Living Water Policy

This week saw the launch of the Living Water Policy Project, a website devoted to Canada’s constantly evolving federal and provincial water policies.

Elizabeth Hendriks is the water governance and policy coordinator for the Water Sustainability Project with the POLIS Project on Ecological Governance. She’s also the project manager for the Living Water Policy Project. We caught up over email to speak about the site and its purpose.

How did the Living Water Policy Project begin? What were the reasons behind creating the site?

The Walter and Duncan Gordon Foundation—through the Fresh Water Protection Program and its Water Policy Fellowships—has cultivated a group of enthusiastic and inspiring water leaders. Over the past several years, these leaders have been discussing gaps and challenges identified in their work and the Canadian water policy community. These challenges were mostly around the fragmented nature of policy. The Living Water Policy Project is the first step to finding a solution to the lack of access of water policy data and improving our collective ability to participate in the public policy dialogue on water.

I’ve been playing around on the site—it has several neat tools. For example, users can draw policy comparisons across jurisdictions. What are some of the other ways users can interact with Canadian water policy on the site?

The photo essays are a simple tool, meant to engage with users on a more intimate level. The photos are a reminder, that in Canada, we do have a wealth of natural capital and there is immense value in it.

We also want to encourage users to subscribe to our site to receive regular updates as data changes and provinces and territories move forward with the water policy. Finally, users can get involved on a variety of levels. One of the most important ways is to contribute to the library by providing policy news using our online submission form.

Who will be using the site?

We welcome the involvement of professors, administrators, government officials, bureaucrats, non-governmental organizations, the public, and the private sector. We feel all of these sectors can benefit from the tools we have developed on the site.

How often will the site be updated? Who’s in charge?

There will be two different types of updates to the site. It’s our vision that our national and growing network will take ownership in keeping the library up-to-date as provincial, territorial, or federal water policies are announced. We have an easy to use online submission form to send policy updates.

We also understand that the world of Canadian water policy is vast and complex; to ensure the website content is relevant, the second update process will be a comprehensive review that will be completed every 8 – 10 months.

To guide the project we have contributors and member organizations that will provide an advisor role in the development and growth of the website. The project is housed under the POLIS Water Sustainability Project at the University of Victoria, where I’m stationed.

How do you hope the site will engage users and encourage discussion on water policy?

Collectively, we have made the conscientious decision to provide an evolving library of objective Canadian water policy information. We feel that consolidated water policy data and user-friendly access to that information is the first step in encouraging dialogue on water policy.

We’re dedicated to further developing this website and maintaining the “living” component of the project.  Future tools on the website might include a water policy news feed, electronically synced updates, or a public participation guide for provinces and territories.

Ultimately, we would love to see the community grow enough to warrant an interactive part to the site, a library cafe so to speak, where folks could “stop by” for discussions, webinars, or forums on water policy issues.