On January 16, 2023 Calgary Metropolitan Regional Board (CMRB) Chair Greg Clark and Chief Officer Jordan Copping attended a Cochrane Town Council meeting to give an update on CMRB.

As the region, currently containing over 1.5 million people, attracts the next million people, CMRB’s goal (see slide below presented at the Council meeting) is to reduce water consumption, carbon production, and vehicles per household, as well as reducing land consumption and costs of new infrastructure.

Such a stated goal, especially with its emphasis on addressing so-called climate change and minimizing land and vehicle use, dovetails with the sustainable development goals of the globalist Agenda 2030 promoted by the United Nations and Klaus Schwab and the World Economic Forum (WEF). As well, Agenda 2030 is actively endorsed and promoted by the Trudeau government, with a recent emphasis on a “Just Transition” which would essentially wipe out Alberta’s oil and gas industry and create impoverishment for its citizens. The CMRB’s goal, which Trudeau would likely endorse, puts Cochrane on the road to Agenda 2030 with the CMRB being a major vehicle to carry Cochrane along that road. 

Greg Clark spoke of having “a more sustainable stance financially, environmentally”. When you hear the words, such as “sustainable”, “sustainability”, “climate change”, and “carbon reduction”, think the United Nations and Klaus Schwab and the World Economic Forum, a group of globalist organizations and oligarchs wanting to control our lives and transform the world.
The following slide with respect to Environmentally Responsible Land Use from the May 10, 2021 CMRB presentation to Council illustrates the commitment to taking actions with respect to so-called climate change (MDPs = Municipal Development Plans).

It should not be forgotten that the City of Calgary with its veto position on the CMRB will by-and-large be driving the bus. Demonstrating her full embrace of the globalist agenda, Jyoti Gondek described her top priority and first-order-of-business upon becoming mayor was for the City of Calgary to declare a Climate Emergency. Her wish was granted in November 2021 when Calgary city council voted 13-2 to declare a Climate Emergency in the City of Calgary. That declaration was given some real teeth in July 2022 when Calgary city council passed a climate strategy that outlined how the city would reach carbon net-zero by 2050 with a hefty $87 billion price tag, or $3.1 billion annually, for the next 28 years to move that agenda forward.

On January 11, 2021, I appeared as a delegation before Cochrane’s Town Council asking that the Town extricate itself from the CMRB because of how it’s influenced by the agendas of the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, and the City of Calgary. With respect to the latter, as an obedient member of ICLEI (Local Governments for Sustainability) the City of Calgary is committed to be “a driving force for delivering on the global sustainable development agenda”. Therefore, with its dominant position on the CMRB, the City of Calgary is expected to drive its municipal counterparts in the region towards Agenda 2030’s sustainable development goals.

In November 2019 our Mayor Jeff Genung took a step towards Agenda 2030 when he decided that the Town should install electric vehicle (EV) chargers at the Transit & Innovation Hub parking lot, “to reduce greenhouse gases”. Unable to secure outside funding, the tab for installing the four EV chargers at a cost of $29,600 ($7,400 per charger) was eventually picked up by Cochrane’s taxpayers. In 2021, there were 67 charging sessions with a combined revenue of $204.13. As I mentioned in a previous blog post, “The Town deciding to set up an outlet on Town land to sell electricity to a small segment of our population who happen to own subsidized electric vehicles strikes me as no different than had the Town set up a service station on Town land to sell gasoline to owners of gasoline-fuelled vehicles”, inappropriate in either case.

At a 2022-2024 budget deliberations meeting held on November 25, 2021, Councillor Morgan Nagel enquired about a $5 million solar project as part of planned capital projects, which is the first I had heard of this. Seeking greater clarification from Councillor Nagel, I was told “the solar panel is assumed in the draft 10-year capital plan”. I sought more information about the planned project from the Town’s Sustainability & Transit Coordinator. He clarified that “The $5 million solar project mentioned during budget deliberations was just a placeholder for a future sustainable energy project(s) and is meant to secure the appropriate reserves to explore future sustainable energy opportunities”. Imagine that, the Town has baked into its capital works program a project that furthers the goals of Trudeau and the globalist United Nations Agenda 2030! Furthering the goals of Agenda 2030 appears to be a part of the Town’s mindset.

Despite the implications of another level of government reducing the autonomy of our Town and coming under the influence of the progressive City of Calgary, at a specially-convened May 17, 2021 meeting, Cochrane’s town council voted 5-2 to endorse the growth plan, with Councillors Morgan Nagel and Patrick Wilson voting no. Being a relatively small organization with only five staff members, Copping pointed out during the recent January 18, 2023 update that the CMRB leans on representatives from member municipalities for input and feedback, including that of Mayor Jeff Genung, thereby dividing our Town’s resources between Town-centred activity and CMRB-centred activity.

During the update that the Council received from the CMRB on December 13, 2021 (video link here), several councillors, Susan Flowers and Alex Reed, were highly dismissive of concerns that some citizens have raised about the CMRB. According to Councillor Flowers (27:44-28:12 minutes in the video), those expressing opposition were responsible for promoting “a lot of fear during the election about this whole topic and misinformation in the community” and, unlike her, didn’t have an understanding of the “big picture”. To see my email reply to Councillor Flowers, click here: Reply to Councillor Flowers.

Councillor Alex Reed, on the other hand, characterized (24:09-27:42 minutes in the video) those who were critical of the CMRB and didn’t share his views as having a fear “literally bordering on paranoia” and that concerns related to the CMRB were akin to a mythical “urban legend in at least for some members of our community”, with the latter comment prompting Mayor Genung to chuckle. To see my email exchange with Councillor Reed, click here: Exchange with Alex Reed.

