Council sends back climate change advisory appointments as Estabrooks calls committee rules into question
Tantramar council has delayed a series of appointments to the town’s Climate Change Advisory Committee (CCAC) after one councillor pointed out discrepancies between the length of the appointments and the committee’s terms of reference.
Councillor Matt Estabrooks asked to send back a motion to appoint Sabine Dietz, Dan Matthews, and Mikko McGregor-Corson. Though councillor Josh Goguen, who sits on the CCAC, and councillor Mike Tower voted against, the rest of council agreed with Estabrooks and so the appointments were sent back to staff for corrections.
Dietz is head of CLIMAtlantic, and a former Sackville councillor. She also ran against Estabrooks for his Ward 4 seat on Tantramar council last year. Matthews is a retired meteorologist and head of Dorchester’s Emergency Measures Organization. McGregor-Corson is an Environmental Studies student and organizer with Divest MTA. The three would have been appointed to serve on the advisory committee for 1.5 and 2.5 year terms, until December 2024 and December 2025. But Estabrooks pointed out that according to the CCAC’s terms of reference, at least two of those appointments should have been made shorter, to coincide with the terms of the people they are replacing.
The CCAC will now be asked to recommend two people—one student and one community member—to serve on the committee for just six months, and then deal with vacancies again at the end of this year.… Continue