UCLA Sustainability

Free Food from the Dining Halls
2023-02-10 22:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Conference Room 1 in the Student Activities Center Basement, 220 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
Bruin Dine is a program serving leftover hot food from the UCLA dining halls FREE. Bring your own containers and enjoy some delicious food!
Every Tuesday and Thursday, you can come get hot & untouched food from the #1 dining hall in the nation would have otherwise gone to waste! Everyone is welcome! Bruin Dine will operate out of the basement of the Student Activities Center (SAC) in Conference Room 1.

Parks and Housing Together: A Win for Communities and the Environment
2023-02-13 10:30 - 12:00 | Online
Please join this panel on “Parks and Housing Together: A Win for Communities and the Environment,” hosted by the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. Topics will include the barriers and challenges to building parks and affordable housing joint development projects, how these projects can improve extreme heat resiliency in Los Angeles, and examples of joint development projects. The event will be held via Zoom.
REGISTER HERE
Panelists:
Marta Segura, Chief Heat Officer, City of Los Angeles
Robin Mark, Trust for Public Land
Audrey Peterson, Holos Communities
Sissy Trinh, Southeast Asian Community Alliance
* The panel members are speaking as individuals and not on behalf of their organizations.
Moderated by:
Beth Kent
UCLA School of Law

Eyes in the Sky, Birds in the Heart and Mind: Counterforce Lab's new lecture series
2023-02-13 12:00 - 13:00 | HYBRID: UCLA, Broad Art Center, EDA Room #1250 and YouTube
Rebeca Méndez (UCLA DMA) and Elizabeth DeLoughrey (UCLA English) in conversation about the oceanic humanities and the aesthetics of submergence.
Eyes in the Sky, Birds in the Heart and Mind is Counterforce Lab’s new lecture series. As a point of departure, we will focus on the Biophilia Treehouse, Counterforce’s flagship project, a public art living sculpture, and an offering to birds. Join us to explore how drones, photogrammetry, and AR can foster interspecies friendships, reveal overlaps and disjunctures between scientific and Indigenous knowledge about birds, and let us marvel at avian life force.
Sessions are taking place in the EDA, Broad Art Center. Free Lunch.
Livestream and recording available via UCLA DMA YouTube channel.

High Impact Tea Panel: Sustainability in the Professional World
2023-02-13 16:00 - 17:45 | Marion Anderson Hall Grand Salon, 110 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
Join this High Impact Tea with an impressive panel to discuss the current sustainability landscape and forecasts for the evolving space. From the built environment to movie screens, it will cover how various industries address sustainability via innovation, measurement, reporting, and more – exploring today’s most challenging questions, including: How do firms define sustainability and measure its success?, How can a company combat greenwashing? and What is the regulatory environment for upholding Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) Metrics?
RSVP required. REGISTER HERE
Panel: 4:00 – 5:00 p.m. PST
featuring Anita Chan, Audit Partner at KPMG; John Rego, Vice President of Sustainability at Sony Pictures; Natalie Teear, Senior Vice President at Hudson Pacific Properties, in conversation with Brad Sparks, UCLA Anderson Lecturer, ESG and Sustainability Reporting
Reception: 5:00 – 5:45 p.m. PST
The High Impact Tea is a quarterly speaker series that features social impact industry leaders sharing stories about their successes and lessons learned in their careers. The social and educational event is open to faculty, students, staff and alumni across UCLA, as well as the broader social impact community. It is designed to provide a forum for conversation and exchange of ideas among people committed to creating social, environmental and economic impact around the world.

Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust
2023-02-13 18:00 - 21:00 | James Bridges Theater, 235 Charles E Young Dr E, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
Reception with refreshments 6:00 pm
Film screening 7:00 pm
Speakers with Q & A 8:00 pm
MANZANAR, DIVERTED: WHEN WATER BECOMES DUST follows intergenerational women from three communities who defend their land, their history and their culture from the insatiable thirst of Los Angeles. Native Americans, Japanese American World War II incarcerees and environmentalists form an alliance to preserve Payahuunadü (Owens Valley), “the land of flowing water.” Featuring breathtaking photography and immersive soundscapes, the film recounts more than 150 years of history, showing how this distant valley is inextricably tied to the city of Los Angeles. It reveals the forced removals of the Nüümü (Paiute) and the Newe (Shoshone) who were marched out of the Valley in the 1860s by the U.S. Army, and the Japanese Americans who were brought here from their West Coast homes and incarcerated in a World War II concentration camp. Water lured outsiders in and continues to fuel the greed which has sucked this once lush place dry.
REGISTER HERE

Strategies to Accelerate Electric Micromobility
2023-02-14 10:00 - 11:00 | Online
Creating an affordable multimodal system: accessible electric micromobility
The cost of e-bikes and scooters prevents access. This webinar on accelerating electric micromobility will explore the various models for expanding access to e-bikes, e-scooters and e-mopeds.
Electric micromobility has evolved from a niche transport mode and gained popularity among commuters across the world. And, shared electric micromobility has proven to provide additional access in transit deserts and to underserved individuals and individuals with disabilities.
The speakers will discuss why incentives for e-bikes matter in creating an affordable and accessible multimodal transportation system that works for all. They will also share examples of incentives and strategies to create an economical ecosystem of transportation.
REGISTER HERE

CLEANR & Newkirk Center for Science & Society Speaker Series
2023-02-15 12:00 - 13:00 | Online
Charles Lee
U.S. EPA’s Emerging Cumulative Impacts Framework: Implications for Research, Policy and Practice
The UCI Law Center for Land, Environment and Natural Resources (CLEANR) and UCI Newkirk Center for Science & Society welcome environmental justice pioneer Charles Lee.
REGISTER HERE
Lee will present key concepts associated with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s emerging framework to assess and address cumulative impacts and their implications for research, policy development and practice. In EPA’s Equity Action Plan pursuant to Executive Order 13985, the agency determined that lack of a consistent, cross-agency framework to address cumulative environmental impacts is a major barrier to achieving equity. Cumulative impact assessment is a research and policy area of tremendous vibrancy and growth. For example, by 2023, one quarter of states in the U.S. had pending or enacted legislation regarding cumulative impacts. As an area that points to major shortcomings in the way that environmental protection has evolved over the past fifty years, cumulative impact assessment continues to call for new paradigms and sound scientific foundations. Lee will consider issues including: (1) the relationship between cumulative and disproportionate impacts, including implications of addressing the relationship between the concentration and distribution of environmental burdens and benefits; (2) how to ensure that the totality of exposures of overburdened communities is considered when assessing and addressing cumulative impacts; (3) how to ensure that information from disproportionate and cumulative impact assessments fits with and informs pertinent regulatory decision structures; (4) how to ensure that EPA’s approaches to cumulative impact assessment and cumulative risk assessment complement and reinforce each other to best inform decisions; and (5) how to facilitate greater attention to and action on upstream factors such as land use planning and infrastructure investment. These and related conversations underway at agencies such as EPA require input and collective learning from multiple academic disciplines and broad sectors of society.

How Businesses Are Making a Social Impact in Hollywood
2023-02-15 12:00 - 14:00 | Ronald Tutor Campus Center, University of Southern California, Room 450 (The Forum), 3607 Trousdale Parkway, Los Angeles, 90089, United States
The 2022-2023 Jacobson Family Sustainable Impact Lecture Series addresses the topic “How Businesses are Centering Community in Social Impact.”
We are excited to be back in person for a free panel discussion and Q&A on How Businesses Are Making a Social Impact in Hollywood on February 15th!
Join us on February 15th at 12 pm PST at 3607 Trousdale Parkway, TCC 450, Los Angeles, CA, 90089. Spots are limited. Register now and then arrive early to grab your seat and a complimentary lunch!
You will meet leading practitioners, such as USC alumna Sumi Parekh, who is the Executive Director of Group Effort Initiative (GEI). GEI, which was launched by Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively, strives to create a pipeline for members of underrepresented communities to get real experience towards lasting careers within the entertainment industry.
Moderated by Christina Fialho, Managing Director, BSEL
R﻿SVP by January 31st for a complimentary lunch box from Greenleaf.
REGISTER HERE

