This episode is a crossover with Climify, an award-winning podcast connecting climate scientists and design educators together to bring climate-related projects into classrooms. Climify is hosted by Eric Benson, Associate Professor of Graphic Design and Responsible Innovation at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. How do you best create positive impact in communities? What does environmental justice look like? In this episode from the Climify podcast, energy justice leader Pamela Fann shares her journey from Corporate America to diversity, inclusion, integration, and climate activist and entrepreneur. She shares how she defines restorative design, environmental justice, and how best we use their principles to tackle both the entangled issues of racism and our climate crisis.
This episode is a crossover with Climify, an award-winning podcast connecting climate scientists and design educators together to bring climate-related projects into classrooms. Climify is hosted by Eric Benson, Associate Professor of Graphic Design and Responsible Innovation at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
How do you best create positive impact in communities? What does environmental justice look like?
In this episode from the Climify podcast, energy justice leader Pamela Fann shares her journey from Corporate America to diversity, inclusion, integration, and climate activist and entrepreneur. She shares how she defines restorative design, environmental justice, and how best we use their principles to tackle both the entangled issues of racism and our climate crisis.
Connect with Pamela
Pamela Fann, an award-winning diversity specialist, and speaker is the Founder and CEO of Integrated Solutions. Pam is also a co-owner/principal of Impact Energy, a certified Black women-owned energy services company that focuses on energy efficiency project implementation and workforce development. Their mission is to promote equitable job expansion within the energy industry that positively impacts lives and supports community economic advancement.
Pam has a degree in Marketing, a certification in Human Resource Management, and is a Certified Cultural Diversity Professional and Trainer (CDP, CDT). Currently serves as the diversity advisor for the BECC conference and on the boards and advisory boards for Women of EVs, Diversity Executive Leadership Academy, and Strategic Energy Innovations. She also is a lead author for the Energy Equity Project, served as an SME for Drawdown Georgia, RCE Atlanta Advancing Justice for All, and Community of Practice committees, and served on the JEDI Advisory Board for the DOE/NREL Innovation Prize. Pamela is also co-executive director of Maa Eagles Foundation U.S., supporting girls from Maasai tribes in Tanzania with education opportunities.
Resources from the episode
EERE Competitions, Challenges, and Industry Prizes
Drawdown solution(s):
Electricity, Health & Education
Episode topic tags:
environmental justice, equity, restorative design, renewable energy, systemic racism, community, social impact, diversity, inclusion, DEI
Find more about how to teach climate design in your classroom at www.climatedesigners.org/edu
Climify Credits
Music in this episode
Nature sound effect by bbc.co.uk – ©2023 BBC
Theme music by Casual Motive
Design Team
Consulting
Kiana Michaan: [00:00:00] Welcome back to Climate with Kiana. Happy June. Happy Pride. I hope that you are finding your joy, even in small ways, every day. Today we have something a little different, a little special. It is a pleasure to bring you an episode from another wonderful climate podcast, Climify. Hosted by Eric Benson.
Climify explores the intersection of climate and design, specifically for educators. If you enjoyed today's episode, go subscribe to the Climify podcast and tune in to their new season launching soon, all about cultivating collective change. This conversation with energy justice leader, Pamela Phan, Talks about environmental justice, energy efficiency, renewables, community power, and equity, all topics near and dear to me.
Enjoy the episode, connect with both podcasts on social media, and as always, be well and stay joyous.[00:01:00]
This podcast is a project of the Climate Designers Network.
Eric Benson: Hey, this is Eric. Welcome to season three of Climify. This season, I'm talking to women across the globe who are at the forefront of climate science and climate action. Each guest is a thought leader in one or more of the drawdown. org Climate solution sectors.
What you may ask are the drawdown. org solution sectors? Well, important topics like renewable electricity, soil and agriculture, architecture, oceans, health, education. So much more. The goal of this season is, of course, to continue to help design educators incorporate a foundation of sustainability and regeneration into their courses and in turn inspire more climate designers.
Climate solutions are already here. You can literally start being part of the solution today. [00:02:00] Climify brings these solutions to you. So no matter what your skill or knowledge level you You can implement what you learned today in your personal life and classroom.
When you look under electricity and the drawdown solution sectors, you'll find a large list of climate solutions ranging from high efficiency heat pumps to solar panels, and from led lighting to insulating your business or home. The guest today, Pamela Phan, checks nearly all these energy solution boxes through her truly inspirational Black owned business, Impact Energy.
Beyond electricity, Pamela also is helping her clients understand that equity and inclusion is vital for environmental justice. And cannot be untangled from our climate problems. One of the many key takeaways I had from this interview today was how best to work [00:03:00] within a community to restore their power and voice and making the changes they need.
I hope you are inspired by Pamela's work and help support all her efforts.
Pamela Fann: Hi, I'm Pamela Fann, co owner of Impact Energy, a certified Black women owned energy services company, where we specialize in both project installation of electric vehicle charging installs and maintenance, heat pump installs and energy audits, and also with a focus on workforce development, so working within communities for economic impact and economic development.
