Village of Canton Goes Green

The Village of Canton’s government has been working to increase sustainability efforts to reduce the village’s environmental impact. These improvements will unlock grant money that is accessible to the town government to further sustainability progress. Some efforts include reduced salt usage in the winter, efficient heating systems for municipal buildings, and more.   

According to Mayor Michael Dalton, Canton government members just passed a benchmarking resolution that establishes the importance of the town’s participation in the Clean Energy Communities Program. “We’re benchmarking building energy, and we’re tracking what we do in these buildings to help us decrease our use of energy or create clean energy,” said Dalton. The use of fossil fuels in government buildings has decreased dramatically.   

Documenting these buildings’ energy usage unlocks grant money from the Clean Energy Communities Program, explains Canton Sustainability Committee Chair Cathy Shrady. “We’re, very close to getting that documentation all in and probably getting at least a bronze rating,” said Shrady, “and why that’s really important is because that unlocks a lot of grant money.” This grant money will go into more projects to lower the town’s environmental impact.  

According to Shrady, climate change is the biggest crisis that we must face at this time. “We have to make every effort to address it,” said Shrady. “We’re called the sustainability committee, and that’s sustainability in the sense of how we can continue to live on this planet in a way that is sustainable for all.”   

One focus of the Sustainability Committee is to reduce road salt usage, which causes contamination in rivers. “We have to keep the roads safe, but that salt and the sand are really not good for the environment,” said Shrady. “The salt goes right into the river; there are places in the Adirondacks where people can’t even drink their well water anymore because it’s been contaminated with salt.”   

Sustainability committee members are working towards creating more low-mow zones to help wildlife thrive in the village.  

 “There’s some statistic — like for a single batch of chickadees, they need some ridiculous number of 6,000 to 9,000 [caterpillars] to raise a batch of chickadee chicks,” explained Shrady. Increasing low-mow zones in underutilized areas is easy to increase and great for the local environment.  

A goal for the Sustainability Committee is climate change adaptation. “Our area is really interesting because although there are going to be a lot of negatives because of climate change,” said Shrady, “it has been identified as an area that there will be climate refugees coming to.” People from west and south of upstate New York are already relocating here to avoid the water crisis, which could provide an economic boost.   

Several projects aimed at improving sustainability include testing hybrid vehicles for police and municipal vehicles. Additionally, with grant money workers, we’re able to switch the sewer treatment plant to electrical instead of burning fossil fuels. “We’ve embarked on a lot of things from an environmental perspective to help improve our position,” explained Dalton. “We’re always looking for new ways to save the environment.”  

All the sustainability efforts being put into the town will unlock more grant money for further improvements. More importantly, it will make Canton more sustainable so that future generations can thrive.