Fixing the Climate: Rethinking Climate Policy in an Uncertain World
2023-02-16 17:30 - 19:30 | UCLA Law School, Room 1430, 385 Charles E Young Dr E, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
5:30 – 7:00pm; Reception to follow
Global climate diplomacy is stalling thanks to the same top-down approach used since the Kyoto Protocol. That’s the argument made by David Victor (UC San Diego) and Charles Sabel (Columbia Law School) in their book “Fixing the Climate: Strategies for an Uncertain World.” Hear them discuss how policymakers should approach climate governance in this timely and provocative conversation with faculty from UCLA’s Emmett Institute.
Charles Sabel
Maurice T. Moore Professor of Law, Columbia Law School
David Victor
Professor of Innovation and Public Policy; Co-director, Deep Decarbonization Initiative, UC San Diego
Moderated by:
William Boyd
Michael J. Klein Chair in Law; Faculty Co-Director, the Emmett Institute
In Conversation with:
Edward A. Parson
Dan and Rae Emmett Professor of Environmental Law; Faculty Director, the Emmett Institute
Mary D. Nichols
Distinguished Counsel, the Emmett Institute
Kimberly Clausing
Eric M. Zolt Chair in Tax Law and Policy, UCLA School of Law
Steve Cliff
Executive Officer, California Resources Board
Please contact Heather Morphew, morphew@law.ucla.edu with any questions.
REGISTER HERE

T.R.E.E. Talks: Can Art Save Nature?
2023-02-17 13:00 - 14:00 | Online
Join TreePeople for an insightful conversation on how the arts are being used to invoke inspiration as a means to address this dire need.
REGISTER HERE
While scientists, government, tech and business leaders are typically those called upon to address environmental issues, artists are the ones that help express, inspire, and creatively educate about the realities of nature’s delicate state. Art is a vehicle that allows us to celebrate and draw attention to saving our environment. Join us for an insightful conversation on how the arts are being used to invoke inspiration as a means to address this dire need. This T.R.E.E. Talk is in partnership with The Soraya in an effort to call attention to the importance of saving California’s beloved trees through the inspirational musical tribute of Treelogy, premiering on February 23rd at The Soraya. TreePeople members receive 50% off tickets HERE.

Healthy Campus Initiative Seed Saving Workshop
2023-02-17 14:00 - 15:00 | jane b semel Healthy Campus Initiative Community Garden, Sunset Canyon Recreation Center, 111 Easton Dr, Los Angeles, CA, 90024, United States
Join this Seed-Saving workshop taught by a pair of visiting Master Gardeners! in this workshop, you’ll learn how to save seeds from your garden and discover the value of building your own heirloom seed library!
REGISTER HERE

Eyes in the Sky, Birds in the Heart and Mind: Counterforce Lab's new lecture series
2023-02-21 12:00 - 13:00 | HYBRID: UCLA, Broad Art Center, EDA Room #1250 and YouTube
Knowledge in environmentally-situated AR with Francesca Albrezzi (UCLA OARC).
Eyes in the Sky, Birds in the Heart and Mind is Counterforce Lab’s new lecture series. As a point of departure, we will focus on the Biophilia Treehouse, Counterforce’s flagship project, a public art living sculpture, and an offering to birds. Join us to explore how drones, photogrammetry, and AR can foster interspecies friendships, reveal overlaps and disjunctures between scientific and Indigenous knowledge about birds, and let us marvel at avian life force.
Session takes place in the EDA, Broad Art Center. Free Lunch.
Livestream and recording available via UCLA DMA YouTube channel.

