August 14, 2020

Press Contact: Chanell Fletcher, Executive Director of ClimatePlan
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 510-695-1009

Oakland, CA -- Today, ClimatePlan announces a new report  - Overarching Principles for Land Use and Water Integration in the San Francisco Bay Area - that provides an overview of water and land-use integration in the Bay Area. The report details how land-use and water decision-making are separated, current challenges to integrating land-use and water within transportation planning, and what needs to be done to integrate these two elements.

The following letter was sent to California Transportation Commission (CTC) Commissioner Hillary Norton and Mitch Weiss, Executive Director of the CTC, ahead of the August 12, 2020 CTC meeting. 

As many of you may know, over the past year, ClimatePlan has been working with Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) and the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) to equitably integrate water into Plan Bay Area 2050.  Through the Community Foundation Water Initiative (CFWI), ClimatePlan has also been working with five other non-profits across the state to advance statewide recommendations that address the gap between land-use and water.

From these efforts, we are excited to announce the release of two things, 

• New report: Overarching Principles for Land Use and Water Integration in the San Francisco Bay Area 
• Virtual Policy Briefing: Ensuring Equitable Public Engagement in Coordinated Planning

At ClimatePlan, we understand that we need policy change at all levels--local, regional, state, and federal--if we want to create real lasting change. As we advance policies that address the intersection of land use, transportation, housing, and climate, we know that much more is needed to address the challenges our nation faces, including a pandemic, an economic recession, and a reckoning against systemic racism and oppression. Starting this month, we will be interviewing our partners and allies to discuss policies they are advancing that can help us create a healthier, sustainable, and more equitable future for all. 

The Green New Deal came to mind as a comprehensive piece of legislation that could address so many of the issues we’re looking to tackle. We talked with Sylvia Chi, Policy Director at the Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN), to hear about the work of the California Green New Deal Coalition, the status of a Green New Deal in California, and how folks can get involved in supporting a California Green New Deal.

The murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis by police has finally created a sea change in our country to support black lives. This is beginning to take tangible forms such as efforts to defund police departments, the creation of task forces looking into reparations for slavery, and interrogating how our nation’s prison industrial complex contributes to racial injustice. We are also seeing residents encourage their city councils, county and state governments, and the federal government to reprioritize black lives and black communities. At ClimatePlan, this change is also being felt at an organizational and network level. 

ClimatePlan’s Evolution 

ClimatePlan was formed in 2007 by 11 nonprofit organizations—American Farmland Trust, California Center for Regional Leadership, California League of Conservation Voters, Center for Clean Air Policy, Greenbelt Alliance, the Local Government Commission, Natural Resources Defense Council, Pacific Forest Trust, Planning and Conservation League, Sierra Club, and TransForm—with a seed grant from the San Francisco Foundation.

Equity was a part of ClimatePlan’s creation--one of its guiding principles was, “Advance Solutions that Increase Social Equity and Environmental Justice.” As a learning network of over 50 organizations, ClimatePlan worked hard to ensure that regional plans and statewide policies led to more equitable outcomes. While there was a clear focus on equitable policy and outcomes, there was not as much attention to advancing racial justice.

Now, in 2019, ClimatePlan is a black-led network, with the majority of staff being women of color. It is clear that the issues that ClimatePlan works on - housing, land use, and transportation - are inextricably linked to the need to center equity and ensure those who are most impacted--black and brown lives--are front and center in decision-making. In the past 2 to 3 years, ClimatePlan has deepened its commitment to equity with the adoption of shared agreements, the promotion of the Investment without Displacement platform as it relates to housing justice in California, and the commitment to centering and amplifying community voices in everything ClimatePlan does.