We’ll kick off the day with a DJ set with DJ Omé, opening remarks from Greenlining’s President, and a performance to set the tone for the day.
Amid the backdrop of a global pandemic, this past year has seen incredible events unlike any time in history: worldwide racial justice uprisings resulting in a uniquely powerful time of racial awakening followed by unprecedented voter mobilization efforts that flipped the White House and the Senate. This session will discuss the implications of this past year and zero in on the extraordinary efforts of Georgia organizers, reflecting on how this historic win reflects the enormous power our movements have built. Though the struggle for voting rights continues, their efforts have helped to create a year of momentum and hope.
Speakers:
- Manuel Pastor, Professor of Sociology and American Studies & Ethnicity, University of Southern California
- Nsé Ufot, Chief Executive Officer, The New Georgia Project
This past year has seen historic, and at times unlikely, wins for racial equity. The common thread: movement building and mass mobilization. This session will explore effective strategies and lessons learned from a variety of movements that have galvanized change. From Black Lives Matter to voter engagement tactics and beyond, speakers will explore what comes next to take movement building and civic engagement to the next level of real, lasting change for communities of color.
Moderator:
- Alicia Garza, Principal, Black Futures Lab
Speakers:
- Alex Tom, Executive Director, Center for Empowered Politics
- Cat Brooks, Co-Founder, Anti Police-Terror Project
- Dulce Garcia, Executive Director, Border Angels
Get networking! This is your chance to connect with fellow racial equity advocates and visit the Expo.
National and State Approaches to Achieve Clean Mobility Equity
The Biden administration has made bold statements about investing in clean transportation and mobility strategies to advance climate justice and resilience. While federal leadership and support is crucial to opening up new opportunities, we need to think beyond a blanket national approach to clean mobility equity. True mobility equity requires programs and strategies that foster community-led ideas and decision-making power to meet community needs. This session will bring together thinkers and leaders from around the country to discuss the types of clean mobility equity programs that should be replicated and scaled up.
Moderator:
- Isa Gaillard, Transformative Communities Program Manager, The Greenlining Institute
Speakers:
- Marcel Porras, Chief Sustainability Officer, Los Angeles Department of Transportation
- Dr. Shelley Francis, Co-Founder, EV Hybrid Noire
How Can Community-Led Transformation Undo Legacies of Racist Policy?
Our neighborhoods have been shaped and carved out by exclusionary and racist public policies, policies that segregated African Americans and other communities of color into less desirable neighborhoods and then starved those neighborhoods of public dollars, services and resources. Against this backdrop of structural disinvestment and neglect, communities are pushing back and building solutions from the ground up.
This session will take a dive into one such example as a case study for community-led transformation: the Transformative Climate Communities (TCC) program is a grant program that makes catalytic climate investments in California’s most under-resourced neighborhoods. Using TCC as an example, we’ll explore how to design equitable policy and we’ll hear directly from communities about all that goes into community transformation: from building power to turning local visions into tangible projects that are ready to be funded.
Moderator:
- Emi Wang, Associate Director of Capacity Building, The Greenlining Institute
Speakers:
- Dora Frietze-Armenta, Lead Project Planner, Pacoima Beautiful
- Additional Speakers TBA
How is the Private Sector Meeting the Moment?
2020 was a big year for corporate accountability. Across the globe, corporations made pledges to develop better commitments to social justice, corporate social responsibility, and diversity, equity and inclusion. The scale of the private sector is massive, with great influence and impacts on democracy, systemic racism and the environment. This session will discuss ways corporations are responding to calls to build equity and justice into their business practices.
Moderator:
- Debra Gore-Mann, President & CEO, The Greenlining Institute
Speakers:
- Kleber Santos, Head of Diverse Segments Representation and Inclusion, Wells Fargo
- Natalie K. Schilling, Vice President of People Culture and Strategy, Southern California Edison
- Angela Jenkins, Community Benefits Manager, Kaiser Permanente
Grab lunch, meet our partners in the Expo, and network away!
In order to create systemic change, we need to understand the system itself. Isabel Wilkerson has provoked a generation to rethink the way we see hierarchy in America, challenging oft-told narratives on race and racism toward a more complex, yet incisive view on the invisible systemic structures at play. Wilkerson, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Humanities Medal, is the author of The New York Times bestsellers The Warmth of Other Suns and Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. This session will discuss Wilkerson’s most recent book, Caste, her take on this present moment of racial truth, and a timely reexamination of systemic racism.
This session will be moderated by Alexis Madrigal, staff writer at The Atlantic, co-founder of the COVID Tracking Project, and author of Powering the Dream: The History and Promise of Green Technology.
Music from DJ Omé until 2:00PM and networking will stay open until 3:00PM.
Networking will stay open until 3:00PM.
We’ll kick off day two with a DJ set with DJ Omé and opening remarks on ‘Galvanizing the Next Wave of Change’.