Electrifying the Nation: Promoting Uptime in EV Charging
2023-02-21 12:00 - 13:00 | Online
The EV charging industry is poised to evolve rapidly in the upcoming decade, especially given the recent $5B investment in the NEVI Program following funding as part of Biden’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. However, as EV charging technology scales, issues of system downtime have provoked increasing concern.
This event focuses on centering discussion around maintaining EV uptime, prompting considerations for how charging station reliability is an equity issue, and ultimately developing approaches for the inception of a more robust and dependable EV charging network across the nation.
REGISTER HERE

After the Storms - A Timely Update on California’s Water Supply
2023-02-21 12:00 - 13:00 | Online
Join State water leaders as they share an update on the status of drought and water supply after the recent set of fierce winter storms. How has our water supply improved? What are we doing to capture large volumes of snowmelt this spring? How are fish and wildlife faring? When will the drought be over?
This dialogue will provide a timely understanding of California’s water situation, with an opportunity to get your questions answered.
REGISTER HERE

Kiss the Ground Documentary Viewing
2023-02-21 19:00 - 21:00 | De Neve Auditorium
Attendance is free and open to all UCLA students. Free vegan snacks (ft. GOMacro & Lesser Evil) & a sustainable items giveaway
The screening is hosted by Sustainagoals, the committee within USAC’s Facilities Commission advancing sustainability on the hill and campus.

Climate Conversations: Pathways to Action - Methane
2023-02-22 12:00 - 13:15 | Online
Methane accounts for around 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions, behind only carbon dioxide. As methane is both more potent and shorter-lived than carbon dioxide, near-term efforts to reduce emissions of methane could slow the increase in global temperature in the next few decades. Rebecca Leber (Vox) will moderate a conversation between Fiji George (Cheniere Energy) and Steven Hamburg (Environmental Defense Fund) about anthropogenic sources of methane, the role of methane in climate change, and potential actions to reduce methane emissions in the U.S. by the private sector, public sector, and individuals.
The conversation will be webcast on Wednesday, February 22, 2023 from 3-4:15pm ET. Closed captioning will be provided. The conversation will include questions from the audience and will be recorded and available to view on the page after the event.
REGISTER HERE
Climate Conversations: Pathways to Action is a monthly webinar series from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine that aims to convene high-level, cross-cutting, nonpartisan conversations about issues relevant to policy action on climate change.

Environmental Justice and Community Organizing with the Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN)
2023-02-23 12:00 - 13:00 | Room 4357 Public Affairs Building, 337 Charles E. Young Drive East, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN) is an environmental justice organization with deep roots in California’s Asian immigrant and refugee communities. Since 1993, APEN has built a membership base of Laotian refugees in Richmond and Chinese immigrants in Oakland. Together, they’ve fought and won campaigns to make our communities healthier, just places where people can thrive. Learn more about APEN’s work and a workshop with UCLA Luskin.
REGISTER HERE through CareerHub
Seng So, Los Angeles Lead Organizer: “In the 1980s Seng So’s parents fled the Khmer genocide and settled in the Bay Area. It is from this history—the struggles and sacrifices of his ancestors—that paves his path today. Seng has been a youth organizer in California’s immigrant and refugee communities for almost two decades. At the heart of his life and work are three principles: community, love, liberation.”
APEN is launching a new organizing project in the South Bay region of Los Angeles County: cities and neighborhoods like Wilmington, San Pedro, Carson and Torrance.

The Settler Sea: California’s Salton Sea and the Environmental Consequences of Colonialism
2023-02-23 12:30 - 14:00 | Online
This talk presents a view of the Salton Sea and its surrounding Sonoran Desert ecosystem that destabilizes hegemonic, settler colonial perspectives on the sea and the desert, exploring the ways that different kinds of human communities have encountered and made meaning out of this complex place. Ultimately, this story of sea, desert, and people is not just a tale of environmental decline in the face of human power. It is a parable about competing knowledge systems – epistemologies and worldviews about the land, ourselves, and one another – and how these knowledge systems hold consequences for arid places and the people who love them.
Dr. Traci Brynne Voyles is Professor and Chair of Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Oklahoma (OU), and Affiliate Faculty in the OU Departments of History and Native American Studies. She is the author of two books: The Settler Sea: California’s Salton Sea and the Consequences of Colonialism (Many Wests book series, University of Nebraska Press, 2021), which won the prestigious Caughey Prize for best work on the American West in 2022, and Wastelanding: Legacies of Uranium Mining in Navajo Country (University of Minnesota Press, 2015).
REGISTER HERE

