Climate Justice and Action Planning

Table of Contents

Innovation Lab - Concept Developing and Prototyping: Learning resources to understand the topic.

Innovation Lab - Refinement: Tools and guides to inform developing programs.

Adoption Accelerator - Standards Emerging and Scaling: Implementation examples to show how it is being done.


Innovation Lab - Concept Developing and Prototyping:

Learning resources to understand the topic.

Green Infrastructure for Environmental Justice and Flood Mitigation in Hackensack, NJ: A project to enhance existing Combined Sewer separation plans with community designed green infrastructure to mitigate storm water flooding in low income neighborhoods addressing Environmental Justice issues. (Partners for Places, 2024). 
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Climate Related Inequities Locally in Copenhagen, Denmark: A project to produce an operational tool of local climate related inequities in Copenhagen that will inform the development of Copenhagen's Climate Plan for 2035. (CNCA Climate Justice Fund, 2024). 
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Equitable, Community-Driven Climate Justice Planning in Harris County in Harris County, TX: A climate justice planning project aimed to co-create local, implementable solutions with frontline residents who have been most impacted by climate hazards and disasters. (Partners for Places, 2024). 
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Near West Side Greenway: Co-designing with the Community in South Bend, IN: A project to create a greenway, as a linear park, in a neighborhood on the Near West Side of South Bend that lacks a park and has asked for one for several years. (Emergent Learning Fund, 2024). 
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Bridging West End to the Rive: A Community Riverfront Vision in Pittsburgh, PA: A project to build a foundation for community leadership as significant riverfront planning efforts get underway in Pittsburgh’s West End. (Partners for Places, 2024). 
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Collective Impact and Climate Art Community Innovation: A project that brings together several city-wide and community-based climate and social well being organizations, as well as youth and local artists from equity deserving communities to collectively design, coordinate and implement a climate art project(s) in North Scarborough. (CNCA Climate Justice Fund, 2024).
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Power-sharing in the Implementation of Vancouver’s Climate Justice Charter (CJC) in Vancouver, CAN:A project that uses processes to draw from the fields of social innovation and systemic design as alternatives to the standard policy-making, program delivery, and public engagement processes that we use at the City. (CNCA Climate Justice Fund, 2024). 
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Waco Green Champions Community Engagement Program: A project that engages community members in educational survey events to inform the development of the Sustainable Action Roadmap and federal grant applications as well as increase community buy-in of city-based sustainable initiatives. (Emergent Learning Fund, 2024). 
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Climate Justice Collaborative of Boulder County, CO: A project to develop a frontline community member-led collaborative that creates and applies a racial equity framework, shifting power structures and enacting just solutions to climate change. (Partners for Places, 2023). 
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Identifying Community Values for Open Space Planning in Douglas County, KS: A project to complete Phase I (of III) of Open Space Plan development focused on building relationships and identifying guiding community values related to open space. (Partners for Places, 2023). 
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City of Minneapolis Climate Equity Plan (CEP) Equitable Engagement: A project to broaden and deepen the City’s engagement with BIPOC and immigrant community members in the Minneapolis Climate Action and Equity Plan update through deliberate partnership with community organizers, organizations and artists and to highlight impacts and best practices to ensure a just and equitable transition to a net-zero carbon future. (CNCA Game Changer Fund, 2023). 
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Multnomah County Community Climate Justice Vision: A project to develop a frontline community centered vision of climate justice that will serve as the foundation for a Multnomah County government and community climate justice plan. (Partners for Places, 2023). 
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Building the Groundwork for Meaningful Climate Empowerment in Pierce County, WA: A project to empower frontline communities in climate planning, informing how local government will initially engage communities and building the groundwork for shared implementation. (Emergent Learning Fund, 2023). 
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Multilingual Engagement-Game to Spur Climate Action! in Seattle, WA: This work will use the Seattle Department of Transportation’s (SDOT’s) robust transportation emissions “Climate Calculator”, to develop an innovative DIGITAL GAME to engage Seattle residents and workers on key strategies to deliver on Seattle’s climate and equity goals through the Seattle Transportation Plan.(CNCA Game Changer Fund, 2023). 
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Aligning Investments: Economic Justice and Equitable Resilience in Salt Lake City, UT: A project to host a regional convening of local governments, partners, and stakeholders of the Western Adaptation Alliance (WAA), to align local climate initiatives with federal Justice40 priorities, catalyze partnerships for federal funding pursuits, and respond to WAA members expressed desire to enhance economic justice and promote equitable resilience in their local climate actions. (Emergent Learning Fund, 2023). 
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Strengthening Frontline Capacity for Climate Resilience Planning in Palm Beach County, FL:  This project strengthened the capacity of frontline communities for climate resilience planning to ensure more equitable processes and outcomes when the County creates its forthcoming county-wide climate change vulnerability assessment and resilience action plan (VARAP). (USDN Emergent Learning Fund, 2023). 
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Centering Justice: Monterey Bay Climate Response in Santa Cruz, CA:  A project to co-create a vibrant climate justice network serving the northern Central Coast of California to rapidly scale up capacity and investment in work at the nexus of climate and justice. (USDN Emergent Learning Fund, 2022). 
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Neighborhood-Level Climate Leadership in City Sustainability Planning in Cincinnati, OH: A project to institute community leadership throughout climate action planning for neighborhood representation in city policy-processes across intersectional climate work.. (USDN Emergent Learning Fund, 2022). 
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Technical Assistance for the Zero Emissions Building Sector: Findings from the City of San Francisco's multi sector Zero Emission Building Taskforce. Taskforce findings are designed to guide the City's first Roadmap to Zero Emission Buildings. (CNCA Game Changer Pilot, 2020)
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Innovation Lab - Refinement: Tools and guides to inform developing programs.

