Campaign to shut down New York City's peaker plants gains congressional ally

The Peak Coalition, which is targeting for closure New York City's 19 different peaking power plants, is made up of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, UPROSE, The Point CDC and Clean Energy Group.

In a press conference Thursday morning in Queens in her home district, Maloney, along with endorsing the shutdown plan, said she also plans to take a look at various renewable power proposals, including converting the Rikers Island jail "into an environmental justice hub" and "building community solar in Sunset Park."

Environmental justice advocates look to historic $3.5T spending bill for bold action

But although the bipartisan $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill that the U.S. Senate passed earlier this month included funding to electrify buses, record spending on transit and other areas that could be considered parts of environmental justice, it fell short of what’s needed, advocates said.

“From our perspective, they don’t go far enough,” Elizabeth Yeampierre, a co-chair of the national advocacy group Climate Justice Alliance, said of the bipartisan bill.

The Community Engagement Power 50

The 55-year-old environmental justice organization Uprose has long had an influential presence in Brooklyn’s Sunset Park neighborhood, as illustrated by Executive Director Elizabeth Yeampierre’s successful effort to block a proposed rezoning of Industry City. She argued that the space should be used instead to promote jobs in renewable energy production and improve resilience in response to climate change. Before leading Uprose, Yeampierre served as the director of legal education and training at the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.

New IPCC Climate Report is ‘Code Red for Humanity,’ but joining forces and using Indigenous knowledge could avert disaster

“The front lines are already way ahead of the politicians. We are leading with solutions—from community-owned solar energy systems that create safe, good-paying jobs to just recovery efforts that ensure those communities most impacted by the crisis are built back in sustainable and safe ways based on community needs,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, executive director of UPROSE and co-chair of the Climate Justice Alliance Board of Directors. “To truly address the climate crisis, we need policymakers to enact bold and transformative policies like the THRIVE Act, which [was] crafted in deep consultation and partnership with Black, Brown, Indigenous, Asian and Pacific Islander, poor, and marginalized communities.”

UN Climate Change Report Predicts Dire Future for New York

Yeampierre, too, believes that politicians’ words often don’t match their actions, to the detriment of all, but especially to frontline communities like hers that will bear the greatest impact.

“Some politicians are taking it seriously, and others are willing to make compromises,” she said. “These people are part of a legacy of compromising justice.”

Despite all the talk, though, Yeampierre feels that groups like UPROSE are sidelined as the existing system of political economy continues its slow march to impending doom.

IPCC Report: Joining forces and using indigenous knowledge could avert disaster

“The front lines are already way ahead of the politicians. We are leading with solutions — from community-owned solar energy systems that create safe, good-paying jobs to just recovery efforts that ensure those communities most impacted by the crisis are built back in sustainable and safe ways based on community needs,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, executive director of UPROSE and co-chair of the Climate Justice Alliance Board of Directors.

IPCC CLIMATE CHANGE REPORT FORECASTS GRIM FUTURE FOR BROOKLYN

The report, compiled by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and released on Monday, paints a daunting picture of the catastrophic effects that increased atmospheric Co2 is already wreaking on the world, and where we’re inevitably headed in lieu of drastic action — including here in Kings County.

“It’s not surprising to us,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, the executive director of Sunset Park-based climate advocacy group UPROSE. “But despite the fact that we expected that news, it’s still dire. It’s still troubling. It still makes you want to cry when you see it in print.”

“Some politicians are taking it seriously, and others are willing to make compromises,” she said. “These people are part of a legacy of compromising justice.”

Despite all the talk, though, Yeampierre feels that groups like UPROSE are sidelined as the existing system of political economy continues its slow march to impending doom.

Reversing climate change? What scientists and activists are saying about UN's 'code red' report

Elizabeth Yeampierre, executive director of UPROSE, Co-Chair, Climate Justice Alliance board member

“The frontlines are already way ahead of the politicians. We are leading with solutions - from community-owned solar energy systems that create safe, good paying jobs to just recovery efforts that ensure those communities most impacted by the crisis are built back in sustainable and safe ways based on community needs. To truly address the climate crisis, we need policymakers to enact bold and transformative policies like the THRIVE Act, which were crafted in deep consultation and partnership with Black, Brown, Indigenous, Asian and Pacific Islander, poor, and marginalized communities.”  

The 2021 Brooklyn Power 100

63. Elizabeth Yeampierre

Executive Director, UPROSE

UPROSE Executive Director Elizabeth Yeampierre met with U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm in June to discuss how federal agencies could encourage local renewable energy efforts like wind power and other green energy businesses in Sunset Park. For now, she’s more concerned with the city’s leadership and hopes the next administration approaches climate change with “humility.” Yeampierre has already gotten the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority and a private energy manufacturer to upgrade the Brooklyn Army Terminal into a wind turbine manufacturing hub by 2025, adding 1,200 jobs to the borough’s economy.

Booker Reintroduces Sweeping Environmental Justice Bill

"Black, Brown, Indigenous, Asian and Pacific Islander, poor, and marginalized communities bear the brunt of a legacy of industrial pollution and environmental racism. A commitment to racial justice and equity demands we center the voices, rights and needs of frontline communities in our work for justice,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, Executive Director of UPROSE, Co-Chair, Climate Justice Alliance Board of Directors.