Taxonomic and functional diversity of xeric alpine plant communities in a changing climate
2023-02-23 18:00 - 19:30 | Online
Kaleb Goff, PhD Student, North Carolina State University and 2022 WMRC Mini Grant recipient
Kaleb will discuss findings that demonstrate climate change’s affects on plant diversity and functionality within the xeric alpine ecosystems of the White Mountains, California. His work is also in collaboration with GLORIA Great Basin, which has been monitoring plant communities in the White Mountains for the last 18 years.
Registration required via Zoom – REGISTER HERE. This talk will be recorded. FREE & OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.

Environmental Justice Series at the IoES Event #2
2023-02-24 14:00 - 16:00 | UCLA Mildred E Mathias Botanical Garden, La Kretz Garden Pavilion, 707 Tiverton Dr, Los Angeles, CA, 90095
REGISTER HERE
Cynthia Babich
Executive Director of the Del Amo Action Committee
Cynthia Babich serves as the Executive Director of the Del Amo Action Committee. The DAAC is a grassroots community-based environmental justice organization concerned about DDT contamination and related health problems in the unincorporated Los Angeles Harbor Gateway neighborhood. The Del Amo area includes two superfund sites responsible for the presence of DDT and other contaminants within the community.
Cynthia successfully led a campaign that resulted in the relocation of residents from homes impacted by DDT contamination. She continues to work to protect public health within the Del Amo community while advocating for new approaches to environmental and chemical policies at the local, state, and national levels.
Refreshments will be served.
About the series
The struggle for environmental justice defines many of the communities that make up Los Angeles. This winter we welcome you to come and hear from some of the region’s leaders about the issues communities have faced, continue to face, and to learn from their activism and commitment.
All events to be held at UCLA Mildred Mathias Arboretum, La Kretz Garden Pavilion.
Save the date for final event in the series.
Friday, March 17 @ 2-4pm
Angela Johnson Meszaros, Managing Attorney at Earth Justice

Explore the L.A. Zoo with Family Nature Club
2023-02-25 09:00 - 10:30 | Griffith Park (below Old Zoo trail), 5400 Griffith Park Dr, Los Angeles, CA, 90027, United States
Family Nature Club is back! Join the Los Angeles Zoo for FREE nature play on the last Saturday of every month, from 9AM to 10:30AM.
Family Nature Club participants will spend the morning enjoying loosely structured outdoor play – exploring nature through art and building, observation and imagination. Families, caregivers, and children of all ages are welcome.
No registration is required. Family Nature Club is facilitated by L.A. Zoo Learning & Engagement staff.
WHERE
Off Griffith Park Drive, below the Old Los Angeles Zoo trail.
Click here for Google Maps location and directions.

Stepping Toward Sustainability
2023-02-26 18:30 - 20:30 | Online
Have you heard about the food-waste program that LA Sanitation & Environment (LASAN) just rolled out to households they serve?
Join the Los Angeles Neighborhood Council Sustainability Alliance to learn about the new food-waste program, and then for a conversation with Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky.
REGISTER HERE
James Roska, acting environmental engineer with LASAN, and Daniel Meyers, manager of the commercial franchise (RecycLA) division, will join to discuss. You can learn more about the program here.
Come with your thoughts and questions!
Newly-elected Councilmember Katy Young Yaroslavsky was recently appointed as chair of the Energy and Environment Committee as well as vice chair of the Olympics committee. In addition, she is a member of the Budget, Finance, and Innovation Committee, the Planning and Land Use Management Committee, and the Transportation Committee.
Join for a conversation with her about her goals!

