FRSS 2024: Climate Resilience and Environmental Justice
On March 7, 2024, Level hosted its annual Facing Resistance Speaker Series (FRSS) event. FRSS offers a diverse platform for legal professionals to confront challenging topics and questions while discussing how we can collectively create a justice system that is responsive, balanced, and fair. This year marked Level’s very first FRSS event in Vancouver, BC.
FRSS focuses on a different legal topic each year, with this year tackling the subject of Climate Resilience and Environmental Justice. This event coincided with Level Justice launching its much awaited Environmental Justice Program, a unique justice education program that teaches youth to advance environmental justice in their communities. This program is especially pertinent as climate change will disproportionately harm youth that are impacted most by racism, poverty, disability, colonialism, homelessness, sex and gender discrimination, and lack of access to health care. To address this, environmental justice ensures representation, inclusion, and protection of the rights of those most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. However, the legal frameworks surrounding environmental justice are still tenuous at best. This FRSS event was dedicated to discussing the current legal landscape of environmental justice and what the legal sector as well as the general public can do to advocate on this issue.
The speakers for the event featured legal and non-legal experts leading the fight for climate justice in the Vancouver region. The panel included Tracy London, the Executive Director of Ecojustice, Canada’s largest environmental law charity; Navdeep Chhina, the Director of Campaigns & Inclusion at HUB Cycling and part of the City of Vancouver's Climate Equity Working Group that created the Climate Justice Charter; as well as Leslie Anne St. Amour, the Campaigns Director at RAVEN, a registered charity with a mission to support Indigenous Peoples in defending their legal rights within a thriving natural habitat.
The evening started with an opening by introductory speaker, Chief Chepximiya Siyam’ Janice George, an accomplished weaver and teacher from the Squamish Nation. She, along with her fellow weaver and teacher, Skwetsimeltxw Willard “Buddy” Joseph, co-founded L’hen Awtxw Weaving House to share the teachings and practice of traditional Coast Salish wool weaving. Chief Janice opened the ceremony, sharing insight into Indigenous Peoples of Canada and their close ties to the natural and spiritual habitat that composes the land on which we reside.
The evening included discussions of different challenges currently facing the legal community in advocating for Climate Resilience and Environmental Justice. This included addressing the current legal frameworks around environmental justice, the barriers to justice for Indigenous Peoples fighting to protect their traditional homelands, utilizing grassroots activism versus legal advocacy, environmental racism and sacrifice zones, the role of the legal sector in this movement, and much more. It was a productive and engaging evening filled with important conversations, forging connections, and future planning.
Level Justice is honored to be welcomed into the Vancouver environmental community with such acceptance. We are especially grateful for the environmental community across Canada that attended the event, either virtually or in-person, to learn more about this fundamental issue. We hope to keep the momentum going through our Environmental Justice Program. For more information on the program or how you can get involved, please email our Environmental Justice Program Manager, Deniz Yilmaz.
