Climate Change

Healthier Together Oregon + Acción Climatica

As the effects of climate change advance each year, putting Latino/x/e and other vulnerable communities at greater risk of poor health, Familias en Acción continues to prioritize efforts around climate change to support our comunidad.

Over the past year, Familias has continued developing a Promotora de Salud/Community Health Worker (PDS/CHW) climate action curriculum. The Acción Climática team is working alongside the Community Council to inform the curriculum and ensure it is meeting community members where they are at. Our vision is for our communities to thrive and enjoy health, social, and economic well-being in the places we work, play, pray, and commune. This vision includes working with PDS/CHW to strengthen families’ health and resilience from the impacts of climate change; promoting and expanding food equity in our communities; and supporting advocacy and civic engagement for equitable climate justice policies based on the health, social, racial, and economic equity of Latino/x/e communities. 

The curriculum goals:

  • Build leadership and knowledge of Promotoras de Salud/Community Health Workers in equitable community climate change wellbeing and resilience, family strategies for greenhouse gas reduction and health advocacy for Latino/x/e communities
  • Build climate change resilience among Latino/x/e communities through family climate change knowledge, physical and mental wellbeing, emergency preparedness, actions for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and skills for climate action advocacy for PDS/CHWs

This work aligns with Healthier Together Oregon’s strategy to build climate resilience among priority populations, which is driven by the 2020–2024 State Health Improvement Plan. We are proud to uplift our community members and help them build resilience through culturally specific education and access to resources.

Familias is grateful for our partnerships with Portland Clean Energy Fund (PCEF) and Portland Bureau of Emergency Management (PBEM), who are financially supporting our climate curriculum and climate disaster preparedness workshops.

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Familias goes on local Portland news channel KOIN!

Check out our Development + Communications Manager at Familias, Rachel joined by Bryn (TacovorePDX) sharing all about our Earth Day Oregon event happening between April 22-29, 2023 on local Portland news channel KOIN.

50% of sales on all Primavera Verde cocktails will go towards our mission to strengthen the health and well-being of Latino familias and communities.

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Earth Day Oregon 2023

Support Familias & Earth Day Oregon this spring! 

It’s officially spring and we’re excited to launch Familias’ Earth Month campaign – dedicated to raising funds for our programs, spreading awareness about Familias’ climate & health equity work, and supporting local businesses that share our values.

Join Familias en Acción in creating a more sustainable Oregon and help us raise $5,000 this spring!

Donate Here

This year, we’ve partnered with Earth Day Oregon and inspiring local businesses to help us amplify our impact. Earth Day Oregon unites nonprofits, businesses, and community members statewide to create a groundswell of support for local organizations leading us to a sustainable future.

Learn More About Our Partners & How You Can Support Familias

Donate to Familias en Acción today through April 30, 2023 for the chance to receive artwork by Corinne Lent.

The first 10 people to donate $100 or more to Familias en Acción will receive a custom print.

Anyone who donates $10 or more will be entered into a raffle to win handmade trinket dish (pictured on the right). Raffle winner announced the first week of May.

Donate to Familias!

Fingerprint & Co. is donating $1 for every candle sold from April 1st-30th to Familias en Acción!

Fingerprint & Co. is a PNW-based company and a long-time friend and supporter of Familias en Acción.

Help uplift Familias and Fingerprint by purchasing a candle for your friends, family, coworkers, or treat yourself! They make great gifts for birthdays, holidays, any day.

Shop Candles Here

From April 22nd-29th, Tacovore is donating 50% of sales on a special Earth Day themed cocktail to Familias en Acción. 

Bring your familia and friends and come enjoy delicious food & drinks for a cause!

Familias is proud to partner with KeyBank’s Latinx/Hispanic Employee Resource Group. Together, we’ve hosted three financial wellness workshop with Familias staff and KeyBank employees to help us better prepare. Thank you for your continued support of Familias and for supporting our climate action work for Earth Month!

