say that last year Codiac Transpo had 3.4M boardings, which is up from 2.5M in 2023 and 1.7M in 2022.

“Incorporating transit allows people to use their vehicles less and encourages walking and even cycling as buses are equipped with external bike racks that allow you to take your bike along,” said Aloma Jardine, director of communications, in an email.

For the Town of Riverview, Earth Day marked the start of a month-long cleanup initiative that will wrap up with a zero waste BBQ and the chance for people to win ecofriendly prizes.

Alicia Clarkson, a community engagement worker for sustainability at the Town of Riverview, says last year about 350 people participated.

“It’s just a lot easier for folks to get involved if they have more opportunities to do so and I like to think that Earth Day is not just one day of the year, it’s hopefully all year long. So, giving that month kind of helps people focus on the fact that it’s not just one day of the year that we want to care about the planet,” she said.

The town also held a draw for rain barrels which saw about 200 people enter.

Clarkson says using rain barrels helps reduce the amount of municipal water people need to use especially when we enter dry patches of weather.

“At the end of the day, you know, our individual impacts do add up to a collective effort so anything that anyone can do, the absolute worst-case scenario is we have a nicer planet to live on,” she said.

In Fredericton, Seniors for Climate Action Now rallied to mark the day.

Officials say despite the wet, gloomy weather, the event drew an intergenerational crowd and saw a lot of new people step up to the microphone and speak out.

Earth Day initiatives are taking place throughout the entire month and New Brunswickers are encouraged to observe it all year long.

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