Protest
Today was No Kings protest day. Evanston folks showed up, once again. What I saw and heard at this event was a little different from past protests. Not that the speeches or the signs were different, But what I personally saw when I looked out at the 1000+ folks gathered
Design
I was reminded of this lesson about how organizations often overlook their most powerful lever - building relationships - in the span of a few hours this past week. The power comes when folks get to know other folks, and importantly know what those folks know and care about. Those relationships and
Environmental equity
Yesterday I had the opportunity to attend the Evanston Environmental Justice Conversation Series, co-sponsored by a coalition of civic and religious organizations (including Environmental Justice Evanston, a group which I am now supporting). Keynote speakers and panelists were folks with deep personal and professional experience in the impacts of
Thinking out loud
A few notes and quotes from recent readings and research. The thread here is the power - and necessity - of connectedness. Environmental justice pioneer Hazel Johnson The arc of the story of environmental justice pioneer Hazel Johnson is instructive. As is the maturity of the organization she founded in 1979 - People
Thinking out loud
I just returned from a 10 day trip, with my wife Jamie, along the coast of Maine. Our first visit to the state. In the final days of our stay I remarked that every Mainer we encountered just seemed so...nice. "I think they're just happy,"
Environmental equity
I took a step back during the past month to reflect on what I am learning about environmental equity and community listening, and what each means to me. All of this is a learning work-in-progress. I am starting to frame environmental equity as a challenge consisting of two
Thinking out loud
I've been thinking about a post that I wrote earlier this year: What if everybody’s job is to do repair? It's on my mind after several meetings with folks in my network and running across some new readings. It all points toward the lesson of
Environmental equity
This post contains a few notes and resources about the status of environmental equity in Evanston. Understanding the map The 2022 Evanston Process for Local Assessment of Needs (EPLAN) helps set the baseline for understanding the legacy impact of discriminatory housing policies and practices on community well-being. The map
Thinking out loud
A couple of recent conversations about climate change and green energy efforts led to the topic of capacity. People capacity, not green energy capacity. People capacity to learn, and then to do. How might we build the capacity to learn and do things (differently) that move us forward to address
Community listening
Early on in my community-listening learning journey this year, I wrote that I was interested in working with groups in three related areas: * How a group listens to the community members it serves. * How a group makes sense of what it is hearing from community members. * How community members
Environmental equity
A opportunity may open up, to work on how how a collection of environmental groups consider environmental equity as integral to their practice. This post is some early thinking about how to address this opportunity. The context. The groups are part of a not-for-profit collective organized to advance
Thinking out loud
What gets lost in my weekly thinking-out-loud routine here is the through-line of activity generated by Environmental Justice Evanston (EJE), the group with which I became associated earlier this year. A lot is happening behind the scenes and I want to honor that work. For what it