Jeanne,
Okay, so we made it through another heat wave, but we’re going to need climate resiliency to stay…
HEALTHY THROUGH HEAT & SMOKE
Lobbying
Thank you to everyone who was able to be a part of our How to Lobby training with Nicole Grant last week. It was fabulous! We are looking forward to supporting you with opportunities to advocate for Green New Deal solutions in our Healthy Through Heat & Smoke campaign. Here are the video and the slides from “How to Lobby” with Nicole Grant.
Now we want to support you with opportunities to connect with your lawmaker—sign up here to tell them why you want investments in Seattle’s community centers for clean air, clean energy climate resilience hubs.
Welcoming Community Events
And we hope you’ll join us for our next two Healthy Through Heat & Smoke events. These are opportunities to explore our personal and collective narratives around Seattle’s recent heatwaves and wildfire smoke.
Bring your experiences for an evening of sharing and connection with others with our Community Story Share. We will be making connections between our stories and the Green New Deal demands of the Healthy Through Heat & Smoke campaign, and equipping you with opportunities to bring your story to others through public comment to officials.
Community Story Share
Tuesday, August 16, 6:30pm
Online, register here.
And then at the end of the month, join us for a special open mic event celebrating our climate organizing community’s incredible talent and creativity as we all work to stay healthy through the heat and wildfire smoke of Seattle’s summers.
“Green Room” Open Mic
Tuesday, August 30, 6:30pm
Online, register here.
Volunteer & Get Involved
We have a huge variety of opportunities to be a part of the groundswell of community support that it’s going to take to win Green New Deal solutions for Seattle’s community centers. Public comment! Art making! Canvassing at farmers markets and parks! And we are having a LOT of fun together doing it. We are actively and intentionally welcoming people of all backgrounds and experiences into the Healthy Through Heat & Smoke campaign and into 350 Seattle.
Check out our Healthy Through Heat & Smoke Volunteer Guide for resources and next steps, and see our 350 Seattle Events Calendar for ongoing in-person and virtual opportunities of all kinds.
350 SEATTLE VOLUNTEER CELEBRATION
It’s been a looooong time since we’ve gathered together in person to celebrate our beautiful community and all of the wonderful people who are part of it. So instead of our usual August meetings, we are gonna host one big celebration together in person with food and social time together.
350 Seattle Volunteer Celebration
Wednesday, August 10, 6:30–8:30
Cal Anderson Park, 1635 11th Ave, Seattle 98122
In person! RSVP here.
Everyone is welcome, whether you’re active with us now or have been in the past, or if you’re new to 350 Seattle. Please RSVP so we can plan out enough food. Bring a chair or a blanket if you’d like, and let’s practice some good Covid safety with masking and asking consent before sharing hugs.
FEDERAL TEAM
It’s a big moment in Federal Policy. Whatever you think of the messy politics, none of us should stop fighting for a climate emergency declaration. Join the Sunrise Movement’s demand that the President declare a climate emergency now!
You’ve likely heard about the ridiculously named Inflation Reduction Act—the result of an agreement between Senators Schumer and Manchin to revive portions of the President’s Build Back Better bill. While the bill includes $370 billion in climate spending, there are pro fossil fuel provisions buried deep in the 725 page bill that would support expanded investment in domestic oil and gas exploration on federal lands and waters. Learn more about the bill and whether the damaging provisions are a bridge too far in this excellent discussion of the bill with Evergreen Action’s Dr. Leah Stokes, Representative Pramila Jayapal, Senator Markey, and climate activist, Reverend Lennox Yearwood.
Reviewing the Climate & Agriculture provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act from Friends of the Earth covers what’s good, what could be improved and what’s bad in this bill. And if you want to really get dizzy, check out the bill’s funny numbers when it comes to Carbon Capture and Sequestration in Hill Heat’s Carbon Rapture post. This isn’t how we save the world, folks.
STOP THE MONEY PIPELINE
A group of 19 Bank of America customers with the Customers for Climate Justice campaign has requested a meeting with the Bank of America – Seattle President, Kerri Schroeder, to discuss their concerns about BOA’s fossil fuel financing. So far, BOA’s leadership has failed to respond to them.
