Foundation News

On August 29, Sierra Club staff, board members, and supporters attended Hurricane Katrina ten-year commemorative events to reflect on the progress New Orleans has made and the significant further action needed to protect frontline communities from climate disruption.

Since 2005, The Sierra Club Foundation has provided funding through the Environmental Justice and Community Partnerships Program for Sierra Club organizers working on the ground with communities hit hardest by the storm.  Promoting clean energy development as a means to benefit the community both economically and environmentally, organizers worked with residents of the Lower Ninth Ward to rebuild their homes with solar power and energy efficiency features. Now, in the Lower Ninth Ward, residents are 500 percent more likely to have solar than other residents of New Orleans because the community supports clean energy and energy efficiency.

This year, The Sierra Club Foundation’s Forward Fund made a grant to the Sierra Club for its coordination and participation in mass mobilization events that build the national movement for strong and just climate action, including the events on August 29 marking ten years to the day Hurricane Katrina, a storm exacerbated by climate change, slammed into the gulf coast.

The events of the day commenced at 10:00 a.m. in the Lower Ninth Ward with a healing ceremony, which included reading the names of loved ones lost, at the site of the Industrial Canal levee breach that flooded the neighborhood. Hundreds of local residents then joined in a march for more than three miles through the city to Hunter's Field in the Seventh Ward, where the Sierra Club, the Hip Hop Caucus, and the Foundation for Louisiana staged a Rebuild, Resist, and Renew Rally featuring a program of speakers and performers that drew more than 5,000 people. Sierra Club Board President Aaron Mair and Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune were among the featured speakers who demanded environmental justice and articulated a clean energy vision for rebuilding and recovery. A candlelight vigil was held that evening at the Sanchez Center, wrapping up the Katrina ten-year commemoration.

"We were there, on the ground, with the people on August 29," says Mair. "Michael Brune and I were accepted, welcomed, and invited in. It was a proud moment for the Sierra Club. This was where we needed to be."