Lifelong respect for the earth
Published Saturday October 17th, 2009
David Coon could talk for hours about the world's environmental woes and what the Conservation Council of New Brunswick is doing to improve things.
But asking the organization's executive director to discuss his private life is a little like going in search of some of the world's most endangered species.
Coon is a very private person who avoids the spotlight unless it's to help promote the work of the organization to which he has committed much of his time for the past 25 years. He's not comfortable talking about himself, he admits with a bit of a nervous laugh.
"Not at all. The reason I am doing the profile is not about me (but) because it's a opportunity to talk about the work of the Conservation Council."
He's had a lifelong respect for the earth and a passion to help stop the destruction of the environment since he was a kid.
One of his grandfathers was a farmer, the other an avid outdoorsman. Both had great respect for the earth, understood the need to protect it and they passed this on to him, he recalls.
In the 1970s, as the first 'green' wave happened, he was 12 and he started to pay attention to world's environmental problems.
Born in Toronto, he later moved to Montreal with his family where he was educated through high school and university at McGill. He pursued a science degree which he thought he would be able to use to affect positive environmental changes.
"But, while I was at McGill a Green Peace chapter was started there which I got very involved in."
As many people do at university, Coon became politically aware and got a better understanding of how social change happens.
"You can make all of the rational science-based arguments you want, and it's necessary to have that, but you've got to have a strong public constituency to move that change forward."
For all of his career Coon has been a part of the effort.
He came to the Conservation Council of New Brunswick in 1985. Many people see this man as the conservation council because, for so long, he has been a prominent face and its voice. But there are many others who have worked long and hard here too, including his wife Janice Harvey.
This couple met at an environmental meeting. Coon says they are two peas in a pod and he can't imagine living his life with anyone other than her. How has she influenced him?
"Wow, totally. In every way. We're a team in every way. In life and in work. She is everything. Janice is an amazing woman."
While he is pleased with the efforts this organization has made to affect positive changes that include a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, the protection of this provinces groundwater, a federally protected marine area in the Musquash Estuary and more, he says, there is still a lot to do. He is especially concerned about the forest management practices in this province.
"If we could make some progress on how we care for our forests in this province that would be tremendous."
When he is not at work he is at a farmhouse in Waweig. Harvey and Coon bought the place back in 1995.
One of the reasons they chose to move out of Fredericton, he says, was to remove themselves from the capital city and all of the political happenings and their work.
That's why they go away from the province for a couple of weeks in the summer each year. For Coon it's a good break from the happenings of this province.
"We had been thinking about living on the outskirts of Fredericton. We just couldn't afford anything that wasn't a terrible fixer-upper. In my work and Janice's work there was just no time for doing that. We found this amazing spot that was just incredible. The immense pine trees and beautiful farmhouse, land, fields, woodlot along the Waweig Stream along the river."
He makes the trip to Fredericton several days a week. Life has always been busy and it got a whole lot busier when children came into their lives. Sadly this couple's first baby, a boy, died shortly before birth. They have two daughters Caroline and Laura. Coon happily discusses his girls and what they are up to.
"They are amazing. They are both very social, confident."
As a family they like to go for walks, camping and take yearly vacations to a family cottage in Ontario. They love travelling and exploring new places.
Both girls are aware of environmental issues because it is so much a part of their parent's lives.
When they were younger, he recalls, one of Laura's friends expressed aloud her worries over the depletion of the ozone layer.
"Laura very calmly said to her 'Oh don't worry about that, my mother is going to fix that.'"
They have a sense of security, he says, that their parents are so actively engaged in fighting pollution.
"We've made a point of trying to raise our kids to understand that we live in a society where we have governments that we elect to serve the common good and who have a responsibility to us as citizens to act in our interest and the interest of the environment," he says. "So they have begun to get a little interested in politics in terms of knowing who are the leaders and who's won the election."
Their's is a very typical family life at home. There are lots of chores such as stacking wood and getting groceries and shuttling the kids wherever they need to go, which they try to do on Saturday. Sundays are reserved for church and family. Coon and Harvey are members of the United Church of Canada and take active roles in their place of worship and have since their oldest daughter was a baby.
"We have a great church family. A great church community. It's the Oak Bay Pastoral Charge for the United Church," he says. "We actually have three buildings which we rotate around from Rollingdam, which is our home church, to the Ledge Road church to Moores Mills."
When he has rare down time this man likes to write and take family pictures, as well as do landscape photography. He also has a keen interest in documentary filmmaking. He has been a consultant on environmental National Film Board documentaries. He loves the process, which he says he finds very fascinating.
Coon is about to turn 53. It's just another year he says. But when he turned 50 he says he took note of this passage and wondered how he managed to reach this milestone. The years have ticked by very quickly and it sort of snuck up on him, he says.
Coon doesn't think about a time of retirement. Because he has had a life-long interest in protecting the environment, he says, likely he will always be involved in some way.
Both of his girls are very musical. They have inherited their gift of musicality from both sides of their family, he says.
His maternal grandfather, uncle and a couple of cousins played and sang in a quartet and recorded two gospel albums. His brother, Bill, is an award winning jazz guitarist who lives in Vancouver. His sister, Michelle, is a classical flutist.
Is he musical too? No, he says with a laugh. While many in his family are exceptionally gifted when it comes to music, Coon says, he is not at all.
He plays the guitar, but, in his words, he does it badly and to the embarrassment of many. He sings, but he says, it's always quietly so that he cannot be heard above other voices. He says he's always been frustrated by his lack of musicality.
"I lust after the ability to play music or sing."
Overall, though, Coon says he is satisfied with his life. He's the kind of man though, who, if he wasn't happy with something in his life, would make a change. "I would just stop and do something else."
Whatever he does and whenever he does it you can be sure that Coon will take it on and put his whole self into it.
Disabled
Search Articles
More CE Network Sites & Partners:
