Evergreen January 2021 - Announcing our 2021 Legislative Priorities

 
What’s the Alpine Lakes Wilderness Without the ‘Lakes’?
By ​​​​​​Margie Van Cleve, Conservation Chair for the Washington State Chapter • Photo credit: Nete Olsen
 
WA Dept of Ecology and Icicle Peshastin Irrigation District (IPID) are moving forward with plans to trundle heavy machinery through the Alpine Lakes Wilderness and begin mining more water than ever before. Take action today to protect this iconic Wilderness landscape:
Speak up to Protect the Alpine Lakes Wilderness!
We're Fighting for Fossil Fuel-Free Schools
By Ruth Sawyer, Beyond Coal Organizer • 592 words / 5 min
 
In early February, the Board of Directors for Seattle Public Schools will consider a resolution to eliminate all fossil fuels used in school facilities by 2040. This will ensure that schools use 100% clean, renewable energy for heating, cooling, cooking, electricity, and transportation. ​​​​​​Here's how you can help create a livable future for our children:
Click Here to Protect Washington's Students
Snake River Salmon and Orca 2020 Wrap-up:
Poised for Action in 2021

By Bill Arthur, Snake/Columbia River Salmon Campaign Chair • 897 words / 7 min
 
As we welcome the new Biden/Harris Administration into the White House, we’d like to take a moment to reflect on 2020, and all that we’ve accomplished together. We believe that 2021 is poised to carry this momentum into the new year and be an opportunity for bold action to save our salmon and orca. Learn more about developing a comprehensive solution for our salmon, orca and communities:
Read Our Snake River 2020 Wrap-up
By Victoria Leistman, Dirty Fuels Organizer • 312 words / 2 min

We have a BIG opportunity in 2021 to finally get ahead of industry proposals and advocate for strong protections against climate-wrecking fossil fuels! The Department of Ecology is making a new rule on how fossil fuel projects will be evaluated. We need your help to make a fair and just rulemaking process. Add your voice today:
Help Us Ensure Strong Environmental Protections

 


By Kelsey Hamlin, Volunteer Outreach & Development Coordinator • 492 words / 4 min

We’re hard at work preparing for the 2021 Washington State legislative session and one of our priorities this year is updating the Growth Management Act (or GMA).

The GMA directly impacts the way growth is managed in our cities, towns, and rural communities--this has big implications for our quality of life, health, and resilience to a changing climate. It’s kind of a big deal. So we need your help to make this a legislative priority in Olympia:
Learn More About the Growth Management Act
By Jesse Piedfort, Washington State Sierra Club Chapter Director • 758 words / 6 min

In Washington state, homes and buildings are the single fastest-growing source of carbon pollution and contribute 27% of Washington’s climate pollution. These emissions largely come from burning so-called “natural” gas. However, “natural” gas is far from safe, healthy, or natural.

Thanks to Washington state’s abundance of clean, low-cost electricity, swapping out gas appliances for electric ones is a huge climate win. Here's how we're working to make our homes and buildings safer:
Learn More About the Healthy Homes & Clean Buildings Bill
By Kelsey Hamlin, Volunteer Outreach & Development Coordinator

Tell your legislators to approve a Clean Fuel Standard! This ruling could improve our air quality, reduce climate pollution, and bring more clean electricity jobs to our region. Send your message to your legislators today and tell them to approve a Clean Fuel Standard!
Send Your Legislator a Message!

WA for Black Lives
 
Organizing together to demand economic, political, and social justice in our state.

Washington for Black Lives is a unified Black-led coalition of organizations across the state building on the innate power of our communities.
Donate
The Northwest Community Bail Fund

The Northwest Community Bail Fund (NCBF) works to ensure that people accused of low-level crimes have an equal opportunity to defend themselves from a position of freedom.

They provide cash bail for people who are unable to pay due to poverty and who are charged with crimes in King and Snohomish Counties and have no other holds. They also provide support to navigate the legal process with the aim of reducing pre-trial incarceration and its consequences, reducing the pressure to plead guilty.
Donate
 

There's No Climate Justice Without Indigenous Sovereignty, with Rebecca Nagle

This episode digs into colonialism and Indigenous genocide as the original sin of climate change, why tribal sovereignty is critical to climate action, and much more with intrepid and profound Cherokee reporter Rebecca Nagle. 
 
Listen here

  Our Reading List:

For the first time in more than a generation, chinook salmon have spawned in the upper Columbia River system.
 
"We had the sheriff called on us, park rangers called on us," recalls Newton, now 37, who owns a construction industry project development firm in Denver.

"This lady who was horseback riding was upset that we were hiking on her trail. She said that we'd spooked her horse," she says of a woman in a group of white horseback riders they encountered. "It just didn't make any sense.

 
Yakama tribal members exercise treaty rights on the Columbia river. A proposed methanol plant could endanger the ways of life those rights protect.
 
The wildfires that burned more than four million acres in California this year were both historic and prophetic, foreshadowing a future of more heat, more fires and more destruction. Among the victims, this year and in the years to come, are many of California’s oldest and most majestic trees, already in limited supply.
 
Inside Climate News: In Georgia Senate Race, Warnock Brings a History of Black Faith Leaders’ Environmental Activism 
Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Martin Luther King Jr. once preached and Warnock is senior pastor, has been a leader in embracing climate action.
 
 
 
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