Elizabeth DeLoughrey at the Counterforce Salon
2023-02-27 12:00 - 13:30 | Experimental Digital Arts, UCLA Broad Art Center, 240 Charles E. Young Dr. N, Los Angeles, CA, 90024, United States
Salon #5: Dr. Elizabeth DeLoughrey and Rebeca Méndez
This fifth and final lecture in the series will feature Prof. Rebeca Méndez, the Chair of the Department of Design Media Arts and director of the Counterforce Lab, in conversation with Dr. Elizabeth DeLoughrey, Professor in the English Department and the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability (IoES). As an artist, designer, and educator, Prof. Méndez delves into projects around the social and ecological impacts of the anthropocene. She has created artworks through fieldwork practice and collaborations that bridge across design, science, and humanities envisioning a just response to the entrenched causes of ecological crises for humans and the more-than-human world we share. Dr. DeLoughrey examines climate change and the anthropocene through environmental humanities. Her expansive work has bridged decoloniality, Indigenous perspectives, militarization, and globalization, with a focus on the Caribbean and Pacific Islands.
Their conversation will focus on how artistic, scientific, Indigenous, feminist, and environmental disciplinary lenses are employed to examine the diverse opportunities for interspecies friending beneath the sea surface. Dr. Méndez will be discussing her immersive 360º video art installation, The Sea Around Us which portrays the Eastern Pacific Ocean as a place of rich interspecies connection and interaction. The art installation intimately explores the long-lasting effects of DDT pollution on oceanic life, while forming an interdisciplinary bridge between science, art, and Indigenous cultures, in order to encourage viewers to face environmental wrongings, take restorative action, and establish relationships with other species based on equality and reciprocity. Dr. DeLoughrey will be discussing an Oceanic worldview across art and science called “tidalectics” – which she defines as a methodological tool which investigates the entanglement between sea and land, diaspora and indigeneity, and routes and roots – and the dynamics of our more-than-human watery planet. She stresses the important contribution of “tidalectics” in forming complex and dynamic stories about the relationship between land and sea in order to challenge dominant narratives about Indigenous and inter-species exploitation. Ultimately, Dr. Méndez and Dr. DeLoughrey will engage in a thoughtful conversation about humans’ relationships to watery environments in order to encourage relationships of reciprocity and respect with the ecologies, species, and cultures that are not only around us, but a part of us.
Links:
Dr. Elizabeth DeLoughrey: https://english.ucla.edu/people-faculty/elizabeth-deloughrey/
Professor Rebeca Méndez: https://rebecamendez.com/
https://Counterforcelab.org
Eyes in the Sky, Birds in the Heart and Mind is Counterforce Lab’s 2023 lecture series exploring interspecies friendships and entering into conversations across disciplines. we ask how technology, in combination with different knowledge systems and design, can provide an avenue to connect with and learn from the more-than-human. Drones, or, “eyes in the sky,” can enrich our empathetic connection to the natural world, if we think critically about how we use them.
Made possible with the generous support of a UCLA IDRE grant and UCLA, Design Media Arts Department

Beyond The Pail: A Virtual Organics Recycling Town Hall
2023-02-27 18:00 - 19:30 | Online
Join LA City Councilmember Nithya Raman on Monday, February 27th, from 6pm-7:30pm via Zoom for a virtual town hall. Learn more about the organics recycling process, and what the new requirements for food scraps and food-soiled paper are.
Hear from local climate organizations and experts from LA Sanitation and the California Climate Action Corps about helpful recycling tips, with the opportunity to answer your questions.
REGISTER HERE

