Needless to say, I am greatly disappointed with the president’s announcement today, that he is pulling out the United States out of the Paris Climate Accord. I must confess that I was unsurprised; after all, as a presidential candidate, Donald Trump called global warming a Chinese conspiracy.
I could argue that the president’s claims of lost jobs is baseless and that his claims that the agreement places our country in an economic disadvantage is equally unproven, but those issues lie outside the immediate concerns of this community organization. The word from climate policy insiders as long ago as ten years ago was that Washington DC had grown so dysfunctional and out of touch and that the power of certain corporate and right-wing ideological voices had grown so loud, that meaningful legislation and policy on climate change would prove to be an impossibility. No matter what the science says, no matter the concerns of the U.S. citizenry, no matter what good common sense tells us what to do, there are enough Senators and members of the House listening to King Coal or ideological lobbyists that our federal government will do nothing to keep the planet from warming up. Donald Trump as president merely puts that picture in stark relief. But those very same policy folks who said that the federal government will not help us address climate change said that this work would now be taken up by states and municipalities, and they have been proven right. California governor Jerry Brown has let Donald Trump know in no uncertain terms that California is going to fight climate change. The city of San Diego has drawn up an ambitious Climate Action Plan. Other states and cities are doing similar work. And that is why we are here. While our state and city work on major transportation issues and work on renewable energy projects, there is still much that we can do in our everyday lives—how we get around, how we warm and cool our homes, even the foods we eat and how we clothe ourselves—that can make a big difference in our emissions. South Park Climate Solutions is committed to finding ways that we as individuals and as a community can lower our emissions. We ask that you join us. There are great things we can do.
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December 2017
CategoriesAuthorPaul Hormick is the founder of South Park Climate Solutions. He sees climate change as one of our central concerns, for ecologies as well as societies. He holds a master's degree in Environmental Science and Policy from Johns Hopkins University |