Climate Change – Puget Sound Sage

What does the Carbon Pollution Accountability Act do?

By: Dimitri Groce, Community Research Fellow

As a result of climate change, our region can expect increased wildfires, extreme weather and heat waves, which will have a disproportionate impact on people of color and people with lower incomes.

Since our last post, we have advocated with leaders committed to economic and racial justice to ensure tangible benefits for people of color and people with lower incomes from the Governor’s Carbon Pollution Accountability Act (CPAA). Below, we break down exactly what the CPAA does and what it means for people with low-incomes and people of color.

First – the bill sets a limit on carbon pollution and targets big polluters in Washington State. In order to meet this limit, industries that pollute more than twenty-five thousand metric tons of carbon dioxide or more per year will bid on emission “allowances”. The amount of allowances a facility may have per auction will be capped, and the prices of the allowances will gradually increase every year until 2026. The bill prohibits free allowances ensuring that every big polluter participates in an effort to reduce our regions carbon pollution.

What’s the specific benefit for communities of color and people with lower incomes? In addition to reducing carbon pollution, the state will generate $1 billion in revenue from these auctions, which will be used to create clean energy jobs, invest in education, fund more affordable housing, and fund working families tax rebate.

Most importantly for local communities most impacted by climate change, the bill includes a provision for “hotspot” mapping that will show how the disproportional impacts of environmental degradation intersects with communities of color and communities with lower incomes. Additionally, the CPAA creates an Economic Justice and Environmental Equity advisory committee, which allows leaders who are the most impacted by pollution to monitor the CPAA and advise the Department of Ecology on how to spend revenue, creating a pathway for the solutions to climate change to be informed by and benefit the communities most impacted.

A Green and Brown City: Why We Need Equitable Growth and Climate Justice

On Monday, I made the case that climate change is one of the biggest threats to social, economic and racial equity. But, how, specifically could climate change impact Seattle? And what does this mean for low-income people and people of color?

As a coastal city, Seattle will be directly affected by climate change. We can expect more extreme heat in the summer, more rain in the winter and the possibility of severe storms. But even more startling, by 2100, just 85 years from now, scientists predict sea levels will rise in Elliott Bay by 6 to 50 inches. If nothing is done to mitigate climate change, land area with substantial value will be lost. This includes parts of downtown Seattle, parts of West Seattle, South Park, Georgetown and the Port of Seattle. Georgetown and South Park are two neighborhoods where the population is disproportionately people of color and lower-income families. In addition, local, good-paying maritime jobs and our food sources are at risk as port facilities, seafood beds and fishing fleets are threatened.

Despite these impacts, scientists say our region will fare much better than many other regions across the country. In fact, climatologists predict that our region will be one of the ideal places to move to avoid the extreme weather and unbearable heat we can expect across the country. Clifford Mass predicts that the Pacific Northwest will become a “potential climate refuge”. If this is true, our region must not only prepare for the impacts of climate change, but also for population growth over the next 80 to 100 years.

But even before we see an influx of new residents as a result of climate change – Seattle is already grappling with a dramatic growth of higher-income earning households moving to the city, resulting in a shortage of apartments and skyrocketing rents. On the supply side, developers are largely building new housing for the upper end of the rental market, leaving a massive gap at the middle and bottom. As a result, Seattle is already seeing displacement of communities of color – especially immigrant and African American communities – to the suburbs.

This displacement is occurring just as Seattle has emerged as one of the nation’s most sustainable cities. Seattle is a leader on curbing carbon emissions and preparing for the worst of climate change affects. We’ve launched large-scale energy efficiency building retrofits, implemented sustainable building practices, invested in light rail and streetcars, expanded bikeways, planned for transit oriented development, piloted urban farming and food forests and crafted an ambitious Climate Action Plan.

Which leads us to wonder, are we investing public resources into a climate-resilient city just in time for communities of color to be forced out? This future is possible, but not inevitable. If policy makers, environmentalists and equity advocates plan together to adapt our city for both growth and climate change, we can build a green and brown city, where all families can live and prosper.

Four Ways to Incorporate Justice into the Environmental Movement

By Nicole Vallestero Keenan, Puget Sound Sage and Ellicott Dandy, One America

Climate change is one of the biggest threats to social, economic and racial equity. Our jobs, our health, and the communities where we live are threatened by climate change, and we can expect more severe heat waves, flooding, extreme weather events, food scarcity, and the increased spread of disease to have the most direct impact on low-income communities and people of color. Although it is often overlooked, addressing environmental inequality is an essential component to moving strong policies that make our environment healthier for everyone. Why? In part it’s about doing what’s right, but it’s also necessary.

Research, by environmental justice organization Green for All, shows that people of color are more likely to care deeply about the environment. As in the rest of the nation, the number of people of color living in Washington State is growing. Census data shows that population growth rates among black, Latino, and API communities outpaces the growth of white communities, and the trend is predicted to continue. As the environmental movement considers strong policies for healthier people and a healthier planet, it must craft policies that serve the interests of the people most impacted, and the people whose voting base is growing.

Even though there is a growing population of people of color in Washington, who are likely to support environmental sustainability, a recent report from Green 2.0, finds that organizations at the forefront of the environmental movement are ill-equipped to engage and empower people of color in their movement. Green 2.0 finds environmental government agencies, foundations, and NGOs are often guilty of unconscious bias, apathy in addressing diversity, and of inadvertently maintaining a “green ceiling” such that the percentage of people of color employees has not grown in decades.

In this context, many of Washington’s environmental organizations are searching for ways reverse the trend found by Green 2.0 and better engage with communities of color. One key element to better engage with communities of color is to incorporate social justice into their work.

Here are four ways mainstream environmental organizations can better incorporate justice into the environmental movement:

Re-think communications: As long-time environmental activist Gail Swanson says: “You can’t enlist all humanity if you only speak to half of the population.” Communications experts in environmental organizations know they have to change the way they talk about the environment to be more relevant to people’s every-day lives, and many have taken important steps to talk about health, safety and jobs. However, communications is just one step to increasing engagement with communities of color, and will often come naturally if an organization applies a social justice lens to their work.

Train staff to apply a critical racial lens: Trainings that teach staff to understand and address racial inequities are important, but it’s even more crucial for staff to learn how to and practice applying this awareness to their work.

How does this policy affect communities of color or low income communities? What barriers inhibit communities of color from fully engaging in this program? Has my organization sought out and included people of color in crafting this program or policy?

The process of asking and seeking answers to these questions can open pathways to deep collaborations with people of color and community based organizations.

Actively seek out the expertise of community-based organizations: No need to reinvent the wheel! Fortunately for environmental organizations, there are people who have been doing incredible environmental justice work in communities of color for years. The mainstream environmental community can and should seek them out and work to support their programs and policy agendas. They should incorporate their input in policy design with the understanding that the policy’s success depends on local expertise of the problem and its possible solutions. Many environmental groups have already begun doing this work, and we encourage strong and socially just partnerships.

Promote and hire people of color into management positions: The Green 2.0 report finds that the few people of color employed by the environmental organizations and agencies studied tend not to hold leadership positions, with the exception of the “diversity manager” role. Even genuine attempts to include people of color in the environmental movement, may be misguided nonetheless. Ensuring people of color have institutional power in environmental organizations is critical for diversifying the environmental movement. This means recruiting people of color to the board and to management-level positions, which means they must expand beyond established networks. When people in charge of hiring are from the communities their organization hopes to engage, more people from these communities are more likely to join the team.