Environmental Justice Committee

OVERVIEW OF THE COMMITTEE

OUR FOCUS: Climate change is a fact. The wider and deeper the understanding of its nature, its causes and its impact, the more effective the PSC can be in crafting an appropriate response.

Clearly, in the realm of public policy, responses to climate change raise questions of environmental justice that, directly and indirectly, now and over the long term, affect the CUNY community and the city of which it is a crucial part. We believe that the PSC must work actively within the university and with allies outside to share information and mobilize support for initiatives that place racial and class equity at the center of public responses to the climate crisis. Our particular focus is the CUNY community and its constituency.

Elizabeth Yampierre, one of several community activists speaking at our Nov. 30 Climate Justice Forum.

The Environmental Justice Working Group will:

work with our City University partners to widen and deepen the understanding across the CUNY community of the nature, causes and impact of climate change

take a census of faculty who teach climate change-related courses as well as those who administer climate related initiatives centrally and on the campuses;

coordinate CUNY-wide discussions of the possibilities for information sharing and collaboration;

support CUNY’s clean energy and community solar efforts, and the many campus-based initiatives that elevate environmental justice issues through teaching, activism, and the building of community a

work to define a distinctive PSC perspective on what an environmental justice agenda for CUNY should look like;

evaluate the most effective ways to collaborate with environmental justice groups outside the university, and particularly our sister unions;

hold forums and workshops to facilitate the above.

We believe that these objectives are not only legitimate in themselves for a social movement union, but have the potential to draw additional members to an active role in union life.

CALENDAR:

Environmental Justice Committee Meetings

Monday, Aug. 13, 6-8 pm at the PSC

CUNY Campus Events

CUNY calendar listings will resume when the fall semester begins.

Beyond CUNY/ NYC, National and Regional Events

SAVE THE DATE! THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 6 – RISE FOR CLIMATE, JOBS AND JUSTICE NATIONAL DAYS OF ACTION! Battery Park, 4:30 pm. Here in NYC, the People’s Climate Movement-NY (PCM-NY) will rally on Thursday evening, September 6, in lower Manhattan in conjunction with the nationwide actions preceding the Global Climate Summit in San Francisco. Join us and insist that action on climate cannot be delayed!
In NY, both the Mayor and the Governor will be urged to expedite the commitments they have already made. While both have voiced strong support for transitioning NY to renewable energy by 2030 that goal will not be reached at the current rate of action. The NY Action is Thursday to avoid conflicting with the Labor Day Parade on Saturday and the beginning of Rosh Hashanah.

Governor Jerry Brown will host a Global Climate Summit in San Francisco, September 12-14, 2014. The Summit will bring stakeholders together to address the climate crisis even as the federal government under the Trump administration, and indebted to the fossil furl industry, persists in denying the science. Please join the Rise for Climate, Jobs and Justice event being organized by the People’s Climate Movement (PCM) in advance of the Summit. PCM calls for a just transition to renewable energy, with good paying, union jobs and support for the workers displaced in the transition and those already being harmed by severe storms and reduced air and water quality.

Go to http://peoplesclimate.org if you want more information or live outside NY and wish to participate on Sat. September 8. For more information about the Summit just go to
http://globalclimateactionsummit.org If you have other questions email Eileen , co-chair of the PSC Environmental Justice Working Group at eileenmoran7@gmail.com

RESOURCES AND LINKS:

National