Two Years of Justice40: How the Initiative is delivering solutions to the climate crisis
2023-02-28 10:00 - 11:00 | Online
President Biden has made addressing environmental injustices a priority by centering justice in his actions to address the climate crisis in the U.S. and abroad. A central pillar of the environmental justice agenda is the Justice40 Initiative, the first-ever federal environmental justice commitment attached to the goal of directing at least 40% of benefits to communities that have been disadvantaged, marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution.
The Justice40 initiative put a new spotlight on the historic inequities faced by frontline communities, the impact the climate crisis has on their future, and the opportunity to create a transformational clean energy economy that is inclusive of all Americans. The Initiative is being implemented using a “whole-of-government” approach that directs agencies to restructure how they operate, redesign their strategies, and be accountable for delivering on the administration’s goal. Currently, 16 agencies have announced hundreds of programs now covered under the Justice40 Initiative. The policy promises to address environmental justice through major legislation, including the Inflation Reduction Act, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
With billions of dollars in climate investment flowing to states and local communities, how well has the Initiative delivered on its environmental justice goals? What is the public understanding of and engagement with Justice40? How are federal agencies collaborating with state and local policymakers to ensure alignment with Justice40 goals in implementation? What are the benefits being delivered to communities and how are agencies calculating those benefits? And what role can local leaders, businesses and households play in advancing Justice40?
Join World Resources Institute on February 28, for a conversation with Matthew Tejada, Deputy Assistant Administrator for Environmental Justice at the Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights, and Carla Walker, Director, Environmental Justice and Equity at WRI United States. We’ll explore the above questions, discuss how the Justice40 Initiative is transforming the climate landscape and the environmental justice movement, discuss how benefits are reaching disadvantaged and historically marginalized communities, and explore what more can be done to fully realize an equitable clean energy economy for all. The conversation will be followed by a panel of experts working to ensure environmental justice at state and local levels and the non-profit sector.
REGISTER HERE
Featured Speaker:
Matthew Tejada, Deputy Assistant Administrator for Environmental Justice, Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights
Speakers
Julia Jeanty, Senior Policy Manager, Data for Progress
Colleen Callahan, Co-Executive Director, Luskin Center for Innovation at UCLA
Naadiya Hutchinson, Government Affairs Manager, WE ACT for Environmental Justice
Dan Lashof, Director, United States, World Resources Institute
Carla Walker, Director of Environmental Justice and Equity, United States, World Resources Institute (Moderator)

Vital Matters: Jainism and Ecology
2023-02-28 12:00 - 12:30 | Online
Drawing inspiration from the sacred landscapes depicted on devotional textiles presented in Visualizing Devotion: Jain Embroidered Shrine Hangings, Venu Mehta will discuss intersections of ascetic principles, spirituality and sociocentric environmentalism in the twenty-five-hundred-year-old tradition of Jainism. Highlighting nonviolence as the path to liberation, Jain principles offer an important worldview of environmental activism.
REGISTER HERE
This event is co-sponsored by the UCLA Center of India and South Asian Studies and the Center for the Study of Religion and generously supported by a grant from Lilly Endowment Inc.
Venu Mehta is Bhagwan Chandraprabhu Postdoctoral Fellow in Jain Studies and assistant professor of comparative religions at Claremont School of Theology. Her research focuses on the devotional practices, literature, and iconography of the Jaina goddess Padmāvatī, with special attention to vernacular and regional forms of devotion and goddesses in Jainism. Her areas of scholarship in Jain studies include Jain religious diaspora and sectarian negotiations in the USA; Jainism and ecology; Jain bhakti literature and practices in Gujarat; Jaina theory of Anekāntavāda; and the Jaina notion of forgiveness.
Vital Matters programs explore objects that arouse devotion, awe, or serenity; mediate relationships between human and spiritual realms; and are of vital importance to the cultural heritage of individuals and communities. This series accompanies the new digital educational initiative Vital Matters: Stories of Belief—a platform for sharing different perspectives on devotional works at the Fowler Museum.

