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2025 Community Input Report
In 2024, Roots 2Empower spoke with 220 community members over a series of seven meetings to prepare them to engage in the development of the 2025 Climate Action Strategy and understand what support they would need to do so. During these meetings, we educated participants about the causes of climate change from an environmental justice lens, provided an overview of climate action the state is taking, and gathered feedback which we published in this report.
Fostering Environmental Justice
This booklet was created to foster conversations about environmental justice in Rhode Island in advance of the state’s development of the 2025 Climate Action Strategy. Although this history is incomplete, our goal was to provide baseline information about the extractive economy, how it started, and the ways it fuels the relationship crisis between ourselves, each other, and the Earth. This booklet is available in English, Spanish, and Portuguese.
Our Comment on Pawtucket’s Proposal to Convert Morley Field
Thank you for the opportunity to comment on the vital matter of preserving the only green space in the majority Black and brown Woodland Neighborhood of Pawtucket. Roots 2Empower is a Pawtucket-based nonprofit that works to build community power and resilience through mutual aid, community gardening, dialogues, visioning sessions, and entrepreneurial training. Despite the work that we do to enable civic engagement for justice-impacted, low-income, and marginalized residents of Rhode Island’s urban core, our impact is limited without a transparent and democratic process. Regrettably, that has been the case with the unnecessary closure of Morley Field and the application to convert part of the field into a parking lot.
Powering Energy Justice: Building a Diverse, Equitable, and Inclusive Offshore Wind Industry in Rhode Island
Roots2Empower was recently awarded a grant from SouthCoast Community Foundation for their project "Powering Energy Justice: Building a Diverse, Equitable, and Inclusive Offshore Wind Industry.” A social justice 501c(3) nonprofit based in Rhode Island’s tri-cities Pawtucket, Providence, and Central Falls, Roots2Empower’s mission is to enable civic engagement and break the cycle of poverty, incarceration, and recidivism for low-income and marginalized communities. This grant will support Roots2Empower’s work educating and engaging community members on the clean energy transition, the essential role of offshore wind energy, and how they can get involved, provide input, and access family-sustaining careers. Their first community meeting for Pawtucket residents will be from 2-4 pm at the Pawtucket Public Library in the Campbell Auditorium on February 24th.