Environment
Regional Inequality Context
For more than fifty years, grassroots organizations and nonprofits on the Central Coast have worked to defend communities from environmental harm. Polluting industries have created hazards in residential neighborhoods, falling disproportionately on low-income residents and communities of color. Air pollution, water contamination, wildfire risk, and energy insecurity do not affect all communities equally: those already facing economic hardship or living near legacy industrial sites carry heavier health burdens, including higher rates of chronic respiratory illness. Pesticide use near schools is one visible example of how environmental risk concentrates where political power is weakest. The resources below reflect the breadth of this work, from legal advocacy and clean energy development to wildfire mitigation and pollution mapping tools.
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Resources
Central Coast Climate Justice Network
C3JN is a network of social justice and environmental leaders committed to a climate movement that advances social, economic, and environmental justice for Ventura, and Santa Barbara Counties.
Central Coast Community Energy
Central Coast Community Energy (3CE) is a locally-controlled energy provider working to source clean and renewable energy for the Central Coast.
Pesticide-Free Soil Project
The Pesticide-Free Soil Project promote youth leadership to grow the movement to end pesticide use on the Central Coast.
Environmental Defense Center
The EDC defends nature and advances environmental justice on California’s Central Coast through advocacy and legal action.
Central Coast Labor Impact Explorer
This tool provides estimates of where jobs will be created or lost, how many jobs are expected in each sector, and what types of jobs are likely to emerge. These insights are meant to support advocacy for clean energy development in the Central Coast.
Los Padres Forest Watch
The Los Padres Forest Watch protects wildlife, wilderness, and clean water throughout Los Padres National Forest and Carrizo Plain National Monument.
Community Environmental Council
CEC builds on-the-ground momentum to reverse the threat of the climate crisis and moves people to create a more resilient California Central Coast.
YTT Northern Chumash Tribe
YTT is the documented descendant Indigenous Tribe of San Luis Obispo and represents an unbroken chain of lineage, kinship and culture.
SLO Climate Coalition
The SLO Climate Coalition champions high-impact, regional climate solutions by bringing together community expertise, creativity & resources.
Santa Barbara Adaptation and Resilience Program
The Adaptation & Resilience Program helps our community prepare for current and future climate-related hazards like sea level rise, flooding, erosion, and wildfires.
Wishtoyo Chumash Foundation
Wishtoyo serves as a “Rainbow bridge” linking Chumash and Indigenous lifeways with the protection of natural and cultural resources, utilizing traditional ecological knowledge to provide environmental and cultural preservation and justice, education, research, and advocacy.
Santa Barbara Channelkeeper
The Channelkeeper protects and restores the Santa Barbara Channel and watersheds through science-based advocacy, education, field work, and enforcement.
Land Trust for Santa Barbara County
The Land Trust for Santa Barbara County protects natural resource and agricultural land.
Regional Wildfire Mitigation Program
The RWMP is a multi-year initiative designed to assess hazard, exposure and vulnerabiliy and equitably reduce wildfire hazard across the Santa Barbara front country.
Surfrider Foundation – Santa Barbara Chapter
The Surfrider Foundation is dedicated to protecting the ocean. In Santa Barbara County, this has meant protecting the Gaviota Coastal ecosystem from development and opposing offshore oil drilling.
Climate First: Replacing Oil and Gas
CFROG is a Ventura County-based advocacy organization leading a just transition away from fossil fuels to protect our health, economy and climate.
Communities for a Better Environment
CBE provides residents in heavily polluted urban communities in California with organizing skills, leadership training and legal, scientific and technical assistance, so that they can successfully confront threats to their health and well-being.
CalEnviroScreen
CalEnviroScreen is a mapping tool that helps identify California communities that are most affected by many sources of pollution, and where people are often especially vulnerable to pollution’s effects.
California Environmental Voters
California Environmental Voters organizes voters, elects and trains climate champion candidates, pushes climate solutions to the forefront of public discourse, and hold slawmakers accountable to take bold policy action.
California Environmental Justice Alliance
California Environmental Justice Alliance is a statewide coalition of grassroots environmental justice organizations.
California Environmental Justice Coalition
The California Environmental Justice Coalition takes action to bring about systemic change in industry and government policies and practices to protect health and promote justice and resilient communities by uncompromisingly following the Principles of Environmental Justice; promoting unity and solidarity; using community-based knowledge; and strengthening community leadership.
Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool
This tool has an interactive map and uses datasets that are indicators of burdens in eight categories: climate change, energy, health, housing, legacy pollution, transportation, water and wastewater, and workforce development. The tool uses this information to identify communities that are experiencing these burdens.
What the Region Still Needs
California has been a leader in the nation in adopting stricter environmental regulations and air quality controls to mitigate the health impacts of pollution and hazardous materials. Despite this headway, there are many Central Coast communities suffering from legacy effects of long-term exposure to chemicals from heavy industry, pesticide use, fossil fuel extraction, and other environmental hazards. Today, there are several grassroots campaigns against fossil fuel industries active in the region, including the campaigns against the Sable Pipeline in Gaviota, the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant in San Luis Obispo, and offshore oil and gas in Ventura County. Coalitions of Indigenous tribes, youth advocacy groups, green energy proponents, and environmental justice communities demand a cleaner and safer future for the Central Coast and are fighting to make their vision a reality.
Explore the Data
This map shows CalEnviroScreen cumulative impact scores across the region. Significant portions of Santa Barbara and Ventura counties fall between the 61st and 99th percentile nationally, reflecting high levels of land, water, and air contamination that affect residents’ health throughout the Central Coast.
Explore CalEnviroScreen data by county in the Equity Indicators below and through the Data Center.
