At the end of 2019, I flew to Jamaica to visit family, and it was a relaxing trip where I ate good food and swam in some of the most beautiful water. This island is near and dear to me since it is where I was born. Nature and especially the ocean have a vital place within the island culture. Since the island was first inhabited, people have lived off the land and eaten abundantly from the sea. The natural beauty and the ability to make you feel like you have escaped civilization continuously draws people to the island.
As I sat one warm morning looking out at the ocean eating my ackee, seafood, and fresh fruit breakfast, preparing to go snorkeling. I felt my excitement building since it has been a long time since I had been in ocean water that was warm enough to jump into at 9:30 am.
Finally, after finishing, I met up with my snorkeling guide, who gave me a quick overview of the plan for the day and an equipment check. We jumped in and began our swim. If you have ever gone snorkeling in the Caribbean, you know that you can find lots of colorful fish and coral. We did find fish and some coral but, we kept running into swarms of jellyfish.
Although jellyfish can be cool to look at from afar, swimming with them is not. We ended our excursion when we ran into a giant jellyfish known to have a harmful sting. Jellyfish have increased in number throughout the world's oceans due to the increasing water temperatures.
With the rising temperatures, different fish are no longer available for consumption or become rare, which increases the prices that islanders must pay at the market. The rising food prices in an already economically stressed country only exasperates the problems of poverty.
For places in the world that depend heavily on their natural resources for their livelihood, climate change will mean ending a way of life. For us who travel to these destinations, it will end our ability to escape into paradise.
April is the month we focus on the Earth, and 2021 marks the 51st year of celebrating Earth Day. Last year we had a wake-up call that things need to change and that we need to start doing regular check-ups with ourselves and our planet. Since moving to Mars is likely far away in the future, we must take care of the place we call home.
If you believe in a higher power, remember that was our number one job is to take care of the planet, our "garden."
Since we have allowed problems to grow in our garden, we now need to take drastic steps.
This month I reached out to Hana Creger, Senior Program Manager focused on Environmental Equity at Greenlining. Ms. Creager contributes to developing and implementing policies leading to clean transportation and mobility investments in California. Her work focuses on the intersection of transportation, climate change, and economic opportunities for low-income communities of color. Ms. Creger has been the lead author of several reports, with her most recent being Clean Mobility Equity: A Playbook Lessons from California’s Clean Transportation Programs. In addition, she serves on several advisory committees for cities, agencies, universities, and nonprofits for projects relating to shared mobility.
Interview with Hana Creger
How do you explain environmental equity vs. environmental justice?
People will have various definitions across the board, but to draw out the difference between environmental equity versus environmental justice, this is from Greenlining’s perspective. Environmental justice is concerned with preventing the environmental “Bads," reducing pollution, for example, closing down an oil refinery near a neighborhood. Environmental equity works to bring ecological goods into those same communities that are experiencing excessive pollution. So, increasing access to electric vehicles or solar panels, or green jobs.
These two kinds of concepts and strategies must happen at the same time. In a lot of ways, they are working at almost different ends of the spectrum.
How does environmental inequity affect low-income individuals and minorities?
You need to tap into history to understand why environmental inequity and injustice primarily impact low-income folks of color. Specifically, one policy from the 1920s called redlining, which continues to shape our cities today, essentially forced residential segregation. Where communities of color, particularly Black, Latino, Asian, and Jewish communities, were forced to live in some cities, away from white communities. And these areas were in undesirable locations that were near polluting industries. Later in the following decades, cities would build highways through these neighborhoods, and toxic waste dumped near these communities. And over the years, these communities have become overburdened by pollution and toxins, which has led to all kinds of detrimental health impacts today.
Today the same communities have much more challenging times accessing the kind of sustainable programs and green technology that are now helping us address climate change. They are not getting to those same communities, so we need environmental equity policies to help rectify that.
How are economics and the environment intertwined?
First, environmental issues are economic issues. The impacts of climate change resulting from environmental pollution and racism are going to affect everyone. Of course, it will impact low-income folks of color first and worst, but you cannot escape it no matter how wealthy you are. Climate change is going to take and is already taking a significant toll on our economy. If we do not pay for it now, we will pay for it heavily in the following years. The racial wealth gap plus climate disaster both of those things take huge tolls on our economy. We are operating at a loss by not addressing both of those issues.
How can we make a clean energy economy a reality in low-income communities?
Around ten years ago California first started investing heavily in clean transportation technology. The general strategy was to take a prescriptive approach by providing financial incentives for people to purchase electric vehicles. On its face, that's great. It helped to develop and uplift the electric vehicle market. Unfortunately, when you look at who has benefited from that, the vast majority of beneficiaries from that policy are middle and wealthy-income white people—many of them who bought quite pricey electric vehicles. And from an equity perspective, that's not who needs those resources and incentives the most.
