ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

In California, Black and Brown people have long been exposed to environmental racism. Our neighbors face poor air quality, unsafe drinking water, toxic chemical exposure, climate change, and extreme weather events that cause negative health outcomes and premature deaths. 

Take our water systems: over 1 million residents in the San Joaquin Valley are dependent on contaminated water, which can prove fatal to infants and damaging to adults. Over 450,000 people in Fresno County and over 32,000 in Tulare County are served by water systems violating drinking water standards because of contaminants like nitrate and arsenic. Residents of the Coachella Valley use water containing 10 times the allowable limit of arsenic. More than 920,000 Californians face an increased risk of cancer and liver and kidney problems due to substandard tap water.

While these marginalized communities recognize the impact of environmental disparities on their livelihoods, policymakers have not made the best decisions to address the environmental racism these families face. In 2016, environmental justice advocates raised concerns about extending AB 32 because the bill did not significantly limit greenhouse gas pollution found primarily in Black and Brown neighborhoods. After passing the bill, the state’s biggest polluters reduced their overall greenhouse gas emissions while increasing air pollutants that threatened the well-being of Black and Brown residents.

Ending environmental racism requires effective policies that reverse the harms of environmental injustice, stop the environmental exploitation of communities of color, and hold corporate giants accountable for their pollution.

Our families deserve to live in clean, pollution-free neighborhoods. Here is what could move us in this direction:

1. Get Federal Climate, Energy, and Infrastructure Funds to Our Neighborhoods. Climate policies must meet the needs of our most impacted neighborhoods. State legislators should reintroduce legislation similar to AB 2419, the California Justice 40 Act, which would have required 40 percent of federal climate, clean energy, and infrastructure funds to flow to the state to benefit disadvantaged communities who have experienced environmental burdens. The bill would have also required 10 percent of these funds to help low-income communities. A bill similar to the California Justice 40 Act has the potential to substantially improve the public health, economic prosperity, and environmental sustainability of our neighborhoods. 

At the same time, state lawmakers must also leverage federal resources from the Inflation Reduction Act, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and the American Rescue Plan Act to address environmental racism. Specifically, the state should use some of these funds to capitalize on a public bank focused on making green investments that curb environmental racism throughout our state.

2. Protect Californians from Excessive Heat at Home. As temperatures rise, our families need access to safe, code-compliant housing that prioritizes safe indoor temperatures. Between 2010 and 2019, the hottest decade on record, California’s official death record attributed 599 deaths to heat exposure. Climate-vulnerable neighborhoods are susceptible to heat risk. A bill like AB 2597 would establish safe indoor air temperatures for newly installed units and existing dwellings, protecting our neighborhoods in the hottest months.

3. Clean Air and Water for Every Californian. Air pollution and climate change caused by oil and gas extraction devastate our families’ well-being and health. Asthma and cardiovascular disease, for example, are made worse by the subpar air quality in our areas. People exposed to more pollution are also at a greater risk of experiencing severe symptoms and other diseases. State lawmakers should enact policies that provide every Californian with the right to clean air and water.

4. Curb Corporate Polluters. Corporations are not only responsible for a majority of greenhouse gas emissions that create climate change but also often exceed their pollutant limits. Corporate pollutants threaten the health of our marginalized neighbors and have fatal effects. California should increase fines for those violating air pollution standards, such as AB 2910 of 2022, to increase the maximum penalty for industrial violators from $10,000 to $30,000. The state should also establish greater oversight and transparency over corporate polluters, as the originally introduced SB 260 proposed – by requiring large corporations to publicly disclose uniform, verifiable data on their greenhouse gas emissions.

POLICING & IMMIGRATION

Built on anti-Black racism, the prison industry and the judicial system perpetuate the theft, exclusion, and exploitation that define our current Oppression Economy. Year after year, California pours more and more resources into policing and prisons, despite 60 years of evidence showing no meaningful effect on crime. For example, as part of Governor Gavin Newsom’s 2022-2023 budget, he proposed spending $447.4 million over five years to support nine public safety proposals. 

Too often, investments like these come at the expense of our most marginalized neighbors, including immigrants, who are already severely impacted by police surveillance, arrests, detentions, and deportation. These investments also crowd out other necessary investments that can protect and uplift our families. And, with higher paying salaries – including an average salary of $81,170 for California correctional officers – policing and prison jobs also become some of the few economic opportunities available to many of our neighbors. 

Ultimately, over-investment in policing and incarceration threatens the safety of our neighborhoods. Our family members are more likely to be stopped by the police, seriously injured or killed by the police, and detained by immigration enforcement each month. To ensure the safety of our neighbors of color, we believe that we must rethink the systems of policing in our state. Doing so means cutting the resources funneled to police forces every year and reassessing the roles police officers take on in our neighborhoods.

