Environmental Justice

An effective approach to environmental justice must center how it impacts disproportionately low income and BIPOC residents. Environmental justice can be a pathway to create stable union jobs that pay living wages for Black and Latinx communities. Environmental justice is racial justice.

At the city level, we must double down on our environmental justice investments by looking at what we have control over: public transportation, urban spaces, disposable good regulations, and building energy requirements. In her first term in office, Councilor Louijeune has 

  1. Signed a letter addressing transit and climate justice (eliminating bus fares)

  2. Councilor Louijeune supported the new effort, Solarize Eastie, a pilot program to increase solar panel installation and onsite battery storage. In partnership with GreenRoots, a local environmental organization, Mayor Wu, Rev. Mariama White-Hammons, ACE Solar, and he Boston City Council,  the program uses a group buying model to reduce costs for residents by aggregating demand and securing a discounted price per watt. This partnership will help immigrants and people of color have an easier pathway into the solar economy.  

  3. Councilor Louijeune has fought alongside community activists to oppose the East Boston Substation. Dangerous fossil fuel projects like the unjustifiable East Boston substation are a result of our current zoning code that works off a patchwork approval system and lacks long term and inclusive planning for sustainable development. The city of Boston needs to step up its response zoning practices by designating zoning overlay districts for affordability, resilience and equity.

  4. In partnership with local beekeepers, Councilor Louijeune filed an ordinance and amendment to the Boston Zoning Code on the keeping of honeybees. Many residents and businesses in Boston are already hosting beehives on their rooftops and backyard as local interest in beekeeping increased during the pandemic. Under the current zoning code, however, beekeeping is prohibited in a majority of Boston neighborhoods.This ordinance and amendment would ensure that the pathway to keeping bees will be simplified for the average future beekeeper and the rest of the city. LINK 0138 LINK 0139