We’re organizing this sign-on letter for BOA customers in the Puget Sound region to express their support for the customers’ request to meet with Kerri Schroeder. To date, 156 customers have signed on—help us double this number to keep building the pressure on BOA executives.
Are you a Bank of America customer? Please fill out this form to add your name to the letter, and share with friends who might be BOA customers as well! (Credit cards count!)
GTN XPRESS PIPELINE
TC Energy proposes to modify the existing Gas Transmission Northwest pipeline to pump an extra 250,000 dekatherms per day of fracked gas through our region—that’s enough gas to serve 1.2 million households daily.
FERC released a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) that recommends approving the project, GTN Xpress. WTF, right? GTN Xpress Pipeline would increase greenhouse gas emissions, despite Washington’s and Oregon’s laws requiring a dramatic decrease in emissions to meet our climate goals. This project is extremely harmful to our long-term public health due to the climate impacts of fracked gas.
GTN Xpress Pipeline Webinar
Tuesday, August 9, 12:00pm
Online, register here.
Tune in to learn more about the GTN fracked gas pipeline and how to get involved to stop this climate disaster.
TRANS MOUNTAIN PIPELINE
It’s mail time! Bust out your markers and stickers and stamps. We’ve got a toolkit to share with you for getting young peoples’ messages against the Trans Mountain pipeline to lawmakers.
The Trans Mountain pipeline would enable further tar sands emissions, guaranteeing increased climate change, impacting young people now and for future generations.
Youth can directly communicate with the companies responsible for enabling this destruction, and together we can stop the insurance underwriting that enabling this oil expansion.
It’s an urgent time to take action to pressure Trans Mountain insurers to back away from the project, as the pipeline insurance certificate expires on August 31st.
We have designed a toolkit for youth and young people from around the world to write handwritten letters to corporate giants. Will you reach out to young people in your life and empower them to take action? All the info is linked here—including addresses.
SAVE THE DAMN TREES
State Forestlands
The Pacific Northwest has the best damn trees for sequestering carbon and providing rich biodiversity. And last month, the Washington Supreme Court made it clear that there are “myriad ways” to generate revenue from state forestlands besides harvesting them. So check out the Pacific Northwest Forest Climate Alliance Washington State Lands Working Group’s Call to Action—seven ways to transform the way Washington State manages its precious legacy forests—and add your name!
Forests on Federal Lands
Next, send a message to the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management. Old forests on federal lands capture and store vast amounts of carbon pollution and should be a cornerstone of U.S. climate policy—it’s time to let them grow!
TRANSPORTATION PLANNING FOR A (NEW) SEATTLE GREEN NEW DEAL
Environmental Impact scoping for Seattle’s Comprehensive Plan and Transportation Plan is happening right now and needs to incorporate Green New Deal priorities, including climate resilience, affordable housing, and affordable and climate-friendly transportation for all.
The city has proposed 5 alternatives leading into the Comprehensive Plan’s Environmental Impact Study, but all of them are a bit too close to business as usual. There is too little affordable housing. The multi-family units that are allowed are almost entirely adjacent to air pollution and traffic, preserving exclusionary zoning that was designed to keep people of color out of Seattle’s single-family neighborhoods. Without more density in Seattle we will create more sprawl that encroaches on wild lands and farmland, and causes long, climate-destroying commutes for people displaced from Seattle.
We need a better alternative that fosters affordable housing, good union jobs and green, walkable neighborhoods with the services we need throughout the city.
Here are three things you can do right now to build a better alternative and a better future:
- Read and upvote comments on the plan to learn about possibilities for Alternative 6. We like the comments from Melissa Hall and Real Change.
- Leave your own comment. If you don’t have a lot of time, try this MadLibs-style comment generator made by our friends at Share the Cities.
- The Transportation Plan comment period has been extended to August 31: if you are like us, you’ve had to wait standing at a light, almost been hit by a car for want of a bike lane, witnessed a wheelchair trying to navigate a broken sidewalk, and sat on a slow bus that should have had its own BRT lane, all in the last week. Share your experience: Put a pin on the map for climate-friendly transportation in Seattle.
