Letter: One Issue Voter

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To the Editor:

This is the year I become a one issue voter.

As an engaged voter – I’ll even knock on doors for you – I’ve made my way through all of the “Meet the Candidate” profiles but have one more ask: How do you plan to address climate change and raise the eco-consciousness of our community in a way that is sustainable and just?

I’m not an idealogue. I am a concerned citizen who believes the impacts of climate change and biodiversity loss touch almost every aspect of our lives. Have you, as a candidate, taken time to deeply understand how we got here and will you commit to breaking cycles of extraction and consumption that were never meant to be sustainable?

The earth, our home, is a beautiful, breathing organism, and it is sick. Our American lifestyle is polluting our water, soil, and air and every indicator suggests the trend will continue. It is 2023 and even the Connecticut legislature could not take significant action on the environment. Perhaps this can be explained by a relative degree of “climate privilege” that we experience in Connecticut – more true for some more than others, of course.

Can any of us look around our own community and say that our work is done? There is tremendous upside to giving everyone the tools to take action against climate change every day – at home, work and school. It will take a massive, coordinated educational effort but eco-consciousness needs to be a part of our culture and is a key step in building a sustainable and just community.   Your leadership is greatly needed to inspire and advance this movement.

What can this look like in West Hartford? Let’s start with a few challenges currently facing our town.

Two years ago we experienced a summer of mild to severe drought, this summer extreme rainfall and heat. Homes, businesses, and roadways flooded and local farmers experienced their most challenging year maybe ever. Several candidates mentioned the importance of addressing stormwater with infrastructure improvements like bigger and better culverts which are currently being planned; but please don’t miss the opportunity to harness the power of nature! Healthy riparian zones and wetlands filled with native plants and vegetation can absorb and filter water and support the food web by providing much-needed habitat for insects and other pollinators. We cannot “culvert” our way out of stormwater problems compounded by over-development on wetland areas just because it adds to our Grand List.

I may have missed mention of the waste crisis in the candidate bios. This issue doesn’t make headlines regularly but it should because our trash currently doesn’t have a home in Connecticut and we are paying to have it shipped to a landfill in Pennsylvania in classic Not In My Backyard (NIMBY) fashion. Interestingly, as marketing and public relations strategies began shaping the American Dream a century ago and citizens were prompted to spend their way out of economic downturns, there was never a plan to address the inevitable mountains of plastics, textiles, appliances, and more. As we became a society of disposable goods, door-to-door garbage pickup was an important advance and cleaned up our neighborhoods but it has also allowed us to simply not think about our purchasing habits at all. We need transparency and leadership who will acknowledge that while recycling helps, the only real solution is to focus on radically changing our consumption patterns.

There is an idea that was put on the table in West Hartford a few years ago and while imperfect it has been tested in the U.S. and throughout the world for decades – you might know it as “Pay-As-You-Throw” (PAYT) or “Unit-Based Pricing” (UBP) trash collection. Towns that have implemented PAYT have seen tremendous results in waste reduction. It defies reason to think we can achieve those results without making significant changes to our day-to-day habits. Will you, as a candidate for public office, champion this effort?

For those who are running for a Board of Education seat the challenges described above offer much-needed opportunities for our children to engage in authentic, experiential, and place-based learning. Technologies like coding and AI (Artificial Intelligence) are here to stay but how can we say we are preparing our children for life after graduation without meaningful and extensive climate and environmental education whether their path leads to trade school or college? A huge task lies ahead in ensuring our children have the connection to the natural world that generations before them did not.

Students, beginning at the earliest levels, could be our best ambassadors for climate resilient action. Everything we need and everything we have comes from the land beneath our feet and yet our children spend very little time learning outdoors. Climate Change Education legislation has passed in Connecticut but I haven’t heard much about it. Let’s explore educational programs centered around environmental justice, farm-to-school, schoolyard native habitats, citizen science monitoring air, water and soil quality, and energy and materials management curriculum to name a few.

Providing our children with a sense of safety and belonging at school is my priority, too, but I wonder at the confusion and anxiety our youngest citizens may feel when “real world” challenges like climate change aren’t addressed head-on during the school day. Let’s offer students awe and wonder and agency. It is not the only solution but a sense of belonging to the land is a critical need of our animal bodies and can be a balm to the experiences of many students who experience societal inequities, anxiety, lack of focus, and trauma.

Thank you for listening. Taking this time to reflect on these challenges is unfortunately a privilege many do not have. Are you, as a person running for office, listening to these voices that are underrepresented in our commissions and committees?

This is the year I become a one-issue voter. To my fellow neighbors and friends, will you join me?

Kim Hughes
West Hartford resident