I am a certified diversity professional, certified diversity trainer, and I've been working in the energy industry on equity issues for over five years. I'm personally located in Atlanta, Georgia, but our office is based out of Massachusetts, and we do work across the U. S. You can find us at [00:04:00] www.impactenergy.energy, or you can find me on LinkedIn under Pamela Fann.
That's as in Frank, a NN. As well as you can find Impact Energy on LinkedIn as well, and follow us.
Eric Benson: Welcome, Pamela. Thanks for being on Climify today.
Pamela Fann: Thank you for having me. I'm looking forward to this conversation.
Eric Benson: Me too. Yeah. It's been a while since we first, uh, met each other when we talked on Zoom. Um, I don't even know, was it like a month ago?
Pamela Fann: A month or maybe two, almost two.
Eric Benson: Yeah. You've been busy.
Yeah, I've been running it. You've been busy.
Pamela Fann: 2nd FEVruary. We've both been very busy.
Eric Benson: It's a good busy though, right?
Pamela Fann: Absolutely.
Eric Benson: Yeah. Well, Yeah. I'm excited to talk to you about, uh, your knowledge, working in energy, your DEI work. I'm going through the list of things you do here. It's, it's quite a lot. So there's, there's a lot of ground to cover, but before we get into the stuff that you're doing right now, I'm wondering how [00:05:00] you got to where you are and, and why you decided to focus in climate work and everything connected.
To climate work, because I, I feel you can't unravel pretty much anything from climate, right? Race, uh, politics. I mean, it's all kind of baked into it.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. Yeah. So I'll tell you, I got here, Uh, by purpose, and I say that because, you know, I like to think that you're, you know, most of our steps are kind of ordered through life and I never would have projected that this is the space that I would be in.
Oh, really? But yet I've got myself here. Yeah, like
Eric Benson: what did you expect to be in when you were younger?
Pamela Fann: Not thinking, yeah, and I think about that because that was, that was all purposeful too, it all led to, to where I am today. I spent 22 years, pretty much all of my working years at the Coca [00:06:00] Cola company where I worked.
Yeah, my last role there, I spent seven years in global public affairs and communication, which seemingly enough worked a lot with the ESG group, the sustainability, doing a lot of the sustainability work and packaging and bottles and things like that. So doing the public affairs around that, but even then, even in then, I still didn't recognize the purpose, right?
Also, you know, they did a lot of work with women in the 5x20 project that reused, whether it was Coke bottles or, uh, caps or material in some sort of way, uh, to make, make things with to then go resell on a marketplace. So when you think about sustainable products in that way, and then you could buy these products through a booklet, a 5x20 booklet.
And the funds for funding from that goes back to the women in [00:07:00] these villages. And these are women all over. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. Yeah. Wonderful. Wonderful. Probably like one of the most inspiring parts of the work that I saw the organization do during my time at coke as well, I, seven years for seven years sat on a diversity board there.
And so diversity has always been a part of something that I encompassed in the work that I've done. I grew up in a small town of Owasso, Oklahoma. My family was the first black family to integrate the entire town. Yes. The entire town, the entire town, like not the neighborhood.
Eric Benson: That's a whole other podcast about how that happened.
Pamela Fann: That's a whole other podcast, but it's still connected because again, what I'm doing is purposeful work. It's purposeful work. And so I think that the way that I. You know, grew up in the town that I was in a lot of me, a certain vantage point and viewpoint of diversity that I [00:08:00] then brought into, you know, the scope of the work that I've always done, whether that's through volunteerism or whether it's in the lens of the work that I had in, in, in corporate.
And then, you know, which led me to, you know, a little over five years ago coming into the energy industry when I go to my first two conferences, my first conference actually was in D. C. And it was a conference of about 700 people were present. And there were literally two black women there, no black men, two black women, myself and another woman.
Very small percentage of women altogether, but racial makeup was very small. There might've been, I think, an Asian man, uh, there that I remember, but this is not a group of 700 people in the energy industry. So I was like, okay, all right, well, interesting. Again, yes, it's very white, very old. Um, [00:09:00] uh, which is, you know, common for, for this industry is commonplace.
Which I didn't really know at the time. I was literally in my job probably about two weeks before I went to this conference. So then the next conference that I go to, some of the same sentiment, like, I think I might've been the only Black person there, person of color even, a few more women, but mostly male, mostly older male.
And that's all you really saw on the stage during the panel discussions. And then all of the top tracks were men, very few women sprinkled in there. And I remember seeing a black woman on a, on a panel at the, about the third conference. And I had a conversation with her and I was like, what's, what's going on here?
Like, you know, I'm so happy to see you in this space and see that you were on the panel. She was on a women in energy panel. So it was for like a women in affinity group. And she was like, yeah, this is how this, this landscape looks [00:10:00] as you start to travel and go through these conferences and events. You know, I'm a business owner and, and it's, it's hard for us here.
And I had a really great conversation with her about it. And I said, I even told her at that time, like, I want to, I want to help with this. Like, I feel like I can help with this utilizing the skillset that I learned back at Koch and then my knowledge of diversity growing up, I really felt that I could make an impact there.
