Spotlight on Literacy Connects: A Gathering Place for Climate Action

Sep 13

Literacy Connects has served the Tucson community for 11 years, providing a place where anyone can learn, create, and access opportunities. As part of their vision, they emphasize the value of transformational learning and collaborative relationships, and understand the interconnectedness of community and environmental wellbeing - as evidenced by their recent hosting of two Tucson Climate Action & Adaptation Plan Community Dialogues in partnership with Living Streets Alliance, the City of Tucson, and Local First Arizona.

Local business owners were convened on August 5th and September 23rd, 2022, to gather their input on what needs to be included in Tucson’s Climate Action and Adaptation Plan (CAAP), also known as Tucson Resilient Together. This is part of a multi-stage community outreach effort to make sure that the upcoming plan (slated for the end of 2022) will benefit all Tucsonans in an equitable way. Local First Arizona acted as a partner and connector to bring together small businesses, with an emphasis on business owners of color, to hear about specific environmental investment needs in the local business community. The first session gave folks a chance to share about their lived experiences as business owners, and the second session was an opportunity to examine a list of proposed actions the city could take, and evaluate those actions according to their unique points of view.

Overall, this process has encouraged Tucsonans to engage with the process of creating and pushing forward climate policies and helped restore trust that was previously lacking between often-overlooked communities and those working in the city to mitigate the effects of climate change. This opportunity to gather would not have been possible without Literacy Connects and their commitment to help foster sustainable change in our community.

In 2021, Literacy Connects became certified as a green business through our Tucson Green Leaders Program (now the Arizona Green Business Certification). Their partnership has been invaluable to us ever since, and we plan to collaborate well into the future as we continue to act to make our community more resilient and connected.

The Local First Arizona Sustainability team will continue to work with the city of Tucson to ensure the vital voices of local businesses and organizations like Literacy Connects are heard as the Climate Action and Adaptation Plan is implemented.