ABOVE PHOTO: Activist Valencia Gunder poses for a photo, Wednesday, August 24, 2022, at her home in Miami. Gunder said he has already seen the effects of climate change in his home state of Florida and has done climate justice work in communities across the state, focusing on the effects of rising levels of sea, displacement of people and jobs in housing and food security. Gunder said farmers in South Florida said they are starting to see saltwater intrusion affecting crops. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)
By Kat Stafford
FELLOW PRESS
The Movement for Black Lives launched a new climate change initiative on Thursday, bringing together more than 200 Black environmental leaders and organizations across the country who pledged to seek equitable climate solutions centered on Black Americans and communities.
The Black Hive initiative builds on the movement’s 2021 Red, Black, and Green New Deal and also introduces the Black Climate Mandate that outlines the urgency for a Black climate agenda and investment in equitable strategies that protect those Black Americans.
The announcement, first shared by The Associated Press, follows a Supreme Court decision that limited the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and the recent passage of Inflation Reduction Act.
Many studies have found that Black and other communities of color have suffered the effects of climate and environment for decades. Black Hive leaders say that structural racism, the legacy of slavery and socioeconomic factors such as redlining, segregation and poverty make it more likely that Black communities are often located near toxic sites or directly affected by climate change.
“The climate crisis happened because of corporate greed, government neglect, the removal of solutions and investment in harmful institutions such as the fossil fuel industry, which harms our people,” said Valencia Gunder, national co -lead in The Black Hive. “It’s time for America to address the anti-Black racism going on here.”
Gunder said he is already seeing the effects of climate change in his home state of Florida. She does climate justice work in communities, focusing on the impacts of sea level rise, displacement of people, and housing and food security issues. He said farmers in South Florida have told him they are starting to see saltwater intrusion damaging crops.
“The climate crisis is probably the most important issue we can work on,” Gunder said. “If we don’t hurry and pay attention and get the stability, I think we’re going to start seeing more destruction, more damage or death, more disease.”
The Movement for Black Lives is a national network of more than 150 leaders and organizations created to build a broad political space for Black people to organize across the country and within their communities. The movement has expanded beyond policy to include issues such as climate change and environmental justice. The collective calls on people to take its Black climate and environmental justice pledge and commit to improving the Black Climate Mandate of the Black Hive which is expected to be updated this year.
Black Hive leaders say they plan to offer resources, data and technology, communications and disaster response support to local communities and Black-led organizations. The initiative focuses on several areas: water, energy, land, labor, economy and reparations, democracy, health, and global integration of the Black diaspora. Participants also plan to focus on grassroots organizing and community education to raise awareness.
For California organizer Aleta Alston-Toure ‘the climate initiative feels particularly timely.
Advocates like Alston-Toure have questioned recent climate efforts led by the federal government, including the Inflation Reduction Act signed into law this month by President Joe Biden. Its proponents say billions of dollars in climate and environmental investments will flow to communities across the country that have long been plagued by pollution and climate threats. But advocates say it is not bold enough to address climate issues affecting Black Americans, and they criticize provisions in the bill that support the expansion of fossil fuels.
“These solutions are Band-Aids,” said Alston-Toure’, who is a member of the Parable of the Sower Intentional Community Cooperative that covers several states. “There is no solution if the Black (community) and Indigenous countries, especially the Gulf South, have to suffer so that there are Band-Aid solutions for the wider public. We want to be taken seriously and informed “Our votes matter because this is a rip-off in our communities, and we need to be heard.”
In June, 14 environmental justice organizations began receiving money under the Justice40 initiative — a Biden administration pledge to improve the environment in poor communities and help them prepare for change. or the climate. The initiative promises to funnel 40% of all climate and environmental investments to communities living with environmental burdens such as diesel soot, lead water pipes and lack of access to green spaces.
But Alston-Toure’ said communities need to be confident that money from these new initiatives will go directly to Black-led organizations. He said that often most of the funding goes to organizations or individuals that are not rooted in the affected communities.
A study last year by The New School’s Tishman Environment and Design Center found that between 2016 and 2017, 12 national environmental grant makers awarded $1.34 billion to organizations in the Gulf and Midwest regions – but only $18 million, or 1.3%, was awarded. in groups dedicated to environmental justice.
Last year, Donors of Color, a philanthropic group dedicated to driving racial equity in funding environmental projects across the country, launched a pledge drive challenging the country’s top climate funders to transfer 30% of their donations to environmental efforts led by Black, Indigenous, Hispanic. , and other people of color.
Alabama resident Rev. Michael Malcom, founder, and executive director of The People’s Justice Council, said he hopes the Movement for Black Lives’ new climate initiative will focus on the efforts of communities that have long been ignored and bring about real change.
“We’ve always suffered in silence in the South,” Malcom said. “We are constantly suffering from industrial pollution, illegal land use and even legal but unwanted land use and our communities. We have the flooding that happens in our communities, we experience the industrial pollution in our communities. Those Black and brown and Indigenous communities need a voice and someone to speak for them. And who better to represent them than faith communities. We are responding to climate change and we speak the language of our communities.
