Diversity and Environmentalists
Environmental Elitism
Environmental organizations' lack of diversity is the main reason they support unfair and discriminatory environmental regulations and policies. The Sierra Club and NRDC have a history of putting spotted owls' welfare before brown babies. Their lack of opposition to the many prisons built over the past decade is the best testament of that.
The war on climate change is a righteous one but it should be fought in a way that equitably balances the needs of people and the cost to improve the environment. It should not be fought in a way that is blind to the impact on people. This is especially true when climate policy falls regressively on the lower classes. Indeed, legislators have required that the economic costs on Californians are to be clearly identified. However, the way this war is currently pursued makes communities of color collateral damage and lacks creativity in distributing the pain fairly across social classes.
The 200 have filed a discrimination lawsuit against the California Air Resources Board (CARB) – the new scoping plan by CARB is so Trumpian. It raises the cost of badly needed new houses by $40,000 (CARB's estimate) so they will achieve a "net zero" energy use. How many folks will that price out of the market verses the improvement in air quality?
CARB's plan includes developing a per person pollution quota that requires local government to enforce. This plan also includes a vehicle per miles travel quota which would disproportionately affect low-income families who must commute from lower cost communities to feed their families. Would CARB propose such policies if it had more diversity of thought in upper management?
Environmental Groups Get Poor Marks for Diversity Efforts
By Jullian Wyllie – January 10, 2019
Diversity at many large environmental organizations has stagnated or worsened in the past year,though a few have shown progress, according to two new reports.
The figures come from Green 2.0, an independent advocacy campaign, in its second annual"Transparency Report Card" on the leaders, boards, and stafs of environmental nonprofits andfoundations. The report is based on self-reported data to GuideStar as of April 1, 2018.
Whitney Tome, executive director of Green 2.0, said the updated report card shows that not muchhas changed from its first report released in 2017. The "green ceiling" has prevented nonprofitsand foundations from advancing their missions, she says.
Diversity at Nonprofits
The percentage of women working full-time at environmental nonprofits increased from 59percent to 64 percent year-over-year from 2017. The senior staf is evenly divided between menand women, and there were 3 percent more women on boards in 2018.
Over all, racial diversity declined among full-time staf, decreased slightly among boardmembers, and grew from 14 percent to 21 percent among senior staff.
Tome said some of the larger nonprofits "refuse" to disclose data about their diversity. She listedPew Charitable Trusts and Oceana as examples in a conference call to media.
Other nonprofits that did not disclose any data for the report this year, according to Green 2.0,include Conservation International and Root Capital, though Root Capital disputes that. Others did not disclose numbers for specific categories, like staff or leadership.
Representatives from Oceana did not provide a response to the data in time for this article.
A spokeswoman for Pew Charitable Trusts said, "Pew is a public charity working on a number of issues including the environment, health, consumer finance, fiscal and economic policy, and state policy. We are also active in funding programs that help the most vulnerable and improve civic life in Philadelphia, and we conduct research about the issues, attitudes, and trends shaping America and the world. We do not consider ourselves an environmental organization. We are committed to creating a workplace that provides equal employment opportunity, values diversity, and fosters inclusion."
A spokeswoman for Conservation International said the organization "has a strong commitment to diversity, and our numbers reflect that." Further, she said, "across the globe, 90 percent of staff in our country programs are led by local nationals that represent the various communities, ethnicities, and cultures of the nearly 30 countries that we operate in. Unfortunately, due to an oversight, we missed the chance to share those numbers in time for this report's release. We are working to correct that by submitting data to Green 2.0 as soon as possible and look forward to participating in future reports."
In a statement, Kristin Williams, a communications manager for Root Capital, said the nonprofit has more than 100 staff members in the United States, Costa Rica, Kenya, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru, and Senegal."As such, most of our team members are from the diverse countries where we work, representing many different communities. That diversity is at the heart of our ability to transform lives in rural areas. While we were not previously aware of the Green 2.0 initiative or asked to provide demographic data for this report, we're proud to showcase our entire global staff, including senior leadership, on our website. We invite everyone to come meet our team and see for themselves."
Robert Raben, president and founder of the Raben Group and Green 2.0, said diversity at some organizations is "pretty lousy." He also said it can set a bad example when leaders don't report their data.
"This is a solvable problem. In the 21st century, we don't have a supply problem, we have a demand problem," Raben said. "There's a tremendous pool of talented people of color who can handle leadership at the board level and the C-suite."
He added, "It is inconceivable to me that some key environmental organizations refuse to talk about the subject, and by talk about the subject in this case I mean report their data." He later said Pew Charitable Trusts and Oceana are among "the incredibly bad actors."
Tome said it will be necessary to apply public pressure on organizations that have skirted efforts to avoid self-reporting on their diversity numbers.
"It is clear that some have been slow to understand why it's important to highlight the diversitywithin their organizations," she said. "Some are continuing to refuse outright."
Foundations See Declines
Full-time staffs at foundations are still largely female, at 69 percent. Women senior staff account for 60 percent at foundations, although boards have slightly more men. As for race, the report showed big decreases in diversity among full-time staff, senior staff, and board members from 2017.
One foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, disputes the findings. A spokesman said the organi-zation publishes staff and board diversity annually on its website — which Green 2.0 did not cite — "in the interests of transparency and to hold ourselves accountable." Further, the spokesman said, "For us, diversity includes but is not limited to age, disability status, economic circumstance, ethnicity, gender, race, religion, and sexualorientation."
Some of the top foundations did not disclose some of their data.
"Foundations specifically exist to infuse resources, to cultivate innovation and action where government and perhaps culture even lag," Tome said. Those that do not take equity and inclusion seriously shouldn't be trying to drive innovation among grantees," she added.
Some foundations have taken steps to do better, Tome noted.
In the conference call, Nellis Kennedy-Howard, director of equity, inclusion, and justice for the Sierra Club, spoke about her experience identifying as a queer woman of color and said she has seen Sierra Club's slight improvements over time.
The Sierra Club increased its racial diversity among senior staff. But the data shows there is room for improvement among full-time staff. Also, the racial diversity on boards decreased from 33 percent to 14 percent.
"We have a majority female-identified executive team and a majority female-identified board executive committee. That being said, people of color like myself remain minorities on both of these bodies," Kennedy-Howard said. "The reality is that we do not reflect the demographics of the communities where we live, work, and love."
One way to increase diversity, the nonprofit has said, is to alter its marketing practices. The Sierra Club recently launched a new effort to attract more Latinos to programs by featuring them in its marketing material. In the past, stock photos on its website were considered inauthentic and lacked the personal touch needed to persuade Latinos that they were welcome.
In another case, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation has increased racial diversity among boards and staff. (The Hewlett Foundation is a financial supporter of the Chronicle ofPhilanthropy.)
Larry Kramer, president of the foundation, said in the conference call that it is important for a foundation to collect information on itself to understand its implicit biases against grantees and workers.
"We're never going to build the kind of political coalition that we need to really move the country forward unless we have fully engaged all of the audiences of color," Kramer said.
Notes: This article has been updated to clarify that Root Capital says it did not receive a request for data for the report. Green 2.0 stands by its statement that it made the request but received no data.
It has also been updated to include a comment from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthurFoundation. Although it was not named in the original piece, the foundation disputes the data in the Green 2.0 report.