UPROSE and GCPE are awarded Kresge Foundation, Climate Change, Health and Equity grant.

“As a grassroots, intergenerational, and women of color led organization working at the intersection of racial justice and climate change, UPROSE is excited to share the great news of receiving a three year Implementation grant from Kresge’s Climate Change, Health and Equity program. This grant will support community-led models, frontline leadership, and the necessary technical assistance from Pratt Institute to operationalize UPROSE’s Green Resilient Industrial District proposal and a Just Transition in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. We want to thank our project partners at Pratt who are committed to supporting frontline community leadership.” Elizabeth Yeampierre, Executive Director, UPROSE

What’s News Breaking: Friday, July 30, 2021

CONGRESSIONAL EARMARKS TO BENEFIT BROOKLYN: Rep. Nydia M. Velázquez (D-NY) has secured earmarks to fund community projects in New York’s 7th Congressional District. These earmarks, which have passed the House as a part of H.R. 4502, would benefit several local initiatives in Brooklyn. One of these is Red Hook Community Youth Education Initiative (Pioneer Works), whose funds would combine the efforts of several nonprofits under one umbrella to provide educational opportunities for youth across Southwest Brooklyn.

Another Brooklyn program that would receive the funding is UPROSE/Sunset Park Regenerative Economies Industrial Ecosystem Development Initiative, a longtime partner in the fight against climate change. Under the provided proposal, UPROSE would receive an investment of $175,000 to  create a workforce development program for climate adaptation manufacturing. 

Winds of Change: An Interview with Elizabeth Yeampierre

Elizabeth Yeampierre: In late 2012, in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, UPROSE created the Climate Justice Center to steer forward a bottom-up climate adaptation and community resilience planning project. We were starting our block-to-block organizing when [Industry City developer] Jamestown came to Sunset Park. We at UPROSE respond to what the community tells us is a priority, and people in the community were concerned about Jamestown’s presence, so the first thing we did was we met with [Industry City CEO] Andrew Kimball a few times. He wanted a lot of information from us so we gave him a copy of all the different planning initiatives that UPROSE anchored. We asked him what exactly he was proposing—what kinds of jobs, and how many? Were we going to be able to turn Industry City into a place that would address food sovereignty, climate adaptation and mitigation? Would we be able to bring in businesses that would address our local needs for jobs and the region’s need to address climate? He didn’t want to share anything. 

I think that because he worked at the Brooklyn Navy Yard he wasn’t used to opposition. He didn’t know what he was in for and really took us for granted. You know, you’re talking about a grassroots organization made up of women of color. I’m pretty certain he thought we got this.

The next test for environmental justice policy? Defining ‘disadvantaged communities.’

“For years what agencies have done is manage our expectations,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, executive director of the Brooklyn-based nonprofit Uprose. “They have this dog and pony show where they basically cook the solutions, and then bring them to communities to see if we can provide them with input and respond to something that they created without us.”  

Yeampierre said this working group is an opportunity to demand a different kind of practice. “We’re saying that climate change really demands co-governance — that communities need to be seen as the experts and as a resource,” she explained.

Climate justice: A new look at combating systemic racism

Although traditional white-dominated climate activism is still the prevailing form of environmentalism, there are organizations that center their activism around people of color. Elizabeth Yeampierre’s organization UPROSE operates as an organizing space for Puerto Ricans in Brooklyn to develop sustainable organizing and development plans for the community.

Eric Adams Said Next to Nothing About Climate Change During New York’s Recent Mayoral Primary

UPROSE and its supporters argued that preserving the waterfront’s industrial nature would allow space for large-scale clean energy businesses and programs, and create better-paid jobs for Sunset Park’s predominantly working class Latino and Asian residents.

“We were advancing a vision for an industrial waterfront that would build for our climate future,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, the executive director of UPROSE. Her organization met with Adams and his staff to discuss this vision, but she said Adams declined to support their proposal.

Keeping New York Honest on Climate Progress

Elizabeth Yeampierre, director of the Brooklyn Latino community organization UPROSE and a member of the Climate Justice Working Group, told the council that in order to benefit frontline communities, climate investments need to be clearly measured and communicated to the public.

Addressing Climate Change is One of the New Roles of a CEO

Elizabeth Yeampierre of Climate Justice Alliance is another role model who co-leads this grassroots movement working at the cusp of environmental and racial justice in the US towards a regenerative future.

As Elizabeth Yeampierre of Climate Justice Alliance also exhorts, don’t supplant these leaders from the margins when you adopt their ideas but lift them up to positions of leadership. Share power.

DOE's Granholm highlights need for 'place-based' climate investments

Uprose Executive Director Elizabeth Yeampierre said she felt positive about Granholm's attention to place-based solutions developed by local leadership. "That's all really promising, and that's something that we're hoping will be part of how DOE moves forward with our communities," she said in an interview.

Architecture Students Explore How Aquaculture Could Transform Industrial Brooklyn with Oysters and Algae

The students were also asked to follow the principles of the Green Resilient Industrial District (GRID). A plan developed by the Sunset Park community organization UPROSE, GRID provides a framework for preserving the neighborhood’s industrial zoning, creating jobs for residents, and building resilience against climate change.