Local climate and environmental orgs receive EPA grant
EcoAction Partners and Sheep Mountain Alliance will see $150,000 in funding for regional initiatives
By Sophie Stuber, Planet contributor
Local environmental organizations EcoAction Partners (EAP) and Sheep Mountain Alliance (SMA) were recently awarded a grant from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to implement regional environmental justice initiatives. This collaboration with the EPA — under the organization’s Environmental Justice Collaborative Problem Solving (EJCPS) grants — will give SMA and EAP $150,000 over the next three years, starting in the spring of 2024, to address environmental and public health concerns in San Miguel and Montrose counties.
Under the Inflation Reduction Act, the EPA selected 98 EJPS awardees that received $43.8 million total in funding for community-based nonprofit organizations. Of these grants, 23 are in rural areas, such as San Miguel and Montrose counties, and 60 will address climate change, disaster resiliency or emergency preparedness.
With the funding, the two organizations in Telluride aim to offer stronger educational programming and community outreach.
“There are a lot of resources available, but there might not be a lot of access to them publicly, or a lot of knowledge about them. So our main goal is connecting those dots between what's already available and how people can access those resources,” Ruthie Boyd, Sheep Mountain Alliance program coordinator, told the Daily Planet.
“With a focus on environmental justice, this grant will enable us to collaborate more effectively as community partners. It will focus on connecting our entire community, especially those disproportionately impacted by climate change, with existing and new projects,” she added.
EAP and SMA are also partnering with the Telluride Foundation and Collaborative Action For Immigrants (CAFI) to design outreach initiatives in the immigrant community, including offering bilingual workshops, bilingual educational materials and growing community engagement.
“Ultimately, one of our main goals is to create bilingual resources to share with people,” Boyd said.
Sheep Mountain Alliance, founded in 2008, works with locals, organizations, landowners and public land managers on public lands issues, ecosystem conservation, wildlife habitat protection and community advocacy in southwest Colorado.
EcoAction Partners, created in 2007, is the central sustainability solution for governments and communities in San Miguel, Ouray, San Juan and the west end of Montrose counties. The organization is developing emission reduction strategies in the region and increasing resilience and economic and social viability.
“This partnership brings a lot to the grant because we do have different areas of focus, so by partnering, we can incorporate all of our projects,” Boyd said.
The funding from the grant will help with outreach for the Colorado Affordable Residential Energy (CARE) Program, which offers income-qualified weatherization and energy efficiency programs that EcoAction Partners oversees locally.
“This is a big focus because it is serving our underserved communities, and we want folks to know that these programs are available and exist,” Emma Gerona, EcoAction Partners executive director, told the Planet.
Locally, the initiative will focus on wildfire and drought preparedness, energy, recreation and advocacy, helping increase access to educational programs for underserved populations and better public health and climate and environmental resiliency.
“We’re hoping to host several workshops on wildfire and drought,” Gerona said. “The idea is to reduce barriers to our outdoor and climate programming.”
The new grant will also improve access to ongoing programs, including SMA’s bilingual outdoor equity programming. The initiative offers hikes, ski days, ice climbing and other outdoor activities.
The first event will be a wildfire resiliency workshop on June 26 at 5:30 p.m. at the Norwood library. The following day, on June 27, there will be a coffee and climate conversation at the Telluride library at 8:30 p.m. The event will focus on engaging in public outreach and teach people how to write public comments.
Read the article here.