By Virginia Reinhart
This year, the amazing network of volunteers and staff who make up the Sierra Club’s San Francisco Bay Chapter achieved important legislative and electoral wins that are making our region a cleaner, healthier, and more equitable place to live. Each one of 2022 victories described below was hard won and is the result of many months — or even years — of organizing, strategizing, coalition building, education, and negotiation.
These victories could not have happened without our volunteer leaders, staff, engaged membership, and incredible partners. Thank you to the activists who show up after a long day of work and sit through a two-hour meeting to give a two-minute public comment. Thank you to our hike leaders who build the next generation of conservationists by creating safe and special opportunities to be out in nature. Thank you to the brave folks who get over the awkwardness of conversations with strangers and phonebank or canvas door to door. Thank you to everyone who donates, signs petitions, and renews their membership in the Sierra Club.
So many people put in the hard work to build this movement we’re all a part of — and it’s not easy. We are up against enormous challenges: inertia, entrenched interests, and the temptations of despair and cynicism. So before we move into the new year and set our sights on new challenges, I think we owe it to ourselves to spend a moment savoring these victories.
Without further ado, here are some of our proudest moments in 2022:
Giving Salmon Space to Survive:
This summer, capping off a multi-decade process, Marin County finally adopted a science-based Stream Conservation Area Ordinance for the San Geronimo Valley that will protect some of the most vulnerable salmon habitats left in California. The ordinance enacts a “no net loss of streamside habitat” target by limiting development within 100 feet of salmon habitat and a 2:1 habitat replacement ratio within the 100-foot zone. Crucially, the ordinance protects ecologically important ephemeral (seasonal) streams, as well as year-round streams. Read more about this important legislation here.
Breathe Easy, Bay Area:
In 2019, Berkeley was the first city in the nation to pass a building electrification ordinance requiring new buildings to install clean, electric alternatives to polluting gas appliances, which are a leading source of both indoor and outdoor air pollution in Bay Area communities. Now, just three years later, 20 municipalities in our Chapter area and over 69 cities and counties across the state have followed suit. That means our homes and buildings are healthier places and we are speeding up the transition to 100% clean, renewable, climate-friendly energy. Our next step? In early 2023, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District is expected to vote on zero-NOx emission standards for home furnaces and water heaters with a plan for an equitable, affordable transition. Learn more and take action here!
Original illustration by Vrinda Manglik.
Advancing Safe Streets:
In order to see our common streetscape reclaimed for community life and safe, sustainable, multimodal transit, our San Francisco Group has championed numerous successful “Safe Streets'' initiatives this year. In November, San Francisco voters rejected Proposition I (the measure that would reopen John F. Kennedy Drive and the Great Highway to cars) and approved the Sierra Club-endorsed Proposition J by a landslide to permanently ban cars from JFK Drive in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. In December, we cheered on the SFMTA Board as they voted unanimously to make permanent 16 of the slow streets instituted early in the pandemic. Read more about these street safety wins here.
Climate Literacy Efforts Scale Up:
Our Chapter’s Climate Literacy Committee, fresh off victories at the local school district level, scaled up its work to meet the challenge of the climate crisis. This year, the Committee — in close partnership with our friends at the environmental literacy advocacy group Ten Strands — has expanded to advocacy for funding and support for climate literacy at the State level. Read all about the Committee’s journey here, including details about the current budget request we’ve presented to the Governor that would fund a scale-up of environmental and climate literacy programming; support for county offices of education to advance environmental and climate literacy; and a grant fund for school districts to implement environmental and climate literacy.
Spring 2022 gathering of the Climate Literacy Committee.
Plate It Again, Sam:
This time next year, all food establishments in unincorporated Marin County will need to serve customers on reusable dishes, with reusable cups and utensils. This is thanks to the passage in May of the County’s Reusable Foodware Ordinance, which has additional requirements that will take a huge bite out of Marin’s single-use plastic consumption, including: requiring a surcharge for take-out cups (to incentivize reusable alternatives); and new requirements for disposable foodware to be made only from materials that are PFAS-free and certified compostable for organic fertilizer. Read more about this ordinance and the Sierra Club-led effort that made it happen.
Point Molate Saved and On the Path to Becoming a Public Park:
Courageous votes by the progressive majority on the Richmond City Council nixed the sell-off of this spectacular swath of shoreline open space to a private luxury developer. Then, the dream of a public park at Point Molate came one BIG step closer to becoming a reality when the Governor signed a state budget that includes $36 million for the East Bay Regional Park District to acquire and clean up the property. This investment by the State will no doubt leverage additional funds to achieve the goal of a community park at Point Molate. Read more here.
Photo by Trisha Fawver via Flickr Creative Commons
Big Wins for the Environment in the Midterm Election:
We prevailed in over 82% of our Chapter’s 2022 Midterm endorsements, helping pass pro-environment ballot measures and elect dozens of environmental champions all across our Chapter area. We look forward to working closely with these elected officials in the coming years to advance cutting-edge policy to clean up our air and water, protect parks and wildlife, and equitably transition to a clean energy economy. Read about some of our local Midterm victory highlights here.
The End of Coal in Richmond:
In May, a federal judge signed the City of Richmond’s precedent-setting legal settlement to phase out coal shipments. This settlement caps off a powerful community-driven effort to end this source of harmful air pollution and creates a blueprint for other communities to protect themselves against threats to public health. While Richmond is now assured of a coal-free future, Oakland remains a target of the coal industry. But alongside the West Oakland community, we are working to make sure that coal never comes to Oakland.
No Coal in Richmond protest. Photo by Steve Nadel.
Keeping Smog Out of Your Shopping Cart:
Spurred by the rise of online shopping, unchecked warehouse development is a growing problem for health and the environment in the Bay Area, and it’s hitting historically marginalized communities first and worst. Used as last-mile-delivery centers, warehouses become hubs for diesel-powered trucks and heavy-duty equipment that emit dangerous pollution. This year, the Sierra Club stood with targeted communities in Hayward, San Francisco’s Bayview neighborhood, Richmond, and more in order to keep polluting warehouse developments away from homes, schools, hospitals, and other places where high-risk communities gather; and eliminate harmful emissions by accelerating the adoption of zero-emission vehicles powered by clean energy. Read about one development in North Richmond where our involvement helped set a new standard, and sign up to get campaign updates here.
We have much more planned for 2023, and we’ll need your help to get it all done. But for now, happy New Year and thank you for being a part of the Sierra Club’s movement in the Bay Area.
Happy New Year from the staff of the SF Bay Chapter, pictured below at this year's back-in-person Chapter awards ceremony.
