Mamdani’s team is making moves 🌇, with NYC’s Chief Climate Officer Louise Yeung

In honor of NYC Climate Week, we’re diving into the climate initiatives happening right here in this city. There is so much going on.

Our guest is Louise Yeung, New York City’s Chief Climate Officer.

We interviewed Louise to give you a real sense of what we actually get when we elect someone who is committed to climate justice. Spoiler: We get a lot of good stuff!

We covered everything from battery-powered food carts, to heat pumps in public housing, to BRT (bus rapid transit, we love it), to social cohesion as a resilience strategy.

We also touched on the fact that Mayor Mamdani, despite being informed and committed, doesn’t really talk about climate very much, and asked Louise if she could help change that.🤞🏽

Louise’s Hot Take 🥵🌎 — Policy-making is an act of love.

We hope this will help motivate you to go all-in for these last six weeks until Election Day.

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Mentioned in this Episode

* NYC Mayor’s Office of Climate and Environmental Justice

* NYC Gov Press Release: Plan to Lower Subway Platform Temperatures and Harness Thermal Energy in Lower Manhattan

* Mayor Mamdani Announces New York City’s First Bus Shelter With a Cooling Green Roof in Brownsville

* During Superstorm Sandy, although 85% of the wetlands in New York and New Jersey had already been destroyed by development, what little ­remained prevented $625 million of damage.

* Heat stress is the leading cause of weather-related deaths–killing more people than hurricanes, tornadoes and floods combined.

* NY plug-in solar bill aka the SUNNY Act

* NYC Launches Food Vendor Cart Electrification Pilot in Queens

* Investing in resilience before a disaster hits can save $6 to $13 on response and recovery.

* Urban Ocean Lab + NYC Comptroller Office’s policy memo: Social Cohesion as a Climate Strategy: Reflections on Superstorm Sandy

* UOL‘s current work: Leveraging Public Procurement for Climate Action

* One thing inspiring Louise — Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals, by Alexis Pauline Gumbs_____

Phone banking ☎️ w/ Environmental Voter Project

We’re growing! In week 2 of our phone banking 52 callers made 19,709 dials, and had a whopping 587 conversations with people who were otherwise unlikely to vote. GO TEAM!

If you don’t know what to do with your election/democracy anxiety, join us! Every Wednesday at 12p ET until Election Day. All the cool kids are doing it. 😎 — Sign up: environmentalvoter.org/AEJ

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Enjoying the show? Share it around, spread the word! And review 🌟 and follow What If We Get It Right? podcast platform — that helps more people find us and these timely conversations.

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Credits: This episode was produced by Remoy Philip and me (Ayana), with support from Jenisha Shrestha. Original music by Emma Munger. Graphic design by Holly Griffin of Design Hungry, and social media support from Feeling Seen Studio.

And thank you for listening. 💛

Get full access to WHAT IF WE GET IT RIGHT? at ayanaelizabeth.substack.com/subscribe