GRID Talks: Going Beyond Black History with Jacqui Patterson
2023-02-28 12:30 - 13:30 | Online
GRID Talks is a new webinar series that brings together leaders from the environmental justice movement to discuss issues related clean energy access and to community-centered solutions. The webinars seek to amplify the voices of GRID’s communities and share the stories, experiences, and work that are creating mission impact and systemic changes.
Jacqueline Patterson, MSW, MPH, is the Founder and Executive Director of the Chisholm Legacy Project: A Resource Hub for Black Frontline Climate Justice Leadership. She has worked on gender justice, racial justice, economic justice, and environmental justice, with organizations including Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, IMA World Health, United for a Fair Economy, ActionAid, Health GAP, and the organization she co-founded, Women of Color United. Before founding the Chisholm Legacy Project, Patterson served for 11 years as the Senior Director of Environmental and Climate Justice at the NAACP. She serves on the Boards of Directors for the Institute of the Black World, the American Society of Adaptation Professionals, National Black Workers Center Project, Bill Anderson Fund and the Advisory Boards for the Center for Earth Ethics and the Hive Fund.
REGISTER HERE

Under the Redwoods: A Sempervirens Fund Webinar Series - "Mycology, Redwoods, and Eugenics | Dr. Patricia Ononiwu Kaishian"
2023-02-28 13:00 - 14:00 | Online
If you want to learn how mycology can inspire us to reconcile the troubling roots of the redwood conservation movement, join mycologist and Bard College visiting professor Dr. Patricia Ononiwu Kaishian, author of A Tangled Web and Underground Allies for February’s Under the Redwoods.
REGISTER HERE

Kanner Forum: "Race, Urban Heat, and the Aesthetics of Thermoception"
2023-02-28 16:00 - 17:30 | Kaplan Hall 193, 415 Portola Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
Join UCLA English for a talk featuring Hsuan Hsu, professor of English at UC Davis. Professor Hsu’s talk will consider temperature as an atmospheric medium of environmental violence and embodied sensation. Drawing on recent discussions of atmospheric racism, Professor Hsu will consider how a range of Black authors and artists have experimented with the sense of thermoception as an immersive sensory capacity that communicates thermal experience and potentialities in the urban heat island.
The talk will be followed by a Q & A moderated by Elizabeth DeLoughrey, professor in UCLA’s English Department and the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability.
This event is free and open to the public. A light reception will follow the event.
REGISTER HERE to attend.
Hsuan Hsu is a professor of English at UC Davis, where his research and teaching focus on American literature, ethnic studies, cultural geography, environmental humanities, and sensory studies. His books include The Smell of Risk: Environmental Disparities and Olfactory Aesthetics (2020) and Air Conditioning, forthcoming in Bloomsbury’s Object Lessons series.
Questions about the event?
Contact Marta Wallien, Programs and Media Manager
mwallien@english.ucla.edu

Martin Wachs Distinguished Lecture and Luskin Lecture with Robert Cervero on Accessibility, Social Equity, and Contemporary Policy Debates
2023-02-28 18:00 - 19:30 | California NanoSystems Institute, 570 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
Admission is free, but registration is required for each attendee. The number of seats is limited.
REGISTER HERE
Part of the Meyer and Renee Luskin Lecture Series.
Robert Cervero works in the area of sustainable transportation policy and planning. He has consulted on numerous transportation and urban planning projects worldwide, most recently advising long-range planning in Dubai and Singapore. His most recent book, Beyond Mobility, won the 2019 National Urban Design Best Book Award. Dr. Cervero was a member of Berkeley’s city and regional planning faculty from 1980 to 2016, where he twice served as Department Chair, was the inaugural holder of the Carmel P. Friesen Chair in Urban Studies, and directed both the University of California Transportation Center and the Institute of Urban and Regional Development. More recently he has held visiting faculty appointments at Tongji University in Shanghai and NYU-Abu Dhabi. During his doctoral studies in urban planning at UCLA, he worked under the supervision of his long-time mentor, Martin Wachs.
Check-in begins at 5:30pm with the discussion following at 6:00pm.
Public transportation: Big Blue Bus (Routes 2 and 17), Culver CityBus (Line 6), Metro
Ridehailing locations: Gateway Plaza, Luskin Conference Center
On-site parking available for $14 (Lot 2, Lot 8)
