8/27/20

Get out your reusable shopping bags again!

It was 10 days before a state of emergency was declared by Governor Baker. A small band of members of Quincy Climate Action Network were spending our Sunday at a Stop and Shop, handing out reusable bags QCAN had purchased to raise awareness of the new prohibition on single-use plastic shopping bags. Despite awareness campaigns by the city and QCAN, many people walking into the store that day were surprised that the single-use bags they were accustomed to getting were now banned by a new city ordinance. What we members of QCAN could not have known on that day was how short-lived the new policy would be. Within two weeks, we’d all be educated on social distancing, PPE, essential workers, and eventually mask-folding techniques. Continue reading →

August 24, 2020

At 7 p.m. on Tuesday September 15, 2020, Quincy Climate Action Network and the Thomas Crane Public Library will cosponsor an online lecture by Ron Judkoff, who recently retired as chief architectural engineer of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), a US Department of Energy facility.

The lecture is free, and all are invited to watch and listen via the library’s Facebook page; on its YouTube channel; or via the Zoom meeting platform. The Zoom meeting ID is 873-8149-9949, and you can access the audio over the phone by dialing 646 558.8656. Continue reading →

For those who didn’t get a chance to Zoom in to QCAN’s first online lecture, cohosted with the Quincy library, here’s the video. The topic is the Exxon Valdez oil spill and the politics of climate change, and the lecturer is Prof. Zyg Plater of the Boston College Law School, who headed up the state of Alaska’s probe into the causes of the disaster.

08/13/2020

Environmental degradation, including the effects of climate change, disproportionately harms disadvantaged communities, especially communities of color. QCAN is committed to fighting for these communities’ right to a safe and healthy environment and to making our organization as inclusive as possible.

Quincy has two environmental justice communities: Germantown and Quincy Point. QCAN supports action, including state legislation, that empowers these communities and gives them a voice in local environmental decisions. We also stand with Fore River Residents Against the Compressor Station and the City of Quincy in defending our EJ communities against the harm posed by the Weymouth compressor station.

July 2020

At 7 p.m. on Tuesday August 11, Quincy Climate Action Network and the Thomas Crane Public Library will cosponsor an online lecture by environmental lawyer and Boston College Law School professor Zygmunt J.B. Plater. Plater will recount his experiences as chairman of the State of Alaska Oil Spill Commission’s Legal Research Task Force, which investigated the Exxon Valdez disaster of 1989. He will also discuss what the findings of the task force can teach us about the politics of climate change.
Continue reading →

Join Quincy CAN and sponsoring partners for a virtual Eighth Congressional District Candidate Town Hall on the Environment, featuring Representative Stephen Lynch and his challenger Dr. Robbie Goldstein.

The Town Hall will take place on July 21 at 11:30 am and will allow you to learn directly from the candidates how they will address the pressing issues facing our communities.

Candidates will discuss their views on issues that relate to our land conservation, equity, climate change, sustainable transportation, and more. The issues that affect you, your community, and the natural places you care about, need strong leadership at the federal level. Attend this one-hour session to better understand the candidates’ positions so that you can make an informed decision for this important election.

You will have the opportunity to submit questions when you register, as well as during the live, virtual event.

Please register today!

June 24, 2020

Environmental lawyer and Boston College Law School professor Zygmunt Plater recently remarked that government and individual responses to the coronavirus pandemic show that actions “that may have seemed radical in the very recent past now seem necessary for societal survivability.” In that way, Plater said, the pandemic and our responses to it should give us a new way to look at the actions we need to take against climate change.

Quincy Climate Action Network agrees with Plater that both crises require novel and multipronged responses, and yet the actions required to fight climate change, while numerous and varied, aren’t nearly as radical as what societies have done in the last few months. Compared to closing down economies or staying shut up in our houses, climate solutions are generally painless. Continue reading →