And so I went back to my office and I had a discussion with our executive director. At the time, and I said, you know, what do you think about this diversity problem in the energy industry? And she's like, yes, it's obvious, right? It's a big problem. It's just an older white man's industry, and this is what it is.
And I said, wow. And I said, I'd like to do some work in helping with this. And. So I thought I, you know, just to be official, I went and got certified as a diversity professional. I got a CDP. I got certified as a diversity [00:11:00] trainer. And this is well before I even became popular after George Floyd and people wanted to get into these careers.
But I wanted to really learn, uh, the fundamentals behind it. And then so people can say, take me serious. Like, yeah, it's enough to say, yeah, I worked on a diversity board for seven years, but then to put some kind of credentialing behind it. So I. Went and did that. And then I came back and after I got those certifications, I took our own organization through a cultural competency framework to ensure that we were living the values in which we thought we were, um, that we were creating an inclusive culture for people to come in and be themselves and be able to work because, you know, even as much as people say that they're diverse or that they embrace diversity and that they're culturally competent.
You know, we're humans and sometimes we're just, we're just not, or our organizations aren't as good as they could be.
Eric Benson: Yeah. Was that sort of, uh, what was that like a workshop or what [00:12:00] kind of, what, what was that all about? How did you come to the conclusions about, were you diverse in terms of what your mission said?
Pamela Fann: Yeah, no, it's actually building out a framework. So taking the organization through assessments to see what the employees thought that worked there, no matter how big or small the organization is. Yeah. Your employees are your best indicators and trackers for how well you're doing on inclusivity, right?
Asking questions like, do you know how promotions are, are awarded within a company? That's diversity because people have to be able to feel like, you know, they're not being discriminated against, whether that's through pay disparity or any other means. Do you have a 360 feedback where you can get feedback to your managers as well as your, you know, doing peer reviews?
All of that HR process stuff is a part of it. So it's not just. Doing bias training. Everybody thinks it's about bias training and learning about our biases.
Eric Benson: I do that all the time at the [00:13:00] university. They, we have, I think, three different tests.
Pamela Fann: Yes.
Eric Benson: Every year.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. So you take the bias test. Are you, are you biased?
Yes. Of course you are. Yeah. Yeah.
Eric Benson: Every day.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. Right. We're all biased. So it's going to come out the same way every time. You're, you're biased. We all are. Uh, so yes, doing bias training and trainings are a part of that, but trainings alone don't create an inclusive culture. You do have to be intentional.
And put intentionality behind creating inclusive, inclusivity into your organization and inclusivity into your work and how you work. So then I began working with other organizations on developing frameworks for their cultural competency within their organizations. They were like, yeah, we want to become more diverse too.
And then after George Floyd, it was like, everybody wanted to become more diverse because. You know, they had made these commitments to diversity and we're going to do better, but they didn't know how to go about doing it. So then I started [00:14:00] working with companies and organizations and a part of that framework is also how do you work within communities?
How are you understanding the needs of communities? Within your work and building equity into that, because as energy companies, right? You're dealing with communities who have taken on the brunt of climate change, who have taken on the brunt of environmental justice. And if you're going into these communities looking like the people that I saw in those first couple of conferences.
Eric Benson: Right. They're not going to trust them, right?
Pamela Fann: They're not going to trust you. They're not going to trust anything you're saying because you're the same people that caused harm to their communities. But how do we bridge those gaps? How do we one get you people employed there? Cause you know what I was hearing is we don't know where to find the diverse candidates.
We don't know where to find diverse people. We're all over like,
Eric Benson: yeah, what are they talking about?
Pamela Fann: That's exactly like, that's exactly it. But you know, you have to think about it and they come, [00:15:00] it's honest for them that they don't know where to find the candidates or the people because their network is small.
You know, if you're not a person who embraces cultural differences, typically, and you hadn't done that and it's not a part of your normal regimen, then you are going to look at, hmm, who went to school at the same school that I went to, which might be a predominantly white school. Or, You know, you see a resume who got recommended or who got recommended from, uh, this person.
Your, it might be someone in your network recommended this person to work for you and more than likely their network looked like them. So you got it, honestly. So I help teach them how to, you know, divert the path a little bit and rEVuild those networks. So you are creating a more diverse network of participants to your applications.
Because you're, you're, you're communities and the people that you're actually your customer base and people who you're actually trying to do this work [00:16:00] for people in your office need to look like that customer base. People in your office need to have that, um, experience, um, that sometimes lends to thought and different thoughts and different reactions.
They have to, you have to have someone on your team that can raise their hand and say, this is not equitable. Um, and so creating inclusivity within your organizations and work is what's going to help build that equity into doing the work externally and doing the work in those communities. And yeah, I mean, we're doing a disservice to ourselves if we're not diversifying our organizations to meet community needs, because again, those are the communities.
that are being left behind in this transition. And so in order to make those communities whole and to bring them along with us. You're going to need to have some people that look like those communities and can understand the problems in the systems and the way that things work in those communities too.[00:17:00]
Eric Benson: Yeah. So I'm wondering, you talked a lot about impact. I'm guessing this is the impact you want with the name impact energy.