The programs that I would like to point to are moving away from a prescriptive approach. Such approaches target low-income folks of color and ones that are driven by individual community needs and recognize that an electric car does not work for everyone. One program I'd like to highlight is the Sustainable Transportation Equity Project.
It's 100% targeted at communities that suffer the most from pollution and poverty. What it does is that it funds those communities. It enables them to do a community-driven planning process, assesses their needs, and figure out what kinds of mobility options fit best. Is it electric vehicles? Is it public transit infrastructure or better bike lanes? At the same time, this program also requires that there will be interlocking complementary investments in anti-displacement measures because we want to make sure that all these new technologies don’t have unintended consequences. There is also required climate adaptation plans to make sure there are no unintended outcomes of this investment.
And finally, there are required workforce development plans because we know that every single investment can positively impact green jobs and workforce development training. This program also funds the implementation of those plans for infrastructure, mobility plans, potential careers, and workforce training. This program was awarded to, I believe, 12 communities across California to do the planning grant and then two or three communities to do the implementation grant.
I believe in Los Angeles, Fresno, and the city of Stockton. It is an innovative program. We recommend the program be replicated and scaled up on a national level because it provides a model of the most inclusive, equitable, innovative mobility program.
What actions can individuals in society take to help the environment that is unexpected or new?
I want to take the onus off the individual and focus on creating a system where for example, the easiest, most affordable option is for someone to choose an electric vehicle over a gas vehicle. How do we create a system that reduces those barriers to access that targets those resources and incentives to the people that need it most?
Of course, individual responsibility is critical, but so is collective action. When all of us are working in the same direction, you know that is going to have that impact. And as advocates and policymakers, we must create those kinds of systems and programs. The ones highlighted in the clean mobility equity report are great examples.
The most impactful thing that an individual can do is get educated on the movements they can join. Then to strategize, donate to those organizations doing great work, figure out how they, as individuals, can participate in campaigns or voting in the right politicians and hold them accountable—staying engaged at every step of the way.
What are the most significant areas of impact of pollution on the environment?
Transportation emissions are the number one contributor to climate change. The reality is that no matter if we stopped all emissions today, the climate is still going to change. We are going to have to adapt and build more resilient cities.
And I'd say that we both have to reduce emissions as fast as we can, but also come to terms with the reality that we're going to be living in a much different world. The government has to provide the funding and the structures to help ensure that the most vulnerable populations will weather that storm.
In what ways has the pandemic helped and hurt strides to environmental equity?
I think explicitly pointing to the drop in public transit ridership in this last year. Hopefully, it is just a temporary thing, but I think people might be a little bit more hesitant to get on a train with other people. Even in a post-pandemic world with more people working remotely, we may see a sustained drop in public transit ridership. And the fear there is that already our public transit agencies are struggling. We know that low-income transit-dependent people will be harmed the most by a drop in ridership, a decrease in fare revenue, which ultimately means service cuts for public transit.
I think where my biggest fear is, are wealthy people going to now prefer to drive to work instead of taking the train, and is that going to lead to more long-term transportation greenhouse gas emissions.
Give us a quick overview of how Greenlining is working on solutions to promote environmental equity?
One of the big takeaways from this report we just published is that electric vehicles are not enough. Electric vehicles are not a silver bullet solution; they still contribute to congestion.
The best thing that governments can do is prioritize a more comprehensive mobility equity approach, which is focusing on moving people, not more cars, no matter if they are electric or not. That means prioritizing investments in walking, biking, public transit infrastructure targeted towards the people who need it. The people who face the most barriers live in the most polluted communities that have been under-invested. At the same time, the government must eventually begin phasing out any programs that continue to entrench our dependency on automobiles, and we have limited resources; therefore, we need to target it to the people who need it most.
Take Action
According to NASA, climate change is already making dramatic changes to the environment; some of the readily observable signs are that glaciers have shrunk, plant and animal ranges have shifted, and trees are flowering sooner.
Around the world, the number of deaths due to air pollution has increased, with outdoor air pollution contributing to 4.2 million premature deaths a year.
The United Nations 2030 goals showcase the depth of the problems face. Acting now will change the world.
Start Planning for a Better Future. Resources and Information at Greenlining: https://greenlining.org/
About the Author
Annmarie Hylton-Schaub, Head Marketing Strategist and Content Developer at Project Good Work a boutique marketing group focused on helping individuals who want to launch social impact projects, charities, and change-making initiatives. The marketing group works to develop branding, marketing strategy, and content to connect clients with the people who believe what they believe so that their project and business can thrive.
If you have a passion for an unserved community, a social justice problem, or simply want to change minds contact Project Good Work at ProjectGood.Work to start your project of change today.