Fin MacDonald

Today I attended the annual general meeting for the Atlantic Chapter of the CaGBC. I recently joined the local chapter and wanted to attend to meet other members, board members, and learn about the chapter.

The Atlantic Chapter has one part time employee on the payroll, and this is the Executive Director Lara Ryan. The rest of the positions are volunteer based. The chapter has 16 board members. There are also four committees:
1) Education Committee
2) Residential Committee
3) Carbon Committee
4) Build Green Atlantic Committee

Over the past year the chapter has held lunch and learn sessions in NS, NB, and NL. They are working on establishing relationships in PEI to be able to do the same there. The chapter currently has 264 paid members with the breakdown as follows:
New Brunswick : 34
Newfoundland & Labrador: 17
Nova Scotia: 204
Prince Edward Island: 9

Build Green Atlantic is the chapter’s major event. It was held on May 5th at the NSCC Waterfront Campus and was attended by 224 people (myself included). The keynote speaker on May 4th was attended by 125. The chapter also held a 1/2 day mini-conference at the Waterfront Campus in December which offered sessions on green building and the industry.

They provided us with a status report on LEED Buildings in Atlantic Canada.
Registered Projects
NS: 107 (up from 78 last year)
NFLD: 39 (up from 29)
PEI: 3 (up from 2)
NB: 41 (up from 36)

Certified Projects
NS: 6 (up from 4 last year)
NFLD: 0
PEI: 2 (up from 0)
NB: 6 (up from 5)

I’m glad I attended the AGM because I learned a lot about what the chapter does that I wasn’t aware of. I intend to be more active with the chapter going forward. It was great to meet the board members who voted to send me to Greenbuild as their scholarship winner. I’m looking forward to connecting with the local chapter at the Canada House Pavilion at Greenbuild in Toronto next month.