Here are five ideas we have identified to breakdown systemic racism and inequality that is rooted in policing our communities:

1. Establish and Expand Civil Response Programs. Too often, police officers take on roles and respond to calls they need to be equipped for, such as mental health crises. Localities should seek to establish Neighborhood Civil Response Teams to promote peace and safety without police involvement. Neighborhood Civil Response Teams should be staffed by dedicated non-police city staff and mental health professionals. These teams can work to respond to behavioral health emergencies, take theft and property damage reports, develop strategies to improve safety, and coordinate resources to implement these strategies. Such a program should invest in expanding the existing civil response program and support existing organizations responding to non-life-threatening emergencies and calls related to behavioral health.

The state should simultaneously establish a $100 million Behavioral Emergency Response Team Program building on the recently launched $10 million C.R.I.S.E.S. Grant Pilot Program. The program will provide grants to support community organizations to respond to 911 calls involving people experiencing mental health crises. 

2. Create Participatory Budgeting Processes. Too often, we are left out of decisions about how public dollars will be spent in our neighborhoods. Localities throughout the state should move to adopt a participatory budgeting process that allows residents to directly determine how a portion of the public budget is spent. Participatory budgeting can help ensure that our public dollars go toward investments that uplift rather than police our neighbors.

3. Democratize Criminal-Legal Data. Policing, crime, and court data are far too inaccessible to the public – impeding accountability for criminal-legal institutions and personnel. State lawmakers should develop uniform criminal justice data standards for state and local agencies to follow when collecting and reporting on this data. Lawmakers should also clarify with whom and when local criminal justice data can be shared. This will make it easier for advocates and researchers to seek the information they need to understand what is happening in their neighborhoods. Finally, state lawmakers should require that every police department collect and publish criminal justice data on their websites. These data should include arrest data, broken down by race, and demographic information of sworn officers. Statewide data collection should be utilized with data collections that look at past transgressions or misconduct histories of police officers.

4. Prohibit Police-ICE Collaboration. Currently, California law enforcement officers are allowed to transfer individuals convicted of specific crimes from local jails and state prisons to the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E.). The state also allows the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to enforce immigration laws. A good policy option to consider emulating would be AB 937, the VISION Act, which would have ended both practices, shielding all immigrants from harsh immigration-related penalties after individuals have completed their criminal sentences. 

5. Close Prisons, Reinvest Funds into Community Services. Despite its reputation as one of the most progressive states in the nation, California proportionately incarcerates more people of color than any other state. Building on Governor Newsom’s budget proposals for closing state prisons and uplifting the work of Californians United for a Responsible Budget, we support efforts to close at least ten state-owned prisons over the next five years. Closing state-owned prisons would generate savings of at least $1.6 billion per year. Savings such as these can then be used to fund community-based services and resources that uplift and support our neighborhoods.

SUSTAINABLE JOBS & LIVABLE WAGES

The current federal minimum wage of $7.25 is far from what an average worker needs to sustain themselves and their families. In California, even the state minimum wage of $15 does not cover basic living expenses, such as food, housing, and transportation. According to data from MIT’s Living Wage Calculator, a single adult worker in the state would need to make $21.82 an hour to support themselves, and a working family of four would need to earn $30.54 an hour. At the current rate, these wages are improbable to reach. Especially when nearly a third of California families are working poor, and the state is home to the second-highest median rent of $2,201 in the nation.

Every worker in California should have access to meaningful workplace protections and jobs that pay a living wage. When we say “every worker,” we mean everyone – including undocumented immigrants, women, and historically marginalized groups. As we work towards realizing this vision, here are some ideas to create an economy that fairly values and compensates people of color throughout the state:

1. Raise the State Minimum Wage to $18 an Hour. While establishing a livable wage may take time, increasing the state minimum wage is a vital step we can and should continue to take toward ensuring fair compensation for low-wage workers. The Living Wage Act, a 2024 ballot initiative, would raise the state’s minimum wage from $15 to $18 by 2026 and index it to inflation to ensure the minimum wage keeps up with the cost of living.

2. Hold Corporations Accountable for Abusive Working Conditions. California is home to 35 Amazon Distribution centers – the most distribution centers in the country. Foster Farms, a poultry company with operations throughout the West and East Coasts, is also headquartered in the state. Both corporations are notorious for cultivating a stressful and exhausting work environment for employees. The state should enact policies that redress corporate economic and labor harms and abuses. These policies should include reducing the number of open grievances from employees, examining the culture of work at these corporations, and fining or banning businesses that foster unhealthy work environments.

3. Create a Statewide Youth Apprenticeship Program to Increase Awareness and Connections to Quality Jobs for California’s Young People. Although California has more than 85,000 apprenticeship programs, only 0.2% are oriented toward the state’s youth. Such a limited number of programs leaves countless young people throughout the state disconnected from pipelines that can lead to sustainable and well-paying jobs. State legislators should introduce a bill similar to SB 1351, the California Youth Apprenticeship Program. This bill would have established the California Youth Apprenticeship Program and the Office of the California Youth Apprenticeship Program within the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency. SB 1351 would have also provided grants to organizations to fund existing apprenticeship programs or to develop new apprenticeship programs to serve opportunity youth, foster youth, and other targeted youth between the ages of 16 to 24.