Pamela Fann: Yeah, that's the whole impetus behind our, our name is that we want to make an impact within communities. And we're doing that. Through, because we, we have the knowledge of going out and how to get the contracts and how to get the project work for EV installation, for EV maintenance, for energy auditing, but we're also going to work with the communities to train people to go out and do the work of these projects that we win.
So not only are we going to make communities whole by making them healthier. Installing, uh, electric vehicle charging stations in their communities and educating them about E. V. charging and E. V. s, that they are cost effective, they are a cost effective option in some pretty, almost more so than a car with an engine that, you [00:18:00] know, you can drive out of state in one and go visit your family if you've got, you know, You know, a larger family and flying may not be an option for you and you drive everywhere.
It's like, yes, this is an option and you can drive your family out of state. Absolutely, and it's the health benefits, the carbon reduction, the health benefits behind making this community a cleaner transportation community where you already are suffering from You know, uh, the carbon effects of large warehousing or highways coming through your communities because of red lining the systematic problems that we see in environmental justice communities that are really like, I don't want to say like the dumping grounds, but really have been for, for climate, for climate issues and in environmental issues.
And so going in and providing these options to communities [00:19:00] and providing economic opportunity to where they can also see a future for themselves in this, in this industry is really our mission. This is what we're passionate about and what we want to do. And we're making some really great strides on getting that done.
Eric Benson: That sounds wonderful. I was wondering as you were talking and maybe you kind of hinted at it, there was What kind of messaging do you go into the communities with, it sounded you were talking a lot about economics and what else has been working for you in terms of having them adopt some of these more clean energy installations.
Pamela Fann: So I recently, well, over the past weekend, I was at a Southeast environmental justice convening that I helped organize with an environmental justice group, Harambee House out of Savannah. And it brought together all of the Southeast EPA, a region for [00:20:00] states, except for Tennessee. We didn't have representation from Tennessee, but everyone else was there.
And in talking to community, that's one thing that you have to do. You have to get in there and in the community and actually have these conversations with them, build the relationships and build the trust and build the understanding of what they actually need. Talk to them about their needs. One, talk to them about their assets.
What are some of the great things that the community already has in place, and then what are the needs that they have? The adoption with electric vehicles, some of the opposition to that has been what does, uh, and these are smart communities. They've been doing this environmental justice work for a long time, so they're.
Their concerns are, what does the waste of these batteries after they're, they're done look like? And is it going back into our community?
Eric Benson: Oh, wow. That's, that's a, that's good thinking.
Pamela Fann: [00:21:00] That's good thinking. That's why I said, they're very smart about their communities. They don't want to see more form done for the sake of innovation.
Eric Benson: I see.
Pamela Fann: Then second is, you know, yeah, the cost, because most people think, That you have to go out and buy the Teslas in order to have an EV. They don't know that there's cost effective cars out there. Like they're not all super expensive. You've got your Leafs. You got your other, and you can buy them used at that.
You can get a used EV. I know like here in Georgia for around 8, 000. And then you don't have the same maintenance problems that you would have on a traditional motor vehicle car. Yes, for a used car.
Absolutely.
So, it's the education piece around that. Looking at the environmental effects. So utilizing a lot of the mapping tools.
That are out there. I know that there's the E. [00:22:00] J. Screening tool that the E. P. A. Has the D. O. E. Has a brand new environmental justice, uh, mapping tool that they utilize, which for those listening, if you're interested in getting some applying for any of those Department of Energy grants that are coming down as part of the infrastructure, the R.
R. A. Or the B. I. L. Bipartisan infrastructure. Laws or the infrastructure bills or justice 40, you have to, to, in order to qualify for any of those, those dollars, you have to be within those communities that they have mapped out on their site. Okay. That's just a little good to know, but showing communities, like these are the things that play currently based upon these maps that plague your community.
I bet carbon offsets really high on probably the majority of these because a lot of them, again, are redline communities next to highways, next to warehousings, you have big semi [00:23:00] trucks and things coming through. And so talking to them about, you know, they even have air quality monitors in most cities is looking even at air quality monitoring.
So you take the, the numbers and the statistics and talk to them about those things. And you put it into terms that people can understand. Here's what this could mean for health benefits.
Eric Benson: I see.
Pamela Fann: Here's what it could mean for not on this. This could also be a solve for some transportation issues that typically plague these communities because they're either that last mile problem off of the public transit or they have too much public transit and not enough really infrastructure for roadways.
And so talking to communities about what it is. They feel like they need. Yeah. Give them the details about what's out there and letting them make the informed decision. Like we would like to see some electric vehicle transition in our community. Like, yeah, it sounds like a good option. So that's, that's [00:24:00] the formula.
Eric Benson: So it sounds like it's in person it's face to face. It's not, here's a video on Tik TOK and it seems like it's very specific to that community. I'm sure there's some general similarities between other communities, but. You really have to know that community pretty well, and that might take some time, I'm imagining, right?
