What's Happening Now?

Twin Cities, Minnesota

Engaging Community and Confronting Environmental Injustice

1796: Saint Anthony Falls, depicted by Jonathan Carver before the milling industry’s rise; the Falls remain sacred space for Dakota people. Courtesy of John Carter Brown Library.

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  1. Twin Cities, Minnesota
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    2088 Larpenteur Ave W, St Paul, MN

The Problem

Minnesota has some of the worst racial disparities in the nation and a history of Indigenous dispossession and disempowerment. Industrial capitalism is a slow violence aimed at vulnerable populations. We focused on how to center community voices in forming more equitable and accountable policy.

The Roots

Disinvestment in communities of color and the impact of industrialization build on the structure of settler colonialism, which aspires to eliminate Indigenous peoples and their rights. The rise of a milling industry on Indigenous sacred space, white flight, and practices such as redlining created landscapes of inequality that manifest in exclusionary redevelopment schemes.

The Solutions

All people deserve to have their demands for equity heard and acted upon. Governments and institutions must take responsibility for restitution by engaging with communities to rectify past actions. Truth telling and preserving land for future generations must replace the neglect of marginalized people’s experience.

Drowning Our History: Minneapolis’ Water Yard Agenda. Courtesy of Avian Ciganko-Ford and Samantha Ly.
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2011 Tornado: Environmental Racism in the Aftermath of Natural Disaster. Courtesy of Samuel Henneberg, Noriko Kikuchi, and Kate Rogers.
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Ford’s Fate: Community Confronts Capitalism. Courtesy of Elsa Ballata, Gabrielle Gauthier, and Amber Januszewski.
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The Rights of Manoomin. Courtesy of Paige Mitchell and Chris Rico.
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Harboring Equity: The Upper Harbor Terminal. Courtesy of Myra Billund-Phibbs, Grace Rude, Shea Swenson, and Jacob Youngblood.
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Owamni-Yomi: What is Environmentally Just Restoration for St. Anthony Falls? Courtesy of Amelia Daddi, Katelin Jaggi, and Grant Simons.
Additional Media

Our Point of View

Our status in the university carries inherent privilege. Yet we hope our work will help promote awareness of environmental injustices that harm historically oppressed communities, undermine Indigenous sovereignty, disadvantage poor neighborhoods, and worsen the effects of climate change. We have grown more conscious of environmental injustices in our communities. Our work has inspired us to amplify stories that help build empathy and accountability, develop a more complex understanding of where we live, and fight for environmental justice.

University of Minnesota

We affirm our interconnectedness of the human and natural world and take responsibility for inspiring change to create a society that equitably protects and promotes a healthy and vibrant environment for all people in current and future generations.

We are grounded in our values of self-determination in Indigenous, low-income communities, and communities of color, and we gear our work toward the creation of a fully informed economic and political democracy.

Center for Earth, Energy and Democracy (CEED)

Contributors

University Partners

University of Minnesota

Faculty Project Directors
Kevin Murphy
Jean O'Brien

Students
Paige Mitchel
Elsa Ballata
Samantha Ly
Kate Rogers
Stephen Estevez
Amber Januszewski
Myra Billund-Phibbs
Grace Rude
Amelia Daddi
Noriko Kikuchi
Chris Rico
Avian Ciganko-Ford
Sam Henneberg

Community Partners

Center for Earth, Energy and Democracy (CEED)