Speaker: Emilia Aguinaga, New Orleans, LA, US
How (and why) are you taking action on climate change solutions in, for, and with your community?
Emilia Aguinaga: Hey, my name is Amelia Yaga and I am Foundation for Louisiana's Climate Justice Program Officer. The reason that I and the foundation are taking action on climate change solutions is because climate change is not a future problem. Climate change is a now problem and it's not just about the planet and the environment. It's really about people. When we talk about climate change, we're really able to talk about everything, every other aspect of our lives. So we can talk about race, we can talk about gender, we can talk about social and economic injustices and environmental injustice that also opens us to a whole new world of opportunities. Addressing the climate crisis is an opportunity for us to solve other existing problems like racial inequities, health disparities and how we respond to disaster and how disasters impact our communities. As a foundation. We're investing in supporting grassroots front line and fence line leaders that are best equipped to tell us how to respond to the problems that are most directly impacting them. We want to help shift the narrative away from despair and away from denial to a narrative about hope and creating a world that is better and more just for us all.
Who or what inspires/inspired you to care about climate change and climate solutions?
Emilia Aguinaga: When I was growing up, we didn't talk about climate change. We talked about global warming, the ice caps and polar bears. Everything changed for me when I moved to New Orleans, just a couple of days before hurricane Katrina hit. Hurricane Katrina was one of the deadliest hurricanes that made landfall in American history, killing over 1800 people. And it was also one of the most expensive disaster recovery efforts that we've had to undertake since then, things have only gotten worse. Our climate continues to get warmer and more unpredictable. We have stronger hurricanes, more wildfires, increased droughts and floods. The time to take action was really decades ago. The next best time to take action is now, I'm really inspired by the people from fence line and front line communities that are choosing to take action to protect all of us and to improve the situation of our life now and for generations to come, it's time that we start listening and investing in their leadership, not only be inspired by their words, but be inspired enough to take action and make our own footprint on this world.