Speaking at a Public Hearing on February 14, 2022 related to a draft Land Use Bylaw (from 29:16 to 33:32 minutes in the video from the meeting), I began by pointing out that Part 4 of the Project Goals mentioned that the bylaw would modernize regulations to reflect current development trends, which would include  “Sustainability”.  Later in the document there was reference to the Cochrane Sustainability Plan, whereby, “All pathways of the Cochrane Sustainability Plan are reflected in the Land Use Bylaw Review”.  I indicated that I was troubled by the consideration of “sustainability” as guiding the drafting of the new land use bylaw and pointed out that when you hear the words “sustainable” or “sustainability”, you automatically have to think of the United Nations sustainable development goals as fleshed out in Agenda 21 and Agenda 2030 as well as by Klaus Schwab and the World Economic Forum’s Great Reset. I reminded the Town Council of the presentation I made to them on January 11, 2021 related to the Calgary Metropolitan Region Board (CMRB) where I gave arguments, as reported by Cochrane Now, for the Town to extricate itself from the CMRB and concluded with a “Call upon the Town of Cochrane to take steps to exit from the Calgary Metropolitan Regional Board (CMRB) and the influence of a corrupt, dysfunctional United Nations through the influence of the City of Calgary”.

Given that the City of Calgary, as an obedient member of ICLEI (Local Governments for Sustainability), is expected to be “a driving force for delivering on the global sustainable development agenda”, I concluded my presentation (Link to full text of my 4-minute presentation at the Public Hearing on February 14, 2022: Public Hearing Land Use Bylaw) by asking our Town’s elected representatives if they agree with Calgary’s mayor that we are in the midst of a “Climate Emergency”.  Unfortunately, I was not able to get a response to my query from any of the Town Councillors that evening. An answer to that question and their position on the globalist climate change agenda needs to be ascertained. More importantly, the residents of Cochrane need to be consulted if they want to be passengers on this journey to a globalist utopia, where you are contained, surveilled, and own nothing and be happy.

Postscript – The Piper You Choose Determines the Tune

The resulting growth plan was primarily determined by the vision and philosophy of the chosen consultants, who developed the plan, namely, HDR Inc, headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, which most likely was chosen by the City of Calgary. Two of the lead HDR consultants involved with the CMRB project were Peter Calthorpe and Charles Hales. For their efforts the consultant firm pocketed an estimated $2 million plus.

In 1983, Calthorpe founded the firm of Calthorpe Associates devoted “to sustainable urban design and planning globally”. In 2019, Calthorpe Associates joined HDR. In 1986 he published “Sustainable Communities: A New Design Synthesis for Cities, Suburbs and Towns”. His most recent book, “Ending Global Sprawl: Urban Standards for Sustainable & Resilient Development,” was written for the World Bank’s Global Platform for Sustainable Cities.
Calthorpe starts off a video, “Climate Change will Change our Cities” released in 2020 making the alarmist declaration that “Over the long run, climate change is going to hurt millions, if not billions, if we cannot cope with it in a serious way. It’s an existential threat. The way we live is at the essence of how we deal with the issue”.

Hales was the former mayor of Portland, Oregon from 2013-2017. From what is known about Portland, Oregon that doesn’t give one much confidence in the guidance provided by Hales in shaping the CMRB’s Growth Plan free of any globalist influence. According to Portland’s “history of climate leadership”, Portland was the first city in the United States to draft a carbon reduction strategy in 1993. It kept on building on that commitment to address climate change, including during the time that Hales was the mayor with the introduction of a Climate Action Plan in 2015, and recently ending with a Climate Emergency Declaration in 2020. Clearly a city, much like Calgary, that wholeheartedly embraces the globalist Agenda 2030!

Again, these were the consultants who were hired to shape the CMRB’s Growth Plan.

An informative video about Agenda 21 and its plan to transform the world. Excerpts:

“It’s a global plan, but it’s implemented locally, and this is what you need to know about it. It is implemented locally.”
(1:45 to 1:54 minutes)
“It’s the region. It’s all about the region …These regional plans are the same all across the United States. It doesn’t matter which city it is. It’s all the same plan. Now we are paying millions and millions of dollars to consultants to come up with these plans, these regional plans that are directing and restricting what we can do with our land. They have climate action plans as part of them”.
(7:24 to 7:49 minutes).

In this video, “Climate Lockdowns: can you see the 3 comms strategies in play: 1) re-brand 2) discredit, 3) limit?”, Katie Hopkins, a political commentator from the UK, provides an interesting perspective on 15-minute cities. Hopkins refers to the 15-minute cities as ultimately being “climate lockdowns”, which aligns with the WEF saying that their “aim is to cut car use, resulting in fewer CO2 emissions”. Hopkins mentions the tactic employed to “discredit” anybody expressing concern, which is precisely what the Cochrane Eagle’s recent Editorial did in response to the February 9, 2023 protest, portraying 15-minute-cities in a desirable positive light and discrediting anyone who speaks out against it.

UPDATE

On Friday, March 24th, the Cochrane Freedom Alliance, an initiative led by Cochrane’s Tex (Lloyd) Leugner, came back to life after a brief hiatus. Dog With A Bone was one of the guest speakers and spoke on “Cochrane’s Road to Agenda 2030”. The thesis of Ron’s presentation that evening was that the Town of Cochrane’s willing participation in the Calgary Metropolitan Region Board (CMRB), a centralized regional planning initiative brought in by the previous NDP government, puts Cochrane on a road to Agenda 2030 and the UN’s sustainable development goals. The City of Calgary, a strong adherent of Agenda 2030, with its dominant role and veto position in the CMRB, was described as essentially driving the bus and our Town’s municipal government, both elected and unelected officials, were described as willing and supportive passengers on this journey.

Full blog post available here.