Speakers:
- Shirley Weber, Secretary of State, State of California
History has shown that culture and narratives have the power to shape a movement and inspire transformative action. This session will explore the role of culture and narrative-building in systems change. Speakers will explore: How do culture and storytelling create and sustain momentum? How have conservative movements tapped into this power and what can we do about it?
Speakers:
- Favianna Rodriguez, Co-Founder & President, Center for Cultural Power
- Additional speakers TBA
Get networking! This is your chance to connect with fellow racial equity advocates and visit the Expo.
Algorithmic Equity Now: Why Regulating AI is an Urgent Racial Justice Issue
From determining whether or not you may receive unemployment benefits to when you may receive a COVID-19 vaccine, algorithms make decisions every day that impact the health and wealth of communities of color. However, algorithms often opaquely make decisions that exacerbate discrimination. This panel will explore why regulating AI is a racial justice issue and how we can approach regulating AI in a way that protects and uplifts communities of color.
Moderator:
- Serena Oduro, Technology Equity Fellow, The Greenlining Institute
Speakers:
- Vinhcent Le, Economic Equity Legal Counsel, The Greenlining Institute
- Dr. Sara R. Jordan, Senior Counsel, Artificial Intelligence and Ethics, The Future of Privacy Forum
- Mutale Nkonde, CEO, AI For The People
The Case for Reparations in Closing the Racial Wealth Gap
Since the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, conversations on reparations have gained increasing momentum. In Fall 2020, California passed legislation to develop a task force to study the impact of reparations for African Americans. This represents an enormous opportunity to address systemic racism and move toward justice and equity for African Americans, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis that has disproportionately impacted Black and Latinx communities. In this session panelists will discuss how government, foundations, and nonprofits can work together to help close the racial wealth gap through reparations in California -- and consider how California’s statewide efforts can serve as a framework for reparations initiatives across the country.
Moderator:
- Kelsey Lyles, Senior Policy Manager of Transformative Racial Equity, The Greenlining Institute
Speakers:
- Jesse Van Tol, CEO, National Community Reinvestment Coalition
- Mekaelia Davis, Program Director, Surdna Foundation
- Pecolia Manigo Awobodu, Executive Director, Bay Area Plan
Just & Equitable Decarbonization: BIPOC Community Stories Across California
As entire states like California move away from fossil fuels and towards cleaner energy options, we must improve the buildings where we live, work, and play -- a major source of carbon emissions and health impacts. A just and equitable transition towards electrification requires BIPOC organizers and communities to lead the way, as they have been the most historically excluded, systemically impacted, and hit first and worst by climate change.
This session will feature seasoned local BIPOC leaders across California sharing stories, strategies, barriers and lessons learned from their efforts to center equity in decarbonization work, focused on the people most impacted. Speakers will discuss how equitable decarbonization can meet local community needs, build resilience, offer protections, and provide potential workforce and bill savings options to frontline communities.
Moderator:
- Katie Valenzuela, Environmental Justice Consultant
Panelists:
- Abigail Solis, Senior Community Development Specialist, Self-Help Enterprises
- Antonio Diaz, Organizational Director, PODER
- Caroline Farrell, Executive Director, Center on Race, Poverty, and the Environment
- Leslie Martinez, Community Engagement Specialist, Leadership Counsel
- Martha Dina Arguello, Executive Director, Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles
Grab lunch, meet our partners in the Expo, and network away!
Before the COVID-19 pandemic started, our system was already broken. The racial wealth gap, displacement and gentrification were destroying communities of color and climate disasters were already a predictable part of the national news cycle. Now, in the midst of the worst economic downturn in decades, this is our time to build a new economic system that radically meets the needs of people of color.
Attendees will have the chance to participate in roundtable conversations with racial equity leaders and learn tools to put equity into practice. With two concurrent sessions on ‘Power Building’ and ‘Policy in Action’, attendees and speakers will explore how to center communities of color and greenline our economy
Over a year into the pandemic, many of us have experienced fatigue and burnout as we live through multiple overlapping crises. While this Summit speaks to the theme of ‘momentum,’ this session will get more nuanced on the theme and what it means to us personally as organizers and advocates -- championing a type of momentum that makes space for pause, rest and self care. Session facilitator Kelsey Blackwell will lead attendees through ways to cultivate long-term resilience to sustain the hard work ahead.
Blackwell is a somatic practitioner and writer dedicated to undermining the master’s tools with contemplative, embodied and creative practices. She supports womxn of color to trust and follow the guidance of their bodies so they may powerfully radiate their worth, dignity and wisdom in a world which sorely needs this brilliance.
How can we reimagine a society that is truly built upon principles of justice and equity? Incremental change alone will not deliver true racial equity. This session will explore how we can hold and work toward a vision of a radically reimagined future, and challenge us to dream big and lay the groundwork for real transformation of our systems.
Speakers:
- Angela Glover Blackwell, Founder in Residence, PolicyLink
- Michael Tubbs, Special Advisor for Economic Mobility and Opportunity to California Governor Gavin Newsom
Join us as we close out the event.
Networking will stay open until 3:00PM.
Agenda is subject to change and all indicated time slots are in PDT.
