This month’s E&S TAG meeting was a collaborative community brainstorming session to determine what local resources are available for heatwave preparedness. We would like to give a special thank you to our "fishbowl" participants with voices including Nuestra Casa, Senior Coastsiders, North Fair Oaks Community Alliance, Climate Resilient Communities and more!

During our recent "Rethinking the Way We Move: Active Transportation for Wellness, Community, and the Planet" event, we had the privilege of hosting informative presentations from Carlos Moreno, Peninsula Clean Energy, Program Specialist, Vanessa Castro, Office of Sustainability Active Transportation Specialist, and Anthony Montes, Silicon Valley Bike Coalition, Community Organizer.

On Wednesday, May 24, Thrive hosted an insightful event "From Canopy Cover to Community Equity: Protecting and Managing Our Urban Forest." This engaging gathering brought together environmental enthusiasts, community activists, and experts in urban forestry to discuss the importance of safeguarding and effectively managing our urban forests.

On April 28th, we held our Environment & Sustainability event, "Keeping the Power On Energy Resilience in San Mateo County," which took place at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Community Space. The discussion focused on the issues surrounding electrification and resilience of the power grid, especially for the Coast Side community, and how different counties in the Bay Area approach electrification from an equitable standpoint. Senators Josh Becker also attended the event and presented the state's efforts to reach the get-to-zero emissions goal by 2045. Dr. Liang Min, managing Director at Stanford's Bits and Watts Initiative, discussed was about the vulnerabilities of our grid system infrastructures and found inequities in the aging infrastructure.

Public transportation plays a critical role in reducing our carbon footprint and promoting sustainability. It is also an essential mode of transportation for many individuals who cannot afford a personal vehicle or who have limited mobility. However, as highlighted by the diverse group of community members in our recent event, access to reliable, affordable, and efficient public transportation remains a significant challenge.

If you weren't at the Cultural Barrier to Induction Cooking event, you missed out on Francesca's quesadillas' warm welcome! It has been well-documented that gas stoves contribute to climate change and produce dangerous indoor air pollution. Yet, cultural barriers often make it difficult for people to make the change.

The first E&S meeting of 2023 came from the need to gather together after much of northern California was impacted by winter storms that caused widespread flooding, mudslides, high winds, and power outages at the beginning of this year. Thrive brought together a panel of experts in the county that will discuss the county's flood risk, current mitigation projects, and the regulatory framework for green infrastructure.

The first Environmental & Sustainability Thrive Action Group meeting was held in 2018. As 2022 comes to a close, we want to recognize and celebrate the many accomplishments of community-based organizations, academia, philanthropy, and government working to make San Mateo County a more resilient place in our final meeting of the year. We discussed our organizations' stories of growth, successes, and challenges, and shared what we have in store for 2023. 

It was the second time this year that we gathered together in person. We reflected on the success of the Climate Summit for San Mateo County, which brought forth commitments to equitable climate adaptation from community organizations, government, funders, and community members. It was the right moment to turn stated commitments into action.

On October 3, Thrive Alliance, along with Climate Resilient Communities, Nuestra Casa, and Rise South City hosted the first annual Climate Summit for San Mateo County. The occasion was monumental for everyone working together in the field with frontline communities against climate change. The event focused on engaging new potential relationships to learn how to the efforts in climate adaptation and equity. The Summit brought together nearly 250 people virtually and in person from community-based organizations, philanthropy, government, academia, and community members to share knowledge and make collective commitments to ensure climate adaptation and equity.

The Inflation Reduction Act is the most extensive climate bill ever, was signed in mid-August 2022, and was discussed in the September E&S TAG meeting. Thank you to those who joined us, and a huge thank you to our presenters, Brian Perkins, Senior Policy Advisor, Congresswoman Jackie Speier's Office, and Jared Johnson, Policy and External Relations Senior Manager, Acterra. Provided much valuable insight into how the new bill would affect your local communities.

Last Thursday, Thrive had our first in-person TAG meeting at the CZI Community Space in Redwood City. As this event was a combination of both the Environment & Sustainability (E&S) and the Basic Needs & Safety Net (BN & SN) TAGs, it was fantastic not only seeing people together in-person, but also seeing the mingling between both the environmentally and socially-focused organizations. This event focused on food recovery efforts in San Mateo County and we brought together six speakers from three sectors, each with a different perspective on food rescue: Tracy Weatherby, Vice President of Strategy & Advocacy, Second Harvest, Jack Steinmann, Resource Conservation Specialist-Waste Reduction, San Mateo County Office of Sustainability, Sonia Escobedo, Food Recovery Program Coordinator, Nuestra Casa, Mauricio Cordova, Chief Operations Officer, Loaves & Fishes, Constance La Trice Taylor, Associate Director of Program & Services, Samaritan House, and Ryan Bailey, Food Management Coordinator, Flagship Culinary.

On March 17th, Thrive brought together leaders and organizations involved in environmental legislation space to speak about what they and their organizations have been working on and how the audience can get involved in the legislative space and participate in their programs. Our panelists for this event were Josh Becker, California State Senator along with Helen Wolter, District Representative, Josh Becker's office, Allison Chan, Policy Director, Save the Bay, Linda Hutchins-Knowles, Karl Knapp GoEV Senior Manager, Acterra, and Josh Hugg, Governmental Affairs Specialist, Midpeninsula Open Space District (Midpen).

On February 24th, Thrive brought together six speakers working in the transportation sector to discuss the current state of transportation, what programs currently and will exist, how these programs include equity, and what we can do to ensure climate change and climate justice are a part of these conversations. A year ago, Thrive held an event focusing on transportation and plans for a more equitable and sustainable transit system for the Bay Area. In addition, transportation was one of the primary climate issue areas brought up in our Collective Climate Goals in our meeting in December.

On January 20th, Thrive brought together five different organizations working in the buildings and energy world within San Mateo County. Seeing the different organizations and the work they are currently implementing was eye-opening and created a sense of urgency to push for gas phaseouts, electric appliances, grid resiliency, and so much more while also recognizing the extensive need for equity, practicing inclusion, and serving under-resourced communities. Even as this was a critical, pressing matter, it also showed a hopeful outlook for the future as we heard about so many other organizations involved in this space, all of the collaboration work between these organizations, and the ideas they have for future projects.