Because you have to build that relationship and trust, and they want to trust you, you're not like, paid and bought for by some big energy company.
Pamela Fann: Absolutely, so. You know, environmental justice communities. And when we're talking about environmental justice, and I just had this conversation earlier, I think that the term is being more loosely used in industry to also combine low to moderate income disadvantaged communities.
You know, we throw these terms around and now it's. EJ communities. I think that that's, but environmental justice is more so of a movement. [00:25:00]
Eric Benson: Yeah.
Pamela Fann: Unless the community.
Eric Benson: I always placed it as a movement from, from my perspective, but.
Pamela Fann: Yes, but industry that hasn't necessarily.
Eric Benson: They're co opting it or are they.
Pamela Fann: Yeah, I think so. They're co opting, they're putting it in with low to moderate income as well as disadvantaged communities. So that's kind of like the EJ word has taken place of disadvantaged, which really it should be environmental. As Dr. Mildred McClain would say, who's one of our great pioneers and the mother of environmental justice movement.
She would say environmental injustice communities because they haven't seen justice.
Eric Benson: That's right.
Pamela Fann: Yeah, they haven't seen justice yet. So if you're looking at environmental injustice communities, some of them may be disadvantaged, but some of them may not be disadvantaged. Some of them. More than likely are low to moderate [00:26:00] income, but we don't put them all in these buckets, like they're not all of the same thing.
Environmental justice is really a movement and is a movement about climate, about sustainability. About community health, uh, about, uh, community economic viability. And it's like, what has created these issues? What's created energy burden? What's created the creation of, of climate change that disproportionately impacts these communities.
So it's more, again, it's more about a movement than it is about a singular community and what this community actually is. So, yeah, I just wanted to, to, to note that
Eric Benson: I'm all, I agree with you on that. And, and one thing that you mentioned earlier on, when you were at these energy conferences, predominantly male and white, that was my experience too.
I am male and white, however, but I would go to, [00:27:00] or not even go to conferences, but read books on climate or sustainability. And of course I was very inspired and that's what got me into doing what I'm doing today. Thank you. Bye. And it took a little while, but I looked at it one day and I'm like, all of these books are written by white male authors.
And I'm wondering where are the other perspectives? And so my question for you really is, I, I came to the realization probably too, not too late, but late later in the game that you really can't like the idea of climate action, environmental justice. It's, it's married to all these other topics, DEI included.
And I'm, I'm wondering, are you, I know you agree with this, but are you finding more people are awakening to that or, or, or not?
Pamela Fann: I would say some people [00:28:00] are awakening to that. I know when I go and speak on this issue, I talk about, you know, the fact because, you know, three years ago. It was all about energy efficiency, energy efficiency, energy efficiency, energy efficiency.
Eric Benson: Yeah, exactly.
Pamela Fann: And I was like, okay, well, we can't talk about energy efficiency without talking about climate change. We can't talk about climate change without talking about environmental justice. We can't talk about environmental justice without talking about. Systemic racism. Are you ready to go there?
Eric Benson: I just want to put insulation in my attic.
Nope.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. Like, no, like we have to talk about all of that. I mean, cause people are wanting to understand like utility companies is specifically try to understand how can we, how, how come we cannot get minority or low to moderate income or disadvantaged communities, all of those terms. To buy into these, these, uh, energy [00:29:00] efficient programs, why are we missing the mark on these energy efficient programs?
It's because they're dealing with climate change and because they're dealing with environmental justice issues, which is all a cause of systemic racism and the systemic problems from red lining and other things. And so if you're talking to, or you can talk to a person about switching out light bulbs.
And changing their, their, uh, their spouse on their, on their, their sinks for water efficiency or in their showers. If the person is thinking about, do I pay is energy burdened, which that's a word that they're, that they're not familiar with, right. All they know they can't pay their electric bill because they have this doctor bill or meta that they go pay X amount of dollars for medicine.
And. It's still no matter if they boost up their air because their house isn't sealed [00:30:00] properly. That they're still hot in their home. Their home is still hot. So, you know, you, you've got to meet people, you know, exactly where they are and, and be able to explain and understand, like, I'm not thinking about changing light bulbs as an energy efficiency measure or thinking about that program, um, when I'm energy burdened.
And when, back in the day, when my grandma used to tell me, you know, to close that door, I was letting her air out.
Eric Benson: I got that too from my dad.
Pamela Fann: Yes. Yes. Or when we would, they would have the wind, all the windows up in the house and have air and have fans in the window because they couldn't cut the air on.
We were energy. They were energy burdened.
Eric Benson: Yeah.
Pamela Fann: You know, as you think about as a culture for people of color, we're some of the most sustainable people out there. We've been growing crops in this U S. For over 400 years, [00:31:00] you know, we've been growing our own food. We've been recycling things and, and utilizing everything we've been saving energy in our phones.
But the name of it, you know, people tend to think that these communities. Aren't thinking about sustainability when there's, when these communities have been probably some of the most sustainable communities, sustainable people out there, but they're also because of conditions of systemic racism. You know, it's caused other issues to where it's hard to, it's hard to catch up.
