Greening OPSEU: On the road....

Friday, June 19, 2009

On the road....

I don't usually travel in my role as OPSEU's green co-ordinator. It's kind of counter-intuitive. In fact, until last week, the only place I travelled to was Peterborough to see Robert F. Kennedy Jr. last spring. I do drive to work (which I don't usually do at my downtown government job), mainly because public transit would more than double the length of my commute.

However, as part of the training end of our plan to implement webconferencing, I thought it would be a good idea to visit some of the regional offices that are closer to Toronto. I initially set a maximum distance of about 90 minutes from Toronto which covers 6 or 7 offices. On Thursday I visited Guelph in the morning and Owen Sound in the afternoon (slightly out of my perimeter). On Friday, I went to the Hamilton and Niagara regional offices.

I was pleasantly surprised that we were joined by Region 2 Executive Board members - Mike Grimaldi and Deb Tungatt for the Hamilton session. Eddie Almeida joined in via webconference from the Guelph office. Thanks to all for taking interest and making the effort.

This coming week I'll be visiting Orillia, Whitby and Peterborough to conduct some more training with our regional office staff who are providing support for the program. I've been conducting the training by telephone for the offices that are further away.

Since I was already up in very picturesque country on Thursday, I decided to take the long way home from Owen Sound. Below are a few pictures. I missed a couple of shots as I was driving but I saw a flock of vultures picking away at a dead raccoon and a porcupine at the side of the road among other things.

I also discovered a very good Italian restaurant in the "middle of nowhere" (actually it was on the outskirts of Mansfield - ski country - at the corner of Road 17 and probably Airport Road).