About Familias’ Climate Action Work

Climate change influences human health and disease in numerous ways. However, not everyone is equally at risk. Latino/x/e community members are more likely to live in urban heat islands, have higher exposure to air pollutants, and are less likely to be able to afford equipment and services to protect them from climate impacts. Climate change health impacts show directly in increased asthma, chronic respiratory diseases, heart disease, diabetes, injuries and premature deaths related to extreme weather events, such as heat waves and snow storms.

The legacy of inequitable public policies has and continues to put Latino/x/e and other vulnerable communities at greater risk of poor health. To ensure that our communities are thriving and healthy, Familias en Acción will continue to:

  • Deliver Climate Disaster & Emergency Preparedness workshops around extreme weather events in Oregon, 
  • Advocate for more culturally specific environmental resources for Latino/x/e communities, and 
  • Host the 2023 Latino Health Equity Conference on the intersections of climate and health. 

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Climate Disaster Preparedness Workshops for Oregon’s Latino/x/e Communities

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Over the last three months, the Acción Climática team has engaged with our community through Climate Disaster Preparedness Workshops focusing on Extreme Heat and Wildfires & Air Quality. Both workshops were held in Spanish via Zoom, consisted of two 2-hour sessions each, and had an average of 23 participants engaged.

Every participant received an emergency kit that was created in collaboration with Cascadia Quake Kits. Cascadia Quake Kits is a Portland-based, woman-owned business run by Marilyn Bishop. Their mission is to prepare resilient PNW communities one kit at a time, and they’ve been an incredible partner to work with.

These workshops were open to families from Clackamas, Multnomah and Washington Counties and drew incredible interest from the community. Workshop spaces filled within two hours of opening and we had a waitlist of 18 people!

For the Wildfire and Air Quality Preparedness workshop, Familias brought in guest facilitators:

Both Denise and Ira made impactful contributions to our workshops – participants were able to learn about resources and policies that protect them from extreme weather events and create actionable solutions for themselves and their families. Having bilingual, bicultural co-facilitators was very important in making our community feel more comfortable and connected to the content they shared.

Thank you all for partnering with Familias! We’re excited to continue building more resilient Latino/x/e communities together.

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Meet Gonzalo from Lomita Farms

Gonzalo was really passionate about getting into agriculture as a way to connect to his Indigenous heritage and to create some healing. His family is from a small rural town in Oaxaca, Mexico, where the majority of the people are Indigenous and grow a lot of the food they eat like Maiz. He describes it as a very humble and beautiful way of life, and it made him sad to not have access to it as a result of migration. These thoughts were always in the back of his head, but he never really knew how to move forward with them. Then in the fall of 2019, a friend shared an application with him for the Zenger Farm Apprenticeship Program, an 8-month intensive program focused on teaching folks all the aspects of running a small-scale farm. He applied and was successful in getting one of the 4 spots available. It was an incredible experience getting to witness an entire season of growing and stewarding the land. What made the experience even more unique was seeing the ways that Zenger Farm and community partners worked to make their food accessible to low-income and other marginalized folks. Gonzalo’s experience challenged and inspired him to envision what food justice could look like for his community. 

Towards the end of his farming apprenticeship at Zenger Farm in 2020, they got to tour and learn about the Headwaters Incubator Farm in Gresham, OR. This program is managed by the East Multnomah County Soil and Water Conservation District and makes land and other farm infrastructure accessible to beginning farmers. Being able to witness how much support there was for beginning farmers like him, empowered him to make the decision to apply for a spot in the farm incubator program, and he was accepted. Gonzalo wasn’t sure if he would be able to go through with it though, because he didn’t have the funds to buy supplies/tools and provide for himself during that first year. But he is resourceful and really wanted to make it happen, so he started a Gofundme and was able to raise some funds to cover everything he needed for the farm and to cover some living expenses.

@lomitafarmpdx

He would not have been able to pursue his farming dreams without the support of community members who believed in his farm aspirations. What especially motivated him to pursue this wild dream was my desire to see more farms owned by People of Color, especially Migrants and folks who have traditionally been exploited by large-scale agriculture. Like many other migrant families, his family struggled with living expenses when they first moved to the United States. To help make ends meet, his family relied heavily on food pantries. Though he is grateful for the support we received, he wants to recognize how these nonprofits sometimes fail families by providing mostly canned foods and foods that are not culturally significant.

