For over twenty years, ACE has been fighting for environmental justice, and as of last week, it’s official: we now have environmental justice protection on the books statewide, after Governor Baker signed the Climate Bill into law.
Black, Brown, Indigenous, Immigrant, and low income communities have been sacrifice zones for centuries on this land, breathing dirty air, drinking dirty water, and living alongside dangerous facilities and infrastructure.
Now, our fight for environmental justice has a strong legal footing to stand on. It gives communities of color and low-income communities more effective tools to protect our health and environment from pollution — tools that we are eager to use to elevate our fight against environmental racism.
Of course, this win is thanks to so many of our allies and comrades, including Neighbor to Neighbor, GreenRoots, and the rest of the Massachusetts EJ table, and legislators, including Rep. Michelle DuBois, Rep. Liz Miranda, Rep. Adrian Madaro, Sen. Sal DiDomenico, Sen. Jamie Eldridge, and others.
ACE’s approach has always been about combining legal expertise with neighborhood organizing and advocacy. With this law on the books, we see a lot more opportunities to use the law to end environmental racism — and I look forward to telling you more about that fight in months to come!
Thank you, to all of our ACE community, for helping power this fight.