It's just hard to catch up. There's no equity. There is not equal. It's not an equal playing field to where they're starting from. But that makes it,
Eric Benson: it does. Cause it's like, they keep on falling further behind if they try to make that step forward, right? Cause they're already coming from, from behind.
Pamela Fann: Right. Either economically and then let a climate disaster happen where we've got [00:32:00] flooding. I understand they're like in many of the Southeast states where. You know, communities are low lying and flooding who got put in those low lying communities. Why, why are they designated as that? Because probably from some redlining that it was undesirable property that, you know, and so it, it is all connected.
Yeah. Every single bit of it is connected. And you talked a little bit about, you know, the books that you've read and things like that have been published by white men. Communities, environmental justice communities are, are really at a point where they're like the systems that are currently out there are very extractive.
And they're like, they're coming into our communities. They're doing this research. They're inviting us to these focus groups. They're getting all this information from us, but they're not putting anything back into the community that addresses our, our issues. [00:33:00] And so it's that restorative justice model that we want to see happen for environmental justice community, where I'm talking about research and design and people are like, will you help us with research and design for connecting with these communities?
I'm like, what's the restorative part? It should be restorative research and design, because as we're going to be Getting dollars for all this research on these communities. Shouldn't we be giving it back to them so they can solve some of the issues that they have?
Are we just extracting from them?
Eric Benson: We'll be back after this message to learn more about restorative design and how to best co create with the community.
Rachel Cifarelli: Where do young designers see themselves at the intersection of climate change and innovation, and how can we teach that intersection in the classroom? Designers are problem solvers, capable of imagining solutions for a more sustainable future. We have a bigger role to play in all phases of the design process.
[00:34:00] My name is Rachel Cifarelli, graphic designer, recent college grad, and part of the Climate Designers EDU team. And after graduating, I realized today's classrooms tend to skip over that universal side of design. So if you're a design educator, I want to hear from your students. Help set in motion the first ever project that centers students at the intersection of design education and climate change.
I want to know what your students think about sustainable design, How they see climate change impacting their future careers. And what even comes to mind when they hear the term climate design, send your students to climate designers. org slash edu slash new wave survey to take the five question survey or sign up for an interview with me, help me inform a new wave of design education.
One that teaches every designer how to be a climate designer.
Eric Benson: We're back with Pamela. So restorative, can you define that in the, uh, environmental justice movement? What, what would be [00:35:00] restorative design research?
Pamela Fann: Restorative, honestly, restorative design research is if you involve community in your research search efforts, for instance, we know that there's a lot of federal dollars that are becoming available, most of those, yeah, which is good, which is great.
Most of those federal dollars are going to require. That, that organizations work with community based organizations to get this work done. So just about every grant that I've seen out there requires like usually three partnerships. So it's saying that you have to connect with a partnership in that community to get this work done.
Some, sometimes you have to connect with the school or university. Or Minority Serving Institution or HBCU to get this work done. And those are the ones that typically are doing a lot of the risk, come in, do the research lens, as well as some utility implementers or utilities themselves, because they want [00:36:00] information like how, and the thing is, the information that they want is bad information.
They want to know how to best support. These communities and the way to do that is to go to the community and find out how can we best support you? What programs could work for you? What type of workforce development should we be looking at for your community? But while you're extracting this information Also find out, you know as you know that you're going to get a certain amount of dollars for this project How are you pouring that back into the community?
So that's the restorative part Are you actually developing a workforce development plan and pulling that together to go back to the community and say, now that we've done this research, we have X amount of dollars that we're going to provide for workforce training. Or now that we've done this research, we know as the utility that we can work with maybe the water company to go in and help clean your [00:37:00] water systems.
Okay. Thanks. So it's that restorative part. We'll give you the information. You can extract it from us. But give us something back and put it in writing. So then that way we know for sure.
Eric Benson: It's legal.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. Put it in writing so we know for sure that you're going to come back and do that. But that's what it is.
And so as I'm working and I will tell you, I'm currently working with a couple of organizations on RFPs to do research with, because I work closely with community. So of course they're like, can you assist us with this? And I'm happy to do it because we need to do the work. Yeah. That is also about. How are we pouring back into that community?
What's the restorative part? So again, it's restorative research in
Eric Benson: design. I like that. Yeah. There is an example I heard on a podcast I was listening to recently, uh, matter of degrees, and they were talking about a U S department of agriculture grant in Southeast Alaska. So I think it's called SAS or. Southeast [00:38:00] Alaska sustainable strategy in which it sounded a lot like what you just described there, but I think maybe even went further in that the grant was actually given to the community and the community collectively, not through some other person or whatever they had to come together and say, this is how we want to use that, like 8 million or whatever it was.
To improve equity and environmental justice in our community. And this particular podcast was glowing about it because like, that's the way it should be done. And so that. That was inspiring. And so it seems like you're working that way too. And was this something that you got from Coca Cola or is this something that you just continually built upon after leaving that job in terms of knowing how to work so well with communities?
