Idols picked

Thunder Bay’s Community Environmental Action Plan co-ordinator says she’s disappointed that the city’s first environmental challenge didn’t attract more applicants despite hearing enthusiasm from potential families.

Earthwise Thunder Bay announced its four families for Climate Idol at a news conference at city hall on Saturday. Four families from Thunder Bay and Duluth will spend 10- months going through a set of environmentally friendly challenges to reduce their energy output.

Sarah Kerton, Earthwise Thunder Bay Community Environmental Action Plan co-ordinator, said there was a lot of interest in the project but when the registration closed in January only four families applied to participate.

"There is definitely support and interest out there but I think people were worried about time commitments or different aspects of the challenge," Kerton said. "I was disappointed. I thought we would have a lot more applications. I literally fielded at least 50 phone calls and emails. I didn’t think it would be a problem at all. People were really excited when I talked to them about it."

Another reason for the low turn out of applicants could have been the timing of the announcement being close to Christmas with families too busy during the holiday season, she said. To fix the problem the announcement of the next Climate Idol could happen in the fall to give families more time to apply, she said.

Kerton said the main goal of the challenge was to show the four families how to become greener. It isn’t a competition but more of a personal challenge for the families to try and change their habits and then go on to share what they have learned with the community, she said.

Begona Nolan, along with her husband, Todd Moore and their three children Olivia, 9, Mitchell, 7, and Gabriel, 2, wanted to know if they could change their bad habits when it came to the environment. She said they wanted to learn the skills necessary to implement meaningful change into their busy lives.

For Nolan, that could mean taking the bus to work everyday.

"I’ve never taken the bus in Thunder Bay," Nolan said. "I’ve definitely commuted and carpooled and never had an issue with it. I just don’t know our transit system that well and I don’t know if it is something I can do."

Nolan, who works as a mobile mortgage specialist, said she has to go to different homes and meet clients at locations all the time and wasn’t sure if the bus was a plausible option.

While public transportation might not be in the near future, her family will try little changes to reduce their energy output such as turning the lights off when leaving the room or turning off the water when brush their teeth.

"Our mind set is there and that’s half the battle," she said. "We’re all committed to it."