CASA recognizes that systemic racism is still active in this country and negatively impacts the lives of people of color. We believe that working toward social equity and racial justice are essential to realizing CASA’s vision of a sustainable, resilient, and inclusive Alameda.
Environmental advocacy has not always centered the environmental issues that most affect people of color or low-income people. For example, the fact that Black Americans are subjected to higher levels of air pollution regardless of their wealth, and race is the strongest predictor of exposure to health-threatening particulate matter. Or that our amazing National Parks are not preserving a previously-uninhabited landscape, as the common story goes, but required forcibly removing the indigenous peoples who used to call those lands home.
We recognize that issues of climate and equity are interconnected, and advocate for solutions that address social and environmental needs at the same time, such as increasing transit access in low-income communities and supporting affordable housing that is low cost and all-electric.
Air pollution links:
https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2017.304297
https://www.greenbiz.com/article/how-racism-manifests-clean-energy
National Parks link:
https://www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/erasing-native-americans-from-national-parks/