Pamela Fann: Yeah, I think again, it's, it's, I go back to purpose, [00:39:00] um, which I didn't see it, you know, that all of the steps in my career and all of the workings cause that I worked it, I, you know, worked a lot. In community while doing volunteerism while at Coca Cola, I used to be what I would call a serial volunteer. So any community project, whether it be a planting beautification project or a feed the hungry project or, you know, whatever the project was, I was there.
My son could attest to that because he grew up going every Saturday with me to either a food bank or something. Oh, wow. So I think, and you know where my spirit of volunteerism came from. Is the fact that when I was growing up in Oklahoma, in that small town of Owosso, when I was, uh, in, it was in 1988, I was, uh, Junior in high school and my family's home was burned down by a white supremacist group.
Eric Benson: Oh my God.
Pamela Fann: Again, that's a story for another day.
Eric Benson: But part of today [00:40:00] too.
Pamela Fann: Yes. Yes. But the, the first responders for us were the American red cross. I give, I donate blood. I'm a platelet donor.
Eric Benson: I'm donating tomorrow. In fact, tomorrow at 10 a. m.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. Yeah. See, I'm a special like, uh, blood donor. And so I've worked a lot with American Red Cross and I never made all of the connections from one, the diversity aspect, from two, the volunteerism and connection with community, but again, as you can see throughout my career, they all showed up.
All these things just showed up throughout the career. And so coming into energy and connecting the dots about what people need, like really one, having that empathy. In that understanding of community in the war, in what they're fighting against.
Eric Benson: Yeah,
Pamela Fann: I've been there. I've been there. So having that understanding of it, knowing [00:41:00] the system part of it.
So seeing it from the other side, because I'm working in the industry and seeing the system of how people aren't making the connection and giving them the tools as a diversity professional to make the connection, to then go and help community. And do better in working within community. And then as part of the climate work, even, you know, I think you and I've talked about it before I support some girls in Africa, cause this is a global thing, right?
Not just a problem here.
Eric Benson: Yeah.
Pamela Fann: So I support girls and send them to school through my Eagles foundation, which you can find at my Eagles foundation, U S. And thinking through the climate issues that they face, which, yes, they can be detrimental for communities here too, for people that look like me. But for these young [00:42:00] women who won culturally, and these are young Messiah women in Tanzania, who culturally would typically get kind of sold off, quote unquote, or cattle or goats when they're 10, 11 years old, because there's that not value.
The value for them isn't around education. They're seen as property.
Eric Benson: You're sold for marriage. Is that what's going on?
Pamela Fann: Yes. Yes. Marrying
Eric Benson: them off.
Pamela Fann: We're sold off from happening. It's still happening. It's still happening. It's a cultural practice. And then if you think of with climate change, these young ladies and women from these villages have to walk so much further because their water sources are drying up, or they have to work in fields a lot longer because they are the ones, they are the, the ones who, who do the agricultural work for their communities and build their homes.
And things like that. So they're out in temperatures [00:43:00] that are like scorching. So they're, they're having health and risk effects, effects, you know, at risk for bodily harm, traveling so far away from home just to fetch water. And so when you educate these girls, you're also supporting them through. Through, you know, the effects of climate change as well, and, and mitigating them from those risks and letting them see that there's other options out there.
So this work, again, this is purposeful work when you talked a little bit about, is it on purpose? So yeah, it is on purpose. It's through purpose that I'm doing this. So I find myself connecting all of these dots with this, with this work that I'm doing and how it's all come, come to, to be a part. And I'm, I'm really just happy and just blessed.
That the environmental justice community has taken me in and has entrusted me so much to help them figure out the system part of it, because they want to be a part of this economic [00:44:00] opportunity that's coming to the energy tree that they know little about. They want to be a part of that and they see it as a way to rebuild their communities.
And so that's what I'm most passionate about doing is helping them connect those dots.
Eric Benson: Is there anything that offhand our listeners who are mainly designers could do to help support the efforts that Impact Energy and the other projects you're involved with? What, what can be done, maybe just, is it donation or what, what can we do to be help supportive of this?
Pamela Fann: So I would say for my Eagles Foundation is definitely donation because these girls are going to private school. We're in the process of trying to build a school as well and secure donations for that. So if your passion is around supporting girls in education, in particular girls who are really in need and so bright and just, it's so great to see that they realize they have a future.
For more information visit www. fema. gov That would be at my eagles [00:45:00] foundation us and with impact energy, if you're thinking through, you know, how to work better within communities and how to build equity within your programs, contact someone like us, we are a minority owned certified minority owned woman energy services company, and we are uniquely designed to To be able to go and work within these communities, not only through having the diversity experience, but having also the lived experience of these communities, which really lends to, um, Getting that trust and building that trust.
So we want to see these dollars and the thing, like you mentioned earlier about the project in Alaska, a lot of the federal dollars are going directly to community based organizations, and then they have to find the partnerships. [00:46:00] But a lot of these community based organizations don't know who they should partner with.
So it's really time to start getting out there and making those connections for them now, making introductions to your organization or to your school. If you haven't worked in community before, start getting out there now and understanding Go to a community event. Go to a neighborhood planning unit meeting and learn about what the community is dealing with and what are some of the issues.
