Mobility Justice Advocates Convene to Build Coalitions

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On June 26th & 27th, more than 30 mobility justice advocates met in Sacramento for the first annual Mobility Justice Advocates Convening. The focus was to better position ourselves to influence state decisionmakers directly at the State Capitol. The convening brought those who have worked directly on the streets who are able to bring experiential knowledge to state-level policy development into the room and into the conversation

The event was a culmination of several years of organizing. It built off our Mobility Justice Labs which CalBike co-leads. In collaboration with People for Mobility Justice, PolicyLink, Public Advocates, and Cal Walks, these convening efforts are central to building powerful new alliances at multiple scales.

The event was a huge success! The participants shared the goal of establishing a mobility justice framework that we can organize around together and separately. A shared framework will solidify the coalition of grassroots mobility justice organizations across the state. This will facilitate a push for mobility justice legislation. The framework will give each group clear actions to target their respective legislators.

Participants gave voice to a variety of shared values that can form the basis for future mobility justice legislation. Some examples include: police brutality and decriminalizing mobility, thinking beyond physical infrastructure regarding ‘safe streets’, anti-displacement policies, intersectional organizing, and programs to increase awareness of active transportation benefits and encourage residents to use non-motorized modes.

To further strengthen CalBike’s mobility justice  policy work, we and our partners will continue to expand the Mobility Justice Labs. We will also develop regional convenings, develop statewide cyber-convenings and skillshares, and develop our Mobility Justice Policy Platform.

Mobility Justice Advocates Set Goals for the Future

CalBike believes alliances like this are the best way to put pressure on decision-makers at every level: state, regional, and local. These partnerships represent a new type of relationship-building that centers on base-building and leading with grassroots voices. The goal is to strengthen the statewide transportation and mobility justice movement, and the first Mobility Justice Advocates Convening showed that the power of the emerging coalition.

Building safe spaces to unite transportation, housing, environmental justice, and other advocates is crucial to bringing about change. Going forward, we plan to share actionable intelligence, monitor state actions, and organize responses to new threats and opportunities, as a coalition.  We hope to eventually shift the narrative on mobility from one focused on vehicles to one that centers on people and justice in our most marginalized communities.

The goals for the Convening were as follows:

  1. Make grassroots advocates the leads in defining and implementing mobility justice (MJ) at the state level.
  2. Build solidarity network of MJ advocates in California.
  3. Connect with state-level elected officials and government officials who wield power in decision making around transportation, infrastructure, etc. in California.
  4. Identify shared values and policy change goals among MJ advocates.
  5. Plan a future convening to accommodate more participants.

We look forward to co-leading a second annual Convening in 2020. Thank you to all the co-organizers and attendees for making the first Mobility Justice Advocacy Day a success.

Stay tuned for more!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Transportation and Housing Groups Demand Equitable and Interconnected Funding

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California’s housing crisis is in the news a lot. But California has another crisis that gets much less coverage than it deserves: the disconnect between transportation funding equity and housing production. We need infill housing near transportation hubs. And we also need transportation that better serves the low-income communities that rely on it the most. We need both to be connected. As the state moves to link funds for transportation to housing performance, California needs to address both silos and ensure that equitable and integrated funding is available to the communities that need it the most.

CalBike has joined with a coalition of NGOs that work on housing and transportation issues to send a letter to Governor Newsom about his housing and transportation proposal. The letter outlines principles for equitable funding for our state’s transportation and housing justice goals, and addresses the ways the two sectors are linked.

The letter highlights the principle that our housing goals should not be defined by production numbers alone; California housing goals must also align with the state’s goals for climate, health, and equity. We must address our need for more housing in tandem with our sustainable and equitable transportation goals.

Principles for Housing and Transportation Funding Equity

The principles laid out in the letter to address how to use transportation funding to further housing goals include:

  • Prioritize the needs of low income households
  • Build new housing near existing jobs, transit, or other infrastructure in both rural and urban areas.​
  • Couple infill investments with inclusionary and anti-displacement protections.
  • Tailor strategies to meet the unique needs of different geographies, including rural communities.
  • Do not condition transit and active transportation dollars.​

CalBike is committed to the fight for transportation justice and housing justice. We will continue to work with our coalition partners, including ClimatePlan, NRDC, California Walks, Western Center on Law and Poverty, Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability, and the Safe Routes Partnership, to bring funding equity to the connected issues of transportation and housing for all Californians.

In the coming months, we will work together, as a coalition, to hold discussions with Gov. Newsom’s key leadership on this crucial issue.

Read the full guiding principles for transportation funding equity connected to housing.

