|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
“Hey hey, ho ho, fossil fuels have got to go,” shouted a crowd of around 50 people outside Palo Alto City Hall on Friday.
The group ranged from high school students to local residents with a common interest: climate action.
Palo Alto Student Climate Coalition, an association of multiple local schools, hosted its Rally for the Future outside of City Hall on April 19 to promote climate consciousness ahead of Earth Day.
The third annual Earth Day rally focused on the future of environmental activism, inviting four speakers to discuss issues ranging from local use of gas-powered appliances to corporate influence on the environment to affordable housing.
Keshav Narang, 18, urged the crowd to hold the tobacco industry accountable for the harm it poses on the environment. While the tobacco industry hasn’t been able to hide the health crisis it launched, he said, it has downplayed its sustainability disaster.
“Cigarette butts are rarely disposed of properly,” Narang said. “That’s why they’re the number one littered object in the world, and the climate then pays a second price for that, because here in California we had at least 44 wildfires just in 2022 from this very issue.”
On a more local scale, 60 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in Palo Alto come from transportation vehicles, said Amie Ashton, affordable housing advocate board chair of Silicon Valley Bike Coalition.
She urged the community to do more, as Palo Alto is making little progress on its goal to reduce emissions by 80 percent by 2030.
“We’re not even close,” she said. “We’re replacing natural gas-powered appliances, switching to electric vehicles; we’re composting, upgrading our electric grid, but that is not enough.”
Additionally, the city should also build more dense housing near transit, jobs and services, which would make the infrastructure more equitable and fun, Ashton said.
The climate coalition, which hosted the rally, was founded in 2021 by three high school students who wanted to push for local policy changes.
Co-founder of the coalition and Castilleja student Julia Zeitlin said those who want to promote sustainability in their day-to-day lives can start with a few key actions:
- Electrifying their homes and learning about the incentives and rebate programs to try and transition away from gas appliances
- Walking, biking and investing in public transportation
- Electing politicians who care about climate change
- Reducing meat and dairy consumption, even for just a day every week
- Talking about climate change and keeping the subject at the forefront of conversation
To celebrate Earth Day, the coalition invited the community to attend the Palo Alto City Council meeting with them on Monday at 6:30 p.m. to promote climate conscious action items and deliver public comments regarding progressive change.
“We’re at a transformative point,” Zeitlan said. “We’ve seen our voices pushed away, but we can’t afford to slow down.”
Just remember, it is the students and their dedicated parents that make the Palo Alto Schools great. Keep up the great work!
How about a local hero awards program? We can put all their names at the top of the list. They put the “adults” of our community to shame.