elections matter to safeguard public health & advance environmental justice: EPA Testimony8/14/2024 It shouldn't be partisan to say that government ought to protect public health, and ensure long-term sustainability and equity and justice across the land. The details are definitely debatable, but morally and Judaically, the basic case is clear.
Some administrations take this responsibility seriously; others downplay or even subvert it. The current one wishes to grant California, and by extension numerous other states, a Clean Air Act "waiver" to tighten tailpipe emissions regulations, reduce climate pollution, address historic racial harms, and save thousands of lives. By contrast, the previous one sought to eliminate the chance for high-pollution states to do this at all, while putting spuriously low dollar values on future generations in their cost-benefit analyses.
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Today, the US Supreme Court imposed a major setback on federal agencies’ ability to apply their expertise in the name of public safety and environmental protection. We at the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life are pained, and outraged – and, redoubled in our commitment to Jewish advocacy toward sustainability and justice.
Lives will be saved, public health and climate goals advanced, and harmful pollution abated due to the EPA’s new light-duty vehicle standards announced earlier today. COEJL is grateful to the agency and the Biden Administration for this important step toward environmental and climate justice:
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CategoriesAUthorRabbi Fred Scherlinder Dobb, an eco-Jewish teacher-writer-organizer for over three decades, is COEJL's new Rabbinic Consultant. Fred serves on the national board of Interfaith Power and Light, and remains active in Jewish and multifaith efforts toward justice and sustainability. Please reach out if he or others at COEJL can work with you in some way, raising eco-Jewish awareness and action. authorIsrael Harris (he/him), a community and advocacy organizer, is COEJL's new Advocacy Director, and NRPE's new Policy Director. As an educator and youth advocate, Israel also supports Reform youth at the URJ, and continues working in support of our Jewish, multifaith, and justice-focus communities striving for equity and sustainability. |