…AND FOR BETTER TRANSPORTATION STATEWIDE
Disability Rights Washington is again sponsoring a Week Without Driving to help the Washington legislature understand what it’s like to get around without a car. Invite your legislators to participate.
ARTFUL ACTIVISM
Join the Artful Team
Sign up here! (Scroll all the way down that page to sign up.) Skills welcomed, not required. Join us! We’ll teach you as you go! Collaborative team tasks like tracing, cutting, twisting ties, painting in between the lines, etc. are always a welcoming and fun way to be a part of the action. You’ll be surprised at how quickly you want to try a little something more in a supportive, learning, fun, and connecting atmosphere with other people who care enough to show up, and who accept you as you are. Maybe you’re experienced in performance arts (theater, spoken word, music, dance, and beyond), visual arts (graphic design, painting, drawing, screen printing, building props, and so much more). Or maybe you are an organized person, or you like data and want to help with the imagery or photo library behind the scenes, or people with creative strategic humor and energy who like to brainstorm. Whatever calls you to the Artful Team, this team is for you! Contact Lisa.
Join the Art Deployment Team
The Deployment Team has lots to organize this summer. We’re bringing collaborative, powerful, and beautiful art to a ton of upcoming events for our campaigns—and volunteers play an important role in all the logistics that make the magic happen! Learn how to set up, position, and animate art at events, and how to recruit and guide other volunteers to do the same! Please sign up here!
Join our next Art Build
We’ll be creating a photo booth and costume props like a heat pump, air filter, battery and community center, along with giant plugs and electrical outlets and cords, and if we have enough people, also painting beautiful Green New Deal screen prints for The Green New Deal Team’s climate-ready community centers campaign, “Healthy through Heat and Smoke”—NO skills needed!
Art Build for the Green New Deal Healthy Through Heat and Smoke
Saturday, August 28, 12:00pm – end (5:00pm latest)
Look for us outside, just west of the Green Lake Aqua Theater, West Green Lake Way N, Seattle 98103
RSVP to Lisa for day-of details.
Bring your mask, smiling eyes, clothes for painting, snacks, and water!
Covid safety: Wearing masks is the default. Please, if you have even mild symptoms or possible exposures, definitely sit this one out! If you have needs or concerns, please let Lisa know in your reply. Everyone’s safety, thinking, and comfort is important, and we will prioritize the needs of the most vulnerable and concerned.
SEPTEMBER GLOBAL CLIMATE STRIKE
Join the strike for climate justice organized by Fridays For Future Seattle and youth around the world this September 23rd.
Since our last climate strike, our climate movement has successfully pressured Biden to invoke the Defense Production Act, and right now, legislation with the largest federal investments ever in renewable energy is on the verge of passing. But fossil fuel companies made record-breaking profits this spring and they’re using them to undermine necessary climate actions and the transformation at the scale and urgency we need.
Global Climate Strike
Friday, September 23
RSVP here.
Join us this September 23rd, and youth around the world, to build on this momentum and take collective action. We need YOU! Together, let’s rise up for climate justice! And to help ahead of time, connect with Climate Action Families.
HEY, THE 350 WA NETWORK IS SOCIAL
350 WA Network—now on Instagram!
Did you know that 350 Seattle is a member of the 350 WA Network? Our statewide coalition of 12 independent 350.org-affiliated local groups now has an Instagram account where you can get to know the fabulous folks behind 350 WA, and follow the work of our 350 WA Civic Action Team’s legislative campaign. Give us a follow! @350_wa
Curious to join our wonderful crew of volunteers in the 350 WA Social Media Team, working together to tell the story of the 350 WA community? Reach out to Grace to get connected.
CLIMATE GRIEF AND EMPOWERMENT
How have you been feeling about climate change lately? It can be discouraging when progress seems slow or even regressive sometimes. Processing how you are feeling with others could help transform climate grief into inspiration.
