Oregon Environmental Justice Council Statewide Listening Sessions
By Oregonians for Food and Shelter,
Oregon’s Environmental Justice Council will begin holding “listening sessions” around the state to hear about environmental justice (EJ) concerns directly from impacted communities. This work is outlined in HB 4077, passed in 2022, which formalized the Council. The bill directs the Council to conduct an inclusive community engagement process to identify EJ priorities as part of a process to develop a statewide EJ mapping tool. OFS was engaged as this bill was being drafted and amended, and along with many of our natural resource partners, we stressed the importance of rural and frontier communities being recognized as vulnerable EJ communities. OFS Executive Director Katie Murray currently serves on the Council, appointed by Governor Brown, along with our Grassroots Director Tiffany Monroe.
The first of these regional listening sessions is scheduled for August 6th in Gold Beach, from 3-7pm at the Curry County Public Library. More information coming soon, but please let us know if you would like to discuss the best ways to engage with the Council on your issues. Rural communities face burdens including wildfire risk and smoke impacts, and economic pressures based on changing environmental regulations that impact communities relying on natural resource sector jobs –these and many others will be important issues to raise through this forum.
The next formal meeting of Oregon’s Environmental Justice Council will be next week, June 13th at the DEQ office in Portland, with a virtual option.
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