Climate Justice (News)

By Whitney Hodges

On March 18, 2011, Judge Ernest Goldsmith of the San Francisco County Superior Court suspended implementation of AB 32, California's landmark law to reduce greenhouse gas ("GHG") emissions. In Association of Irritated Residents v. California Air Resource Board, [Statement of Decision] the Court found the California Air Resource Board (the "ARB")'s

FOR IMMEDIATE  RELEASE                

March 14, 2011
Contact: Aaron Lehmer, Network Development Director, Bay Localize
(415) 613-4781, aaron@baylocalize.org

Bay Localize to Honor Prominent Community Leaders
at “Roots of Resilience” 5-Year Anniversary Gala

(Oakland, CA) — Celebrate with us on Saturday, April 2, 2011 as Bay Localize – an Oakland based project of Earth Island Institute dedicated to local sustainability -  hosts its Fifth Anniversary Gala, Roots of Resilience.  The event will honor community leaders, businesses, and civic pioneers who are stepping up to build a vibrant and resilient Bay Area. Highlights include Keynote Speaker Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, hip-hop headliner artists, Ashel “Seasunz” Eldridge and Jennifer Johns, and honorees of the Community Resilience Leadership Awards.  

EVENT DESCRIPTION:
SAVE THE DATE!  Saturday, April 2nd, 2011
Gala Dinner at 6:30 – locally grown, organic  entree with dessert
WHERE: CA Ballroom, 1736 Franklin St., Oakland (near 19th St. BART). (Parking available)
COST:  $50 Activist (limited supply) and $75 General; Group rates for Table Sponsorships

By Sarah Terry-Cobo

The latest legal challenge to California's landmark climate-change legislation isn't coming from big polluters faced with a series of new regulations. Instead, groups representing low-income residents are challenging the environmental law as unfairly burdening their beleaguered communities.
A handful of community groups, represented by the San Francisco-based Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment have filed a motion that could delay the implementation of parts of the Global Warming Solutions Act, also known as AB 32.

The Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission's (MTC) draft Public Participation Plan will set the framework for major decisions that it will make over the next three years in planning for over $200 billion in transportation investments.  MTC is required by SB 375 to implement a Sustainable Communities Strategy, or SCS, that will integrate transportation and land-use planning in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and address climate change.

The Public Participation Plan will shape how well the SB 375 process will address the needs of the region's low-income communities and communities of color - communities at greatest risk from the impacts of climate change.  A just and equitable Public Participation Plan that actively empowers low-income communities of color in these important decisions would be an important step in moving the Bay Area toward greater inclusion.

“We aren’t demanding a loan or finance; we’re demanding a repayment of a debt, climate debt,” says Bolivian negotiator Navarro

In a central plaza of the Universidad del Valle in Cochabamba, Bolivia, a small group of men and women are presiding over a beauty competition, of sorts. They’re looking after a half a dozen llamas tethered to the base of a nearby stage, and flashing smiles as people come up to have their pictures taken with the tall, wooly animals. Over the sound system, somebody is describing with loving detail the various ecologically important functions that the llama plays in local agriculture, not to mention providing wool for winter clothing.

Nearby an impressive solar panel display has been set up by a local NGO called Energética, which supplies electricity to some of the nearby food stands and feeds into the university’s power grid. “Our goal is to bring clean energy to places in the country that have never before received electricity, rural places where they haven’t even ever had light after sundown,” staff engineer Mauricio Richter tells me, describing Energetica’s work, which is funded by both private grants and the Bolivian government. “We’re here to show that the technology is here, and it’s available.”