Advocates for environmental justice speak at panel hosted by Ford School

The Ford School of Public Policy hosted a panel of four environmentalists at Rackham auditorium Monday evening to answer questions regarding environmental justice. About 75 students attended the panel, Paving the Way: Taking Bold Action Toward Environmental Justice, which was part of the University of Michigan’s 2025 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Symposium and aligned with this year’s theme of “Restless Dissatisfaction: An Urgent Call for the Pursuit of Justice and Equality.” The panel was mediated by Walker Miller, a current Environment and Sustainability doctoral candidate. 

During the panel, Jalonne White-Newsome, the first federal chief environmental justice officer at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said in order to advance the movement for environmental justice, activists need to be adaptable. 

“I say all the time environmental justice did not start with the federal government and it will not end with the federal government.,” Newsome said. “The second thing we have to do is adapt. … We don’t have the right to sit back and be fearful, we have to acknowledge the madness that has happened.” 

Tony Reames, Environment and Sustainability associate professor, said living in South Carolina where Black communities were often told to simply accept unfortunate environmental circumstances pushed him to pursue environmental justice.

“I grew up in rural South Carolina,” Reames said. “The county leaders needed to create jobs, so they brought in the state’s largest landfill and largest maximum security prison. I learned that it wasn’t just my town. Other Black communities in South Carolina and across the country had waste facilities. So, in that moment, I said as an engineer I had to think about what is the intersection of race and income that allows people to make decisions for people, to indoctrinate people to accept things that nobody else would want.” 

Pre-selected members of the audience were invited to ask the panelists questions. In response to a question about how to continue environmental justice work under President Donald Trump’s second administration, Shalanda Baker, the University’s first vice provost for sustainability and climate action, said having a plan is crucial. 

“This is the time to organize,” Baker said. “We need to be thinking about the 20-year plan, the 50-year plan. It’s so difficult at times in communities that are experiencing environmental justice concerns to think that far ahead, but that is the work … So, we need to be organized and we need to be as unapologetic and unashamed to do the good work” 

At the end of the panel, Miller said courage is one of the most important tools for fighting environmental injustice. 

“I am a hypersensitive introvert, highly anxious person and so many things scare me,” Miller said. “But my quote, by me, is that ‘courage is a renewable resource’… For me, there is nothing worse than being in that room and not doing the courageous thing and having to deal with myself later because I could have made a difference. My call to action is that when you are in a room and can make a difference, be courageous.” 

Public Health student Chloe Thach attended the panel and said listening to the panelists speak inspired and motivated her to keep going. 

“I feel like right now it’s so easy to lose hope, but coming to stuff like this and hearing professors talk candidly is inspiring because they’re still so committed to this work,” Thach said. “Like (Baker) saying her voice quivers in a room, but she still speaks through it because there are millions of voices behind her that can’t. I feel like we are so privileged to be at this school, to get a college education right now, and that is what is getting me through.” 

Daily Staff Reporter Caroline Wroldsen can be reached at cwrold@umich.edu.

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