Just Transition on the Gulf Coast
Much of the U.S. portion of the Gulf of Mexico is a sacrifice zone for the fossil fuel industry. Drilling rigs, petrochemical plants, refineries and more cover both water and coastal lands from Texas to Alabama, leaving only Florida free of drilling. Join advocates as they share their work around a Just Transition to renewable energy–one that values and restores the people and communities that have long suffered under these extractive corporate interests.
Panelists:
Roishetta is Healthy Gulf’s Community Organizer for Southwest Louisiana and Southeast Texas bringing communities together to stop the buildout of petrochemical and fracked gas export facilities in the region. She is serving as a She Leads Fellow for the Power Coalition where she empowers other women of color to go out into their communities and make positive change. She is the founder of The Vessel Project of Louisiana, a small mutual aid organization located in Southwest Louisiana that was founded in the aftermath of several federally declared natural disasters that ravaged Southwest Louisiana.
Michael is Healthy Gulf’s Coastal Louisiana Organizer. She works with frontline communities to fight unchecked oil, gas and petrochemical expansion while uplifting grassroots struggles for clean air, healthy jobs and the right to thrive. She is a leader in Gulf South for a Green New Deal, a co-founder of Louisiana Just Recovery, and serves as a board member for True Transition, an advocacy organization developing policy for a just energy transition based on the needs and experiences of fossil fuel workers.
Christian works to protect water quality, create a healthy energy future, and improve coastal resilience in communities along the Florida panhandle and Southeast Alabama. His previous work experience includes land use planning, green building, clean energy advocacy, and the connection between community design and water quality.
Dr. Ott is a marine toxicologist and former Alaska commercial fisher ma’am who found her Path and Voice during the transformative crucible of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Accomplished in civic activism and grassroots engagement, she inspires youth and adults with accessible, science- and civics-based trainings, and with Stories, to engage people in working together towards a healthy democracy and a healthy energy future. Dr. Riki Ott currently directs two projects through Earth Island Institute, The ALERT Project and Ultimate Civics. Riki is also one of the original founders of Move to Amend.
Jennie (Moderator)is a National Co-Director for the Move to Amend Coalition.
As a journalist, she observed the immense stranglehold corporate power exerts over our government and communities. This experience shaped her perspective and fostered a deep passion and focus in her organizing work on environmental, social and economic justice issues leading her to collaborate with various intersectional grassroots movements dedicated to building a just and sustainable future.
The power reaped from the insane notion of corporate constitutional rights exists in tandem with structural oppression, and environmental degradation and is found as a cause of so many injustices. Move to Amend and the #WeThePeopleAmendment strikes at the root of that reality.
Jennie continues to live a fairly nomadic life, but in recent years calls the sacred ancestral Gulf Coast land, of the Apalachee Nation; the Muscogee Creek Nation, the Miccosukee Tribe, and Seminole Tribe, home again. In addition to building people power to end corporate rule, she receives immense pleasure from spending time with her clan, creating and cultivating things, hiking and soaking in natural springs.