USDN Socioeconomic Mapping Tool for Climate Risk Planning: This project produced a practical and scalable mapping tool that enhances cities’ ability to use socioeconomic information and connect it to climate risks. (USDN Innovation Fund, 2019)
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Adoption Accelerator - Standards Emerging and Scaling: Implementation examples to show how it is being done.

Advancing Equitable, Shared Governance for Monterey Bay Regional Climate Investment: A project to redefine local government and environmental justice groups’ roles and relationships in the Monterrey Bay (California) Regional Climate Project Working Group (RCPWG) by developing meaningful pathways for the emerging Monterey Bay Area Climate Justice Collaborative (MBACJC) in project development and decision-making around funding priority climate work in the region, focusing on a bottom up approach to defining those roles. (Emergent Learning Fund, 2024). 
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A neighbor-led greening plan centers people impacted by climate injustice in Richmond, VA: A neighbor-led greening plan centers people who are directly impacted by climate injustice and seeks to repair decades of systemic disinvestment in South Richmond. (Partners for Places, 2022)
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Making Equitable Climate Action a Reality in New Orleans, LA: A project to implement Taking Steps on Equity and Climate report recommendations selected by frontline leaders and advocate and integrate report recommendations into the City’s updated Climate Action Plan. (Partners for Places, 2022)
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Luchando para Salud y el Ambiente (Fighting for Health and the Environment) in Princeton, NJ: A project to improve the sustainability of suburban landscaping practices to positively impact the health of landscape workers and the environment. (Partners for Places, 2022)
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Uplifting Voices for an Equitable, Regional LA Sustainability Plan in Los Angeles County: A project to employ innovative, empowering engagement strategies to build meaningful community partnerships that reverse oppression to provide input into a cutting-edge sustainability plan. (Partners for Places, 2021)
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Climate Equity for an Island Future in Honolulu, HI: A project to create a clear, ambitious, achievable climate action and adaptation plan that addresses O'ahu’s unique cost of living and climate impact vulnerabilities, and serves as a model for climate planning throughout the Hawaiian Islands. (Partners for Places, 2021)
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Climate Equity in San Diego: A project to build community voice and action among communities in Southeast San Diego in implementation of the City of San Diego's Climate Action Plan. (Partners for Places, 2021)
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Park City Community – Climate Drawdown: A community stakeholder-driven process to co-develop an equitable building decarbonization and efficiency plan to help meet Park City’s net-zero carbon goals by 2030.(Partners for Places, 2021)
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Community Planning Piloted in Indianapolis IN: A project to create a comprehensive, equitable, and socially just sustainability, climate action, and resilience plan for Indianapolis, with actions initially implemented within revitalization-focused neighborhoods. (Partners for Places, 2020)
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Community Climate Action Planning Initiative in Bend OR: A project to engage diverse voices to co-create and implement a community climate action plan with innovative strategies that balance equity, efficiency, economic development and meaningful climate benefits. (Partners for Places, 2020)
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Climate Ready Resilience Strategy in Miami, FL: A project to align Miami’s Strategic Plan with the resilience priorities, initiatives and performance measures identified in regional resilience strategy development and the City’s updated Comprehensive Development Plan. (Partners for Places, 2019)
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A Socially Just Employment, Energy and Climate Transition in Boulder, CO: A project to guide Boulder’s Climate Action Plan and implementation to be equitable, inclusive, socially just and sustainable and to cultivate model green economic development projects. (Partners for Places, 2019)
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Lancaster, PA Climate Change & Resilience Action Plan: A project to develop a Municipal Climate Action Plan in collaboration with community stakeholders, while educating the public about the necessity of adaptation and resilience in Lancaster. (Partners for Places, 2019)