Climate Grief And Empowerment
Saturday, August 13, 10:00–11:45am
Online, register here.
You are invited to join the next Climate Grief and Empowerment meeting, where we move through our feelings in community.
COMMUNITY RESILIENCE
The climate movement requires many skills and talents. You don’t have to be an organizer, protest-goer, phone-banker, or someone who’s ready for civil disobedience to get involved in climate justice. We need you: teachers, carpenters, gardeners, personal trainers, mechanics, therapists, accountants, lawyers, nutritionists, hairdressers, herbalists, storytellers, knitters, comedians, acupuncturists, midwives, bakers, chefs, child and pet care providers, care-givers, doctors, dentists, massage therapists, healers, nutritionists, farmers, and MORE!
Do you have a skill or service you would like to offer to the 350 Seattle activist community?
Please tell us about yourself here or contact Hillary for more information.
THE PEOPLE’S ECHO
Over the past few months, we’ve been reflecting on ways to make our song community more inclusive and reach more people with the medicine of community singing. Now we’d love input from you to help us shape our next steps forward. Please fill out this community survey to share your thoughts with us!
Here are some beautiful song circles coming up organized by People’s Echo member Ahlay Blakely:
August Song Circle in Port Townsend
Thursday, August 18, 6:00–8:00pm
Fireside song circle with songs caught & led by Ahlay Blakely
Email Ahlay for details.
September Song Circle in Seattle
Story and Song circle with Rain Crowe & Ahlay Blakely
Saturday, September 10, 6:00–9:00pm
Madrona Park, 853 Lake Washington Blvd, Seattle 98122
Shareable event page here.
Want to weave song into your daily life more? Check out this podcast by our song siblings up in Bellingham:
Bliss is Ordinary
Listen on Apple Podcasts, listen on Spotify
VIDEOS
Our 350 Seattle Instagram is loaded with fresh videos! The fabulous Healthy Through Heat & Smoke crew have been ramping up a groundswell of community energy and support for Green New Deal solutions in Seattle with an incredible public comment turnout, a Heatwave Anniversary community rally at City Hall with partners in July and this past weekend’s exuberant Art Build at Lake City Festival.
And check out the 350 Seattle YouTube page for our library of content including DIY Art how-to videos, recordings of past general meetings, webinars, and trainings.
SAVE THE DATE FOR INTERTWINED!
Mark your calendar and get ready to party—Intertwined is back! On Saturday, November 19th, join the 350 Seattle community to share a meal together and celebrate our roots and resolve. Hear about our accomplishments, and where we’re going in our work to respond to the climate crisis. Find joy and inspiration in this community of resistance and resilience. With special guest speakers (to be announced), food, music and more!
Intertwined
Saturday, November 19, 6:00pm
Metropolist, 2931 First Ave. S, Seattle 98134, + livestream
Sponsorship packet here, or email Shemona.
We are looking forward to seeing you in November! Joining together in community is the best.
GET INVOLVED!
Do you care about climate justice? Want more general information about 350 Seattle? Then check out this handy new volunteer welcome guide.
Here are some really great ways to start on that path of engagement! Check out our updated Volunteer Opportunities List and our 350 Seattle event calendar. Opportunities range from low commitment to high, introductory to skilled. All you have to do is find something you’re excited about and reach out! Unless otherwise noted, all opportunities can be done from home.
Unsure what you want to do? Still have questions about who we are and what we do?
Weekly Welcome Call
Tuesdays through summer, 6:30pm
Online, register here.
And you can schedule a time to connect with Grace Hope for a phone or video chat, or even meet with our Healthy Through Heat & Smoke Welcome Team if you’d like to get plugged directly into our active Green New Deal summer 2022 campaign.
No time for all that? Well, never fear—you can support the work we do at 350 Seattle by becoming a monthly donor! Sign up here!
Solidarity friends! Stay strong!
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350 Seattle is an independent local affiliate of the global 350.org. We are not legally or financially connected to 350.org. We’re funded by supporters like you! Click here to make a donation today.
350 Seattle
5031 University Way NE
Seattle, WA 98105
United States