Ania:Last year, a program called the Community Funding Project was reintroduced in the United States. How does it support the goals of fighting climate change?
Alexandria:This is something I'm particularly excited about, because it provides great opportunities for the Green New Deal. It's a program in which municipal districts are able to take some of the federal funds and direct them to local communities. The program operated a few years ago under a different name, but was phased out, and in 2021 it returned with higher ethical standards and more rigid protocols. It has led us to one of the first major Green New Deal projects in the country, right here in the Bronx, where there is one of the longest shorelines in the entire city. This section, including the one in Queens are filled with bays and water infrastructure, with SUNY Maritime College on the Bronx side at the forefront. It's a unique maritime institution on the US map. Normally, if you want to get a maritime degree in this country, you have to go to a private school—and this one is public.
Two weeks ago, we got confirmation that we were able to get funding from the Community Funding Project for over three hundred students to start a training program in which we will train people from our community in the professional skills necessary to build wind turbine structures on the water. This is a very specialized job, and most importantly, it is the profession of the future! In this way, we are investing in our community. Instead of training people in skills that will become obsolete—like building pipelines—we are helping them learn how to build the pillars of surface infrastructure.
Ania: How is the Green New Deal resonating at the Congressional level?
Alexandria: We are working with other congressmen to see if we can get climate projects off the ground nationally. So far, we have identified seventy-nine Green New Deal projects in the United States that will start this year and next year. The changes and projects should have a backdrop of creating new jobs for millions of people. And not just any jobs. We care about quality: it's about good, satisfying work that also provides health care and additional benefits. We also address environmental injustices in poorer communities. In Astoria (NYC), for example, we were able to put pressure on one of the country's largest oil companies, EOG, which was trying to build another peaker plant here. A peaker plant is a type of power plant that is supposed to be active, to be online, only during peak energy demand, for example, in the summer when air conditioners are on, a peaker plant helps increase energy production to meet more demand by burning more fuel. It's just that we don't need more peaker plants in Astoria, instead we need more solar plants to meet our energy needs and decarbonization goals. Every time an energy company tries to build another peaking power plant, it is actually trying to trap communities into a circle of demand for a type of energy that will only get more expensive, when the alternative is much less costly. Energy "sponsored" by fossil fuels is limited and there simply isn't enough of it. Solar, wind, thermal and hydropower—they will only get cheaper because they are renewable, infinite.
Ania:In other words, the most effective way to mobilize change to improve the climate should be to educate people that adapting the economy to environmental needs actually protects their pockets here and now, not just the lives of future generations.
Alexandria:That's exactly right. Energy costs are crushing working families in our community. This is one of the main reasons why I opposed the separation of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal from the Build Back Better Act, because they were actually designed as two puzzles of the same picture. For example, with the former act we got some important investments in building EV (electric vehicle) chargers—a lot of money was allocated for this. What was not considered was what the real geographic need for EV chargers is. If you can't afford an electric car—you don't need chargers, they aren't used and the investment doesn't work. The Build Back Better Act offered a package of thousands of dollars in subsidies to enable people to buy electric cars to use this infrastructure. Without this kind of assistance, without comprehensive thinking, EV prices will never come down, and charging station infrastructure will continue to be built only in wealthier areas where people can actually afford electric cars. As a result, rich people save more money because a certain type of modern solution is built around them. I want this kind of technology to be distributed more equitably. So back to what happened in Astoria: when EOG announced that it wanted to build a peaking power plant, we protested and stopped it. When I say "we," I mean the Astoria community that raised the protest, and I worked in Congress with two more senators and environmental activists. This was combined with the efforts at SUNY Maritime College in the Bronx that I mentioned earlier.
Ania:What are the projections for the scale of the Green New Deal's impact in the near future?
Alexandria:The Green New Deal just had its first-ever reading in Congress. It was held in the Oversight Committee, of which I am a member. It includes economists, justice activists, academics and experts from all over the country. I feel honored and fortunate that such a great legislative opportunity has come so quickly for this program—after only three years. This is the opening of a new chapter for the Green New Deal.
Ania:Thank you for the interview!
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The reading of the Green New Deal project in Congress was sponsored by one hundred and four congressmen who support climate action and took place on April 27, 2022. It was summed up with calls for achieving the Green New Deal goals through a ten-year nationwide mobilization. The resolution lists goals such as building smart grids (which enable customers to reduce energy consumption during peak demand periods); retrofitting all existing buildings and building new ones to achieve maximum energy and water efficiency; removing pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation and agriculture sectors; cleaning up existing hazardous waste and abandoned sites; and providing higher education, quality health care and affordable, safe and adequate housing for all.
listened to, prefaced and translated: Anna DIDUCH
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez—American politician and activist. As of 2019, she is serving as US Representative for New York's 14th congressional district on behalf of the Democratic Party. The district includes the eastern part of the Bronx, parts of north-central Queens and Rikers Island. On June 26, 2018, Ocasio-Cortez gained national recognition when she won the Democratic Party's primary in New York's 14th congressional district. She then easily won the general election in November, defeating Republican Anthony Pappas. She was re-elected in the 2020 election, defeating John Cummings. Taking office at age 29, Ocasio-Cortez is the youngest woman ever to serve in the US Congress. She is very active on social media compared to other members of Congress. Ocasio-Cortez attended Boston University, where she graduated with honors in international relations and economics. Before running for Congress in 2018, she was an activist and worked as a waitress and bartender.
