Chatham-Kent’s mayor is showing his support for the Paris Agreement, following an announcement last week that US President Trump was pulling out of the climate change accord. 
Hope says it’s up to the smaller levels of government to tackle environmental issues.
“A lot of my colleagues in the United States are quite frustrated with the fact that Trump has pulled out of the Paris (Agreement) because a lot of them support it around the Great Lakes basin,” Hope says. “We need to send a strong message that the federal governments need to wake up, it’s us that’s going to need it, we need the tools in order to make this happen.”
Chatham-Kent is a member of the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative which is made up of 130 US and Canadian mayors, all of whom support the Paris Agreement.
A release from the Initiative denounces Trump’s decision as “short sighted, ill advised, and not in the best interests of the people of the United States, Canada, or the world.”
Municipal officials cite Chatham-Kent as an early adopted of renewable energy in Ontario, and a leader in energy efficiency and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
