Catherine Coleman Flowers appointed to ‘Unity’ Task Force on Climate Change
Moved by a visit to Lowndes County, Alabama, Bernie Sanders has appointed Catherine Coleman Flowers, Founder of the Center for Rural Enterprise and Environmental Justice (CREEJ) and CEE Fellow on Environmental Justice and Civic Engagement to the ‘Unity’ Task Force on Climate Change. Flowers has been shining a spotlight for years on conditions of abject poverty in southern states where neglect of poor people, largely communities of color, has led to a sanitation nightmare and the return of diseases long thought eradicated from the United States. She will serve alongside task force members selected by both Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders to inform policy making discussions in preparation for the 2020 presidential election in November.
In addition to her work through CREEJ and at the Center for Earth Ethics, Catherine serves as the Rural Development Manager for the Equal Justice Initiative. Her first book, WASTE: One Woman’s Fight Against America’s Dirty Secret will also be available in November.
Read a full list of Climate Task Force appointees below.
Read a summary of all the task force news at Vox.
Biden’s appointees:
- Former Secretary of State John Kerry, task force co-chair
- Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL), chair of the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis
- Kerry Duggan, former deputy director for policy to Vice President Biden
- Former EPA administrator Gina McCarthy
- Rep. Donald McEachin (D-VA), member of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and co-founder of the United for Climate and Environmental Justice Congressional Task Force
Sanders’s appointees:
- Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), task force co-chair and co-author of the Green New Deal resolution
- Varshini Prakash, co-founder of youth activist group Sunrise Movement
- Catherine Flowers, founder of the Center for Rural Enterprise and Environmental Justice