As we grapple with the horrific impacts of Hurricane Helene, we're grateful that so many people from near and far have reached out to NC Climate Justice Collective to offer emotional and material support, often asking "What can I do to help?"  

 

As a statewide grassroots climate justice organization, our commitment will always be to center the leadership of the communities who are first and worst impacted by both acute climate disasters like this one and the long emergency of structural oppression. This is why we're thankful that our movement family in the Gulf Coast -- specifically Jayeesha Dutta, Bryan Parras, Another Gulf is Possible and T.E.J.A.S. - -created the Just Recovery Framework in the wake of Hurricane Harvey to make clear what it means to provide resources directly to community-based environmental justice organizations and steer away from entities that marginalize impacted communities.  Grassroots Global Justice offers this summary: "Just Recovery is a framework that resists the status quo solutions of disaster recovery that focuses on aid, extraction, and displacement and moves toward transformative solutions that respond, recover, and rebuild."

 

4 Steps To Support A Just Recovery

 

You can support the Just Recovery of Western NC by taking these four steps:

 

1) DONATE to support Hood Huggers International, our NCCJC Resiliency Organizing Hub in Asheville, providing immediate and direct support in hardest hit Buncombe County.  Hood Huggers engages in community-based disaster response while forwarding transformative solutions. This organization is addressing the long-standing needs of marginalized people by creating a "synergistic mix of art, environment and social enterprise--a destination where the health and wealth of the Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) community takes center stage."  Your contribution helps meet the needs of those most often overlooked by top-down disaster management and ensures that the critical resources to recover and rebuild are not lost once the headlines shift to other crises. 

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2) REFUSE to shrug this off as another "natural disaster"; talk to EVERYONE about this unprecedented destruction as evidence that human caused climate change is worsening... but we don't have to accept it as the new normal. We must build the political will to avert climate chaos by rapidly expanding our movement.

 

3) LEARN about how to bring more balance and justice to our world by joining our one of a kind Ballots and Balance Roadshow touring eight cities in central and eastern NC, Oct. 4-12th. Ballots and Balance is a dynamic cultural arts tour designed to raise awareness about climate issues and the power of democracy. Lifting up frontline community leadership, we are partnering with our Resiliency Organizing Hubs and other community groups to present this tour. The tour performances combine spoken word, visual art, movement, soundscapes, and puppetry into beautiful storytelling to inspire action. Don't miss this chance to be part of a stirring moment where creativity and imagination meet activism and community engagement!  All events are free and open to the public. Fri, Oct. 4th kickoff at Durham's Hayti Heritage Center will also be Just Recovery fundraiser.

 

4) VOTE for people who support policies rebuilding impacted communities better than before the storm. And support everyone everywhere, especially in impacted communities, to vote. We need leaders who will prioritize our people and our planet over corporate greed. 

 

In solidarity and community,

NCCJC 

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