Good things are happening! In Los Angeles, grassroots organizers made history by banning projects that have long harmed the health of millions of residents. Also, from Puerto Rico to southern New Mexico, environmental activists are making strides to change the legal battlefield against the fossil fuel industry. Meanwhile in Maine, consumers are taking energy justice into their own hands by putting a bold new measure on the 2023 ballot.
Read about all these historic victories in this week’s edition of You Love To See It below, a weekly feature reviewing good news and progress for Lever supporting subscribers.
Rock the boat.
LA Bans Oil And Gas Drilling
In a historic win for Los Angelenos on the front lines of environmental racism, the LA City Council voted 12-0 last Friday to ban new oil wells immediately and phase out existing ones within 20 years.
Los Angeles sits on the single largest urban oil field in the country, with nearly 4 million of its residents living within a quarter mile of an active or idle oil or gas well. Drilling infrastructure is predominantly located in low-income communities and Black and Latinx neighborhoods. For years, grassroots groups have organized for health protections in response to disproportionate exposure to drilling-released carcinogens and pollutants linked to respiratory disease, cancer, and other health conditions.
“The future of LA will be free from fossil fuel extraction,” Stand Together Against Neighborhood Drilling — LA, a coalition of community groups that spearheaded the law, said in a statement. “Black, Latinx, and other communities of color currently living near polluting oil wells and derricks in South LA and Wilmington will eventually breathe easier.”
