Reflections on Racial Equity at the Center of the New York City Panel on Climate Change
photo: Tim Pierce
New York City Panel on Climate Change (NPCC) is a unique institution. Convened by Mayor Michael Bloomberg in August 2008, it works to integrate climate science and advise policymakers on local resilience and adaptation strategies to protect cities from future environmental hazards.Composed by a 20 volunteers The group has broad academic and professional expertise and is organized into six working groups, each of which addresses climate change challenges unique to New York City, from flooding and health to forecasting and future vision. Ultimately, the NPCC aims to study climate science from an interdisciplinary perspective in order to better prepare cities for future climate impacts.
More recently, NPCC members have committed to addressing “Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion” issues in their work and have made strides in actively engaging with anti-racism.with support Environmental Justice and Climate Justice Cities Network At the Climate Institute, I became the first-ever racial equity intern at Columbia University’s NPCC. My task is to support this work and keep the NPC delegates going.
Last spring, the group asked its members to reflect on equity and racism in person, both personally and within the NPCC.At the same time, the team members also completed the dark space, an interdisciplinary collective of black urbanists dedicated to recognizing, affirming, and expanding the black presence in the built environment. Following up on these activities, in fall 2021, each working group completed an interim report outlining the status of their work related to racial equity and completed a second workshop with BLACKSPACE.
Building on this, the NPCC sought to develop a framework for evaluating its own work on anti-racism. My job as a racial equality intern is to help revise and enforce racial equality standards. The goal of the standard is for working groups to collectively assess their commitment to racial equality.Meanwhile, these groups are researching and drafting the upcoming NPCC 4 report, which aims to further embed justice, equity, diversity and National People’s Congress 3.
To help revise the standards, I first looked for other examples of internal racial equity assessments conducted by government advisory committees. Considering that this type of work has been done by other municipalities and is designed to build on their justice initiatives, I’m looking from high and low for some kind of government-based assessment strategy that I can use for my own development example, but I came with nothing. Clearly, there are not many examples of local government climate change advisory committees, let alone the standards of racial equality used within these committees. This means that our work this summer, if successful, could serve as a model for other organisations and agencies within government. Of course, this work by the NPC is progressive, but its impact potential didn’t strike me until that moment.
Therefore, given the apparent lack of example rubrics, I turned to current research and methods on assessments and techniques for anti-racism assessments.I read about the ways in which different academic departments can contribute to racial equality, reviewed articles on the importance of language in anti-racism work, researched white superiority and white vulnerability complexes (in Robin DeAngelo), and consulted the company Racial Equity Impact Assessment. Eventually, I learned how to translate the concept of anti-racism into action – I think a process needs to be incorporated into the NPCC.
After two months of reading, researching, writing, taking notes and attending NPC sessions, my main takeaways are action more than verbal promises. Physically, this might look like a continuation of the annual racial equity training, an external review of draft chapters by nongovernmental experts and community members, or the creation of a more publicly accessible, less formalized version of the report. Despite all the important and genuinely groundbreaking work the NPCC has done on racial equity as a municipal advisory council, there is still plenty of room for the panel and its members to acknowledge the complicity in an oppressive system that sustains it and reflects internally on its processes and processes. Racism inherent in the program.
Going forward, the NPCC intends to recruit additional Racial Equity Fellows to complete two additional external assessments based on upcoming draft chapters from the NPCC Working Group. This is a necessary and important next step in the group’s journey to racial equality, but it is by no means the end. Racial equality is not a short-term commitment. It requires forgetting, growth, recognition, responsibility, time, and most importantly, action. It won’t be an easy journey, but the NPCC is definitely on the way. It is my hope that the Columbia Climate School will continue to support this and other work of the NPCC through the ongoing NPCC Fellows Program, and learn lessons for its own campus anti-racism efforts.
Editor’s Note: Columbia Climate School is committed to integrating diversity, equity, inclusion and anti-racism into every aspect of our work—including hiring a associate dean Work across the Climate School to ensure a welcoming, diverse and inclusive culture. Read more about our DEIA program and promises.
Georgia Grzywacz is a graduate student at Columbia Climate Institute MSc in Climate and Society.