@lomitafarmpdx

This experience really informed his vision for food justice and has guided the way his farm operates. He is trying to grow culturally significant vegetables for Latinx folks, things like maiz, epazote, calabazas, and more. Next year, he wants to find more creative ways to get all his food out to Latinx folks and to also share my experience and traditions through community events centered on Latinx folks. 

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Spotlight: Elizabeth Lopez-Hernandez

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Elizabeth Lopez-Hernandez, new Community Health Worker and Climate Justice Advocate at Familias en Acción,  describes her  philosophy:  “Life has no ‘class syllabus’ to tell you what to do…you have to try things to find out.” 

That philosophy led Elizabeth into experiences that required balancing strong family ties with a passion to experience life and push herself to test, and find, independence and resilience.  Growing up in Gresham, OR as a first generation Mexican American, Elizabeth helped her parents translate and navigate employment, community and legal systems—even worked as a legal assistant in a law firm to understand the workings of those systems.  Going to college in Portland she was only a half hour away, but when offered the opportunity to study in France she saw it as a chance to fulfill a dream.  Her parents were shocked—and worried—that she would face the same challenges they do as immigrants.  She thought she had understood her parents’ immigration experience, but in France she lived through it firsthand –doing everything alone with only the most basic language skills: find an apartment, negotiate price, learn to shop, set up a bank account and  work multiple jobs on top of studying. It is that understanding and resilience that she now brings to her work as a CHW, helping others take steps forward and find resources.

It was during the college years that her passion for the environment and working with youth came together.  Through a new French friend she learned about the environmental impacts of a meat based diet.  In political science classes she learned how underdeveloped countries were losing natural resources to richer countries.  And that the resulting wars, poverty and migration would never be solved without addressing the underlying effects of climate change. 

When working with youth programs she used environmental issues as the platform for tutoring English,  developing curriculum around water management, organizing trail clean ups, etc….always planting seeds of information.  She finds youth to be really interested in their environment and is certain that, if their creativity and positivity is recognized and given wrap around support, they have the potential to be leaders that will bring about change.  

Her current role at Familias is holding Charlas to learn about how climate change is affecting lives in the Latino/x/e community….and getting ideas about how to approach it. She knows that Familias en Acción cannot do it alone, that we need the resources the community members bring. With encouragement and education they will become the strongest voice and best advocates for change. Because she feels supported in her new role, she will be able to bring that support and enthusiasm into tackling climate justice. She sums up her motivation this way: “You must try to do what you think is right. So you don’t look back and say What if…”

To register for our Charlas please contact: Elizabeth@familiasenaccion.org

Learn more about our Climate Change program here!

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HIKING

Family Hiking Trips

Join our summer hikes with Familias en Acción in Multnomah and Washington County!

We know this pandemic has changed our lives and would like to offer a fun, healthy way to enjoy connecting with our community & the outdoors.

More info coming soon on future hikes!

For more information, please contact Diana:

503.201.9865

diana@familiasenaccion.org

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Climate & Health Equity

For the past two decades Familias en Acción has worked closely with Latino families and communities across the state responding to provide immediate health support, and ensuring that Latino health and well-being is front and center. We have led this work with a clear understanding that inequitable public policy, racial descrimmination, and systems that marginalize our communities only exacerbate and perpetuate recurrences of chronic illnesses, food insecurity, mental health decline in our Latino communities. Familias en Acción knows that these health inequalities, symptoms, and occurrences do not happen in a vacuum but in an environment where natural and community resources have been exploited, over extracted, and polluted by capitalist and colonial forces leading to a cycle of inequitable effects of climate change –more disproportionately affecting those with existing health and social disparities, making social justice a more accurate and very bold goal for the future of our work and Latino/x/e communities. 

Familias en Acción with the support of the award from the City of Portland Clean Energy Community Benefits Fund (PCEF) is excited to engage and focus our work from chronic illness support, food equity,  sexual health education, and more through the implementation and framing of a Latino/x community plan for climate equity, health and resilience. 

To work toward climate justice, our plan will start by centering the richness and power that our communities bring to conversations around climate and health justice.

More soon!

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