2009 YEAR IN REVIEW:
Update Phillips EJEAC, led by WEI’s community-based group PESCI (Phillips Environmental Steering Committee
Initiative) in South Minneapolis, did intensive grass roots organizing to stop a proposed wood burner by successfully advocating for a new state policy that requires a “cumulative health impact analysis” to be done before any new
polluting industry can be sited in Phillips Neighborhood – the first such environmental justice burden law in the nation; sent two PESCI members to the Green Jobs Conference in Washington DC; helped WEI be active as a Steering
Committee member of HIRE, the “green jobs” coalition to ensure federal stimulus dollars help train and hire inner city residents; designed and completed a door-to-door community health survey with 11 multicultural/multi-lingual people
hired from the neighborhood and presented it for review at a community forum and strategizing session on October 3; sent 40 people on a bus to Milwaukee to get intensive urban farming training with Will Allen at Growing Power’s Urban
Farm Center; launched WEI’s first “Farm and Food Justice” demonstration project with Little Earth of United Tribes, mobilizing the support of many community allies, including the Indigenous Green Jobs Coalition; brought Will Allen to
LEOUT to do on-site compost/vermiculture training and Erika Allen of Growing Power’s Chicago branch to do
Project Planning; hired two new PESCI coordinators/community organizers (Angelina Matias Vasquez and Aisha Gomez); and worked with three interns who provided generous assistance; and was recently awarded a MN Department of Agriculture Food Specialty Grant. WEI is currently collaborating on a proposal to develop a bio-digester on site at LEOUT; is working with the City of Minneapolis on an asthma prevention project; and is also joining with
neighborhood forces to promote alternatives to Xcel Energy’s proposal to install high-voltage electric transmission wires right through the heart of Phillips Neighborhood.
Update East Metro EJEAC,led by WEI’s community-based East Metro Environmental Justice Steering Committee (a collaboration with Hmong, Latino and American Indian organizations), hired its first coordinator/community organizer (Claudia Foussard); held three culturally specific environmental justice trainings with our principal investigator (Dr.
Fardin Oliaei) which were attended by approximately 160 participants for whom Hmong and Spanish interpretation and translated documents were provided; participated in radio programs and gave interviews to several culturally based
newspapers to promote education and information about environmental toxic contamination in the East Metro; won our first federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) grant to do organizing and basic research about potential
perfluorochemical contamination in the East Metro; was recently informed that US EPA, itself, will do our long proposed “market basket” research for East Metro Hmong and Latino farmers in Spring 2010 -- with WEI and the Steering
Committee members at the table to help design and guide the project—a major environmental justice victory! The East Metro EJ Steering Committee is also expanding to include African American and African immigrant residents and
organizations on the East Side and will participate in policy work related to EJEAC-East Metro.
All of this great EJEAC work in both projects was done with specific grant funds awarded to WEI’s environmental justice/agricultural justice projects. We thank Bremer Foundation, Headwaters Foundation, Bush Foundation, McKnight Foundation, Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation, Minneapolis Foundation, the Central Initiative Fund, MN Department of Agriculture, United States Department of Agriculture, and the US Environmental Protection Agency plus our many generous donors and volunteers who have made this work possible and so promising!