Now Accepting Proposals for 2019 California Bicycle Summit

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Have your voice heard! Submit a proposal to share your knowledge and insights with your California allies at the 2019 California Bicycle Summit! Proposals must be submitted by May 1. Your proposal doesn’t have to be complete but we want your ideas!

This year’s theme is about the intersections in our work: the physical intersections in our communities that should be safe places to traverse and converse instead of the hazardous injury hotspots they too often are; and the theoretical intersections that define how we each approach bicycling via other issues, such as land use and housing, other forms of mobility, how race and class have impacted and continue to impact transportation justice, and the urgency of climate change. We will address all these kinds of intersections in plenary sessions, workshops, bike rides, walking tours, parties, mixers, and community activities. This will be a very inclusive event, with about 200 free and deeply discounted tickets, and a steering committee dedicated to recruiting participation from across California’s diverse communities.

Los Angeles Announced as 2019 California Bicycle Summit Location; Request for Proposals, Early Bird Tickets Now Open

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Although it’s only April, it’s already clear that conversations around bikes and biking are more connected than ever to intersecting issues like transportation justice, climate change, bicycle infrastructure, shared mobility, and the connections between transportation policy and California’s housing crisis, and continue to shape policy, activism, and innovation. As the California Bicycle Coalition celebrates our 25th year, we couldn’t be more excited to bring activists, educators, advocates, elected officials, and industry leaders together to talk about these intersections for 3 days and nights of workshops, rides, plenaries, and more at the 2019 California Bicycle Summit in Los Angeles.

Early-bird ticket sales are now open, and the deadline to apply for the steep discounts we’re working with our sponsors to offer is Friday, May 31st-just around the corner! CalBike wants everyone to be able to come to the 2019 California Bicycle Summit; we’ve set aside the largest number of tickets and transportation and housing stipends ever, and we’re committed to financing as many applications as we can. Apply for a scholarship here.
Our steering committee is developing an amazing set of speakers, but our advocate, organizer, academic, and industry friends and their breadth of perspective and expertise are what makes the California Bicycle Summit the state’s biggest and most engaging ‘bikes and beyond’ event; our Request for Proposals for workshops, rides, demonstrations, or presentations is open, and we can’t wait to hear from you; submit proposals here or reach out to Communications or Info for more details. We need help spreading the word! If you know an individual, organization, coalition, or leader with a great project, tool, story, or innovative idea California needs to know about, please share our Request for Proposals page to help make this year’s summit the best ever.

Envisioning the Future of Transportation Advocacy; Mobility Justice Lab Series

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Almost a year after the first BIPOC Mobility Justice Lab in Los Angeles, CalBike co-organized a second gathering in January of stakeholders, advocates, and representatives of a broad group of Los Angeles-area community organizations to provide the opportunity and space for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color to collaborate on local and state transportation and mobility justice issues. This time led by People for Mobility Justice, the convening  focused on relationship-building, power-building trainings and exercises, and strategizing around statewide and Los Angeles specific policy and programming possibilities: thinking beyond policing, disability justice, and government fiduciary responsibility.

The ongoing BIPOC Lab events implement two important and related parts of our strategic plan: prioritizing marginalized communities in transportation spending and policy decisions, and strengthening the power of the transportation justice movement. Ultimately, our success in Sacramento—to advocate for equitable, inclusive, and prosperous communities in which safe and healthy biking can be a key element—is dependent on the influence and power of local organizations and movements that can apply pressure from below to hold our state decision makers accountable. It was clear this time around local organizations, advocates, and activists have continued their work and built on their experiences at our last meeting and are considerably more prepared to tackle mobility injustices, at both the state-level and in the ongoing local struggles that are not just unique to Los Angeles but also align with many local struggles across the state.

What sets these BIPOC labs apart from other transportation advocacy convenings are the laboratories’ hyper focus on the way that forms of race, gender, and sexual exclusions are embedded features of our statewide mobility systems. The framework for these discussions and strategy sessions is rooted in both historical and present manifestations of colonialism and white supremacy that highlights particular forms of Indigenous and Black dispossession of land and resources. This bold frame opens up new opportunities to engage with and center government policy for historically discriminated groups while directly integrating the lived experiences of our state’s most marginalized residents.

We look forward to these transformative strategic meetings, ongoing and stronger partnerships, and substantive action in the months ahead!

Lead the Way, California: A Transportation Platform to Lead Us Forward

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California has new leaders, and our communities deserve plans, principles, and priorities that will move our state forward instead of holding us back. To help support Governor-elect Newsom and his administration in truly leading the nation and the world in sustainable and equitable transportation policy, CalBike joins almost 50 organizations in releasing our comprehensive platform.