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Equity in Climate Action: Resilient Communities for a Sustainable City in New Orleans, LA: A project to engage the community in making equity a priority in implementation of the City of New Orleans’ Climate Action Strategy and to help the City meet the strategy’s climate mitigation goals equitably. (Partners for Places, 2019)
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Community Climate Action Planning Initiative in Bend, OR: A project to engage diverse stakeholders to co-create a community climate action plan (C-CAP) with innovative strategies that balance equity, efficiency and meaningful climate benefits. (Partners for Places, 2019)
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Community-Centered Sustainability Decision Making in Philadelphia, PA: A project to identify Philadelphia populations disproportionately exposed to environmental stressors, and reduce disparities through community-centered decision-making. (Partners for Places, 2019)
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Creating a Unified Community Vision for the Future of Syracuse’s Urban Forest: A project to create a public outreach campaign for urban forest master planning (Partners for Places, 2018).
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Development of an Office of Sustainability for Detroit: A project to develop a citywide Sustainability Office and eventually to create a sustainability plan for the City of Detroit (Partners for Places, 2018).
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Social Equity Through Sustainability Planning in Baltimore: A project to ensure social equity is a key consideration and lens in updating and implementing the city of Baltimore’s sustainability plan, in addition to becoming a model that can be replicated and used across departments (Partners for Places – Equity Pilot, 2016). 
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Building Equity into the Local Sustainability Plan in Providence: A project to better understand the needs of the city’s most vulnerable, address them in an updated sustainability plan and make equity a fundamental part of Providence’s Office of Sustainability’s work (Partners for Places – Equity Pilot, 2016).
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Committing to Inclusive Sustainability Action Hartford: A project to create a sustainability director position for the city and a climate action plan that comprehensively addresses energy, land use, transportation, waste and water usage. The plan will look at the root cause of climate change, including ways to improve air quality and reduce flooding, to improve the health and well-being of all residents (Partners for Places, 2016).
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Diverse Participation in Environmental Progress in Seattle WA: A project to create opportunities for all residents, especially people of color, immigrants, refugees, low-income, and those with limited-English proficiency, to fully participate in and benefit from Seattle’s environmental progress. (Partners for Places, 2015).
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GIS Tool to Integrate Environmental, Social, and Health Data in New Orleans LA: A project to create a GIS tool that collects environmental, social, and health outcome data to better inform the City and developers on how, where, and when to incorporate "green". (Partners for Places, 2015).
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Neighborhood Greening in Louisville KY: A project to implement a neighborhood-scale greening plan in a socioeconomically and environmentally-deprived neighborhood; this project will assess the impact of the natural environment on human health. (Partners for Places, 2015).
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Community Energy Plan in Holland MI: An overview of a one community's energy plan for efficiency retrofits, energy audits, and building performance labeling. (Partners for Places, 2014). 
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Energy and Climate Action Implementation in Oakland CA: A project to engage community organizations and residents in the implementation of the City of Oakland’s Energy and Climate Action Plan. (Partners for Places, 2013).
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Energy and Climate Action Implementation in Binghamton NY: An energy efficiency retrofit project that also developed a Task Force to coordinate community engagement in the implementation of Binghamton’s Energy and Climate Action Plan. (Partners for Places, 2012). 
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