Over six months in 2020, The Praxis Project, Living Hope Wheelchair Association, and Unitarian Universalist Service Committee convened a Learning Circle cohort of community organizers to develop a disaster justice framework from a racial justice perspective. This approach to disaster included social and structural disasters, and throughout this process we collectively shared experiences and tools for community-based sustainable disaster response and recovery. From the inequitable impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic to fires ravaging the West Coast, from migrant children being forcibly separated from their parents at the border to continued police violence against the Black community, we have witnessed an array of disasters in the last year and beyond. This broadened definition of disaster is a tenet of disaster justice, as is the need to center racial and social justice in its response.
Join this webinar to discuss:
Our virtual Learning Circle process on equitable disaster justice
Examples from the field: Disaster justice in action from Jackie Sims at People's Alliance for Transit, Housing and Employment and Denisa Livingston at Diné Community Advocacy Alliance.
Recommendations for public health, public policy, and philanthropy to support and invest in community-led disaster justice efforts
Speakers:
Denisa Livingston, M.P.H., (Diné, she/her/hers) is an Indigenous food justice organizer and community health advocate of Diné Community Advocacy Alliance, Slow Food International Indigenous Councilor of the Global North, an Appointed Member of the Champions Network of the United Nations 2021 Food Systems Summit, and an Ashoka Fellow. Her work addresses the trust, values, and vulnerabilities of Indigenous communities moving towards stewardship, resiliency, adaptability, and sustainability. Denisa focuses on servant leadership, gastronomy, creating new roles for society, and bridging community members to purpose and innovation. Contact or follow her at Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter: @PrincesseDenisa and @DineAdvocacy.
Jackie Paul Sims has served the Nashville community for the past twelve years as a community organizer and an activist. Her work in Nashville has been centered around justice and equity. As one of the founding members of the grassroots organization, Democracy Nashville/ Democratic Communities, Jackie has discovered her most meaningful work has been that of guidance as an elder to new activists. Intergenerational work has always been essential to activism. Successes come more often when we set aside self and our differences which better allow us to work in harmony with one another. Most of Jackie's efforts are now centered around housing instability and inequity. Housing injustice has its roots in an intentional targeting of mostly Black and brown peoples denying them access to fair affordable decent housing. The public and private sectors continue to be complicit in this harm to our communities. She has come to see the resulting trauma of housing insecurity as a form of sanctioned violence on communities on Black, brown, and Indigenous peoples.
Cost: Free
This webinar was hosted and recorded on Thursday, May 6, 2021. View the recording below.
Centering Community in Public Health Webinars: Praxis is in a unique position to build bridges between community organizers and traditional public health institutions. Below includes our 2020 webinars designed for local health departments, public health collaboratives and other agencies interested in increasing community-centered health equity and justice; we offer and provide additional webinars and trainings tailored to the needs of our partners upon request.