This transportation platform offers concrete proposals for the next governor to act to meet our ambitious state climate, air quality, housing, health, and equity goals. The platform takes an ‘intersectional’ approach that attempts to break down the usual operation of our state silos in meeting goals. CalBike is leading the way ensuring governmental action is carried out in more coordinated ways that challenge the true structural obstacles that cannot be solved piecemeal ways.

The platform lays out concrete steps in five priority policy areas:

 

Six Things to Prepare for a Bike-Friendly 2018, #5: Harness the Power of the Ballot

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Every single U.S. Congressional Representative, every single California State Assemblymember, and one half of the California State Senate face re-election this November. Some of them craft policies that help protect you and your family when you choose to get on a bike to ride around your community—and some of them support and are well financed by the same corporate interests invested in maintaining California’s dependency on automobiles and fossil fuels.

Make 2018 the year we build a bike-friendly Congress and State Legislature.

Your support is needed now. CalBike is preparing dynamic campaigns to influence elections in strategically targeted districts. We use our statewide reach to amplify the work of our local partners and build the movement in the most effective way we can; by electing champions of safe streets, and refusing to give a free pass to leaders responsible for unsustainable, unsafe, and inequitable transportation policies.

Now is the time to chip in $10, $20, or any amount monthly to make sure that our elected officials respect our demand for communities where bicycling is safe and can easily be a part of our healthy and joyful lives!

We are one of the few bike advocacy groups with the ability to influence elections. Please do your part to elect friends and allies to important seats.

Follow CalBike for endorsements and updates on key legislation—and don’t forget to vote.

Six Things to Prepare for a Bike-Friendly 2018, #4: Show Your Local Advocacy Organization Some Love.

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Most of the decisions about whether your street is going to be safe for biking are made at the local level, by city councils or County Boards or regional agencies. They are fights over real estate on the street. State policy matters—we work hard for policies that make it easier for locals to win those street fights—but the fights are local. So join your local advocacy organization today. If you don’t know who they are, check out our list of local partners.

Local advocates had some great wins in 2017. Two highlights include California’s entry in the People for Bikes list of the best new bikeways in the U.S.: Bancroft Way. It’s a short stretch, but a hard-won and beautifully built protected bikeway filling a dangerous gap in Berkeley’s bike network. Congratulations Bike East Bay on this win brought about by your passionate advocacy. And cheers to Sacramento Area Bike Advocates for convincing Caltrans to completely rebuild the Arden Way/Capitol City Freeway providing a new, direct connection between the nearest Light Rail transit stop in the underserved neighborhood of North Sacramento and the major retail job centers along Arden Way on the other side of the freeway.

Plus, it’s time to welcome three new executives to the helms of local advocacy organizations: Erik Jansen took over at the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition; Joey Juhasz-Lukomski heads Bike Ventura; and the one and only Marven Norman takes an executive policy role at the Inland Empire Biking Alliance.

Six Things to Prepare for a Bike-Friendly 2018, #2: Be a Volunteer Activist

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Changing the world takes action on all levels. We need the professional, focused advocacy that CalBike delivers—and we also need volunteer effort, and lots of it. In fact, CalBike at its best works to coordinate and amplify the passion and energy of thousands of volunteer activists for transportation justice, without whom we simply could not win.

Take Walt Seifert, for example. He decided he wanted to see California follow Idaho and Delaware in enacting the common sense reform of stop sign laws so that people on bikes have to yield but don’t have to come to a complete stop if nobody else is present at the intersection. He single-handedly secured the endorsement of more than 37 important organizations and the support of key legislators, making the impossible seem possible. We didn’t win this year but he laid a strong foundation for another try.

Now take yourself, for example. Don’t doubt that you can make a difference.

If you’re like Walt and like the political game, lobby your local legislator. To help budding and experienced transportation advocates from across the state get engaged, we’re coordinating Bike Advocacy Week to connect our members with their local Assemblymember or Senator during the Spring Recess when they are in their district. Join today so you can be sure not to miss that action.  

If you’re more of a direct action type of person, consider this: build your own infrastructure. There’s no better example of DIY traffic safety work in California than the innovative “guerrilla urban planning” projects launched by the San Francisco Municipal Transformation Agency. From human-protected bike lanes to self-installed vertical posts, the SFMTrA has been making safety improvements in record speed for low costs since 2016.

Across our state, volunteers from all walks of life are getting engaged in local politics, learning, organizing their communities, and hitting the streets. Their work is our work—and we can’t wait to see what the passionate and dedicated volunteers that make up the foundation of the movement will create in 2018.

 

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