OJTA Summer Member Tours Wrapped Up as We Prepare for Deeper Relationship Building in Regional Convenings!
An illustration of Resilience:
When I started my role as Alliance Manager in November of last year, one of the many motivations that drew me towards OJTA was building and collaborating with a statewide alliance on ways to engage and support community based organizations that serve frontline communities, through a justice transition lens. To be completely frank, it has been a challenging year for the environmental justice movement. We have witnessed staffing losses, loss of capacity, rollbacks on federal funding, and attacks on immigrant and frontline communities. Although our collective work has led to the work being and feeling more challenging, each of our alliance members has met the moment, continued to serve their community's needs in times of crisis, and remain a part of the just transition solution
From the Salem Capitol to the Food Pantry:
I began my visits to alliance member organizations in February, prioritizing events that were being hosted or setting up a day to connect with them in-person. During the Fight for Our Future Rally in Salem, many of our alliance members: PCUN, Rogue Climate, VERDE & APANO were in a packed capitol building for a variety of hearings such as community resilient hubs, the immigrant justice package, and to support policy solutions that make Oregon more resilient to climate injustice and federal authoritarianism. This continued for the month of February for the Make Polluters Pay advocacy day which included organizations: Rogue Climate, Verde, Beyond Toxics, and PCUN. Many of our alliance member organizations who had endorsed were in attendance, invited their community bases, or were hosting their own advocacy days for other policies.
In March, I had the pleasure of visiting two of our member organizations offices in the Rogue Valley: Coalicion Fortaleza & Rogue Climate. I had a great discussion with Rogue Climate in their Rogue Valley Office, filled with protest art and signage created by their youth who worked to pass their electrification ordinance in 2025. We discussed supporting more skills-based training for their grassroots base, growing their youth-led activism work, shared learning opportunities, and network building across the state. When visiting Coalicion Fortaleza in Medford, Oregon, I met with numerous staff who support their community resilience and wealth-building programs throughout Jackson county. It was exciting to tour their food pantry, which was started as a means to fill the need for food access with the recent loss of federal SNAP benefits. I also learned more about their annual El Mercadito, a community, youth & LGBTQ+ led cultural market! Their next one is happening in September on the 19th.
In April, I visited Adelante Mujeres’ beautiful office in Forest Grove where murals, color, and programs were highlighted throughout their entire space. One of my favorite parts of this visit was learning about their weekly farmers market and seeing their small businesses area, available for folks to showcase and sell their products, for their small business development program. During our time together, we discussed the community resilience work they are a part of with the Governor’s office, their listening sessions of their community members impacted by the data center construction in Hillsboro, and ways to uplift others in the immigrant solidarity collaborative with an environmental justice lens.
I also had the opportunity to connect with PCUN headquartered Woodburn, and Oregon Rural Action headquartered in La Grande. When meeting with PCUN, we discussed the urgent needs for the farmworker community in this political environment- both in immigration threats, and workplace hazards such as heat, smoke, and pesticides exposure.. When meeting with Oregon Rural Action, they caught me up on their community organizing in Eastern Oregon focusing on water justice (nitrate poisoning in low-income communities) and immigrant justice. They also unveiled their plan to resist additional construction of data centers in the Umatilla Basin.
In June, I rounded off my listening tour in the Portland area to meet with the staff at Voz Worker’s Rights Education Project. I learned about their history as an organization, their workforce training opportunities such as welding, landscape and others in partnership with Portland Community College, and Day Labor Committee. I also learned more about their emergency preparedness cohort that connects volunteers to day laborers in 4 different locations in the Portland area. This last year, they also started a garden for their workers as a way to stay engaged and active with one another when work is slow.
What’s Next?
Connecting with OTJA’s members has cemented my belief that our network of frontline communities is resilient and committed to making the world a better place for underserved communities that also serve Oregon. Our alliance is here to make changes for low income, immigrant and communities of color both in policy reforms, and also direct wealth building, and resource-sharing ways.
As a convener for the climate justice and environmental justice space, OJTA has been providing a Just Transition Series to our members and their community members to build their leadership in the Just Transition Framework. These training sessions started in August, and will end in October. In the months of October and December, we also plan to host our regional convenings to continue our work together and dive deep into the issues our communities are facing and how we want to address them as an alliance.
We look forward to continuing to share updates and highlights from these future visits and our regional convenings!