Go to a city council meeting and understand what's happening in your community so you can start making those connections now. Because chances are, they're going to need you. Although the dollars will flow a lot of them directly to the CBOs, what are they going to do with it when they get it? They've got to implement it and who can help them best with that?
The colleges and universities, the organ minority based, uh, or minority business enterprises like my own, where [00:47:00] the, we are the technical experts that can go in and help them with their issues. Yeah, I think that that really is, is like the best model, like go and find out what these communities need, immerse yourself in the community.
So they know who you are and where to find you when they do get these dollars or when it's time to apply for these funds, because again, even though the funds go to them, they've still got to come with two or three partners too, to make sure that that funding works. So get to know your communities.
Eric Benson: Yeah.
You're also involved with a pretty great. You're on an advisory board with, is it, is it Jedi? Is it, how do you. Yeah,
Pamela Fann: I'm a Jedi advisor with the department of energy and NREL for their innovation prizes. And so they originally brought myself, uh, I think there were about six of us. That either people from community or diversity experts that helped them with their first innovation prize.
[00:48:00] What they wanted to do was really change the landscape of who is applying for these awards and not continuously giving them to the same people over and over again. And bring about some diverse folks who haven't typically received government funding before to help them do some great work in their community.
So they brought us on to help educate them around how they diversify their network. Again, we talked a little bit about that earlier. Yeah. Ensuring that the program itself Was not exclusionary, meaning that it was so difficult for people to do it, that they were excluding those organizations that one only had like two or three people already working for them.
And then they've got to fill out this 40 page. Innovation grant, do they have the capacity to do that? You know? So they handheld them through the whole process and they picked some wonderful, wonderful organizations. They had over 200 applicants, which they had never had before. [00:49:00] And they were very diverse applicants.
And so, yeah, they're doing a lot of great work. They, they're, they brought me back to continue to do some more work with their collegiate innovation prizes. I know you're going to share the link with everyone, but there are several different programs in there that, that colleges and universities can be a part of and work within community and get some really great work done and some really nice grants.
Eric Benson: Yeah. There's a lot of my listeners are working as design educators and at college and university, and I'm on the website right now from the department of energy or is it energy. gov. You sent me and there's a lot of really good opportunities here for students interested in similar work that you do with internships, fellowships and competitions.
Can you talk to us more about actually those internships and fellowships? And the competitions.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. So I don't know a whole lot about the [00:50:00] internships and partnerships, although I do know some people who have been fellows. I remember, I, I personally know one of the first African American fellows that they brought on to work in their group.
He's now actually a full time person there. Hey, we had a lot of this. Yeah. And so we had a lot of discussions. It was about four, almost probably almost five years ago when we were introduced. When he started doing this work and I was helping him think through some of the equity pieces of, of his work and also helping, because she was the only one of him at that time in the organization.
The only person that looked like him, helping him navigate the challenges of being the only one that's still trying to lead the way for others. And now there's so many others. Yeah, now there's so many others. So I've met a couple of the fellows. It's a great program. They look for, they tend to [00:51:00] look for minority people in particular to do their fellowships, their internships.
Are great opportunities if you are, especially right now with the teams that they have at DOE, I've never seen it this diverse. Nobody ever has since they brought on a person, uh, Shalanda Baker to lead the equity work within DOE. They have really had a great focus of making sure the department and the group of people doing this work reflect the communities.
That they serve, and we are talking about nationalities across the board. They have a really, really great representation there, which makes you really proud to see, but with that, you know, they're always looking for great people. So I think if equity is your, is your jam, if that's something that you believe in, especially in this climate and energy work, I, you know, Florida, go in there and take a look at the jobs.
There are a lot of jobs out there now with the Department of Energy as well, because what it [00:52:00] means. Is that if you get people in a position that they are, you know, they already come with the sense of, of diversity and diversity, dexterity, and they know, and they are engaged with diverse people and diverse thoughts, and we have them in these positions, that's going to make for better programmatic work.
That's going to come out of these offices in the long run, not for the short term, but for the long term.
Eric Benson: Yeah, it reminds me of, there was a guest I had on last season named Brooke Havlick and, and she was talking about this idea of two truths where, yeah, it's, it's bad. There's some bad climate stuff going on, but there's also some, a lot of good stuff happening and, and hearing the stuff that you're telling me right now just kind of reinforces that, that yeah, there's, there's hope here.
We can do this. [00:53:00]
Pamela Fann: There absolutely is. There's so much going on in this space. I thank God for diversity initiatives. I'm happy that many utilities have a diverse spend requirement, whether that be through their, their prime contractors.
Eric Benson: That's great.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. Through their subcontract, not all of them. They're not all of them have it, but many 40 percent diverse spend requirement, which means they have to engage.
Minority owned businesses in this space. So, you know, I'm happy to see, to see all of the equity work that's being done. What makes me most excited is that I, I can actually see a vision for communities to become whole. Not only to benefit from the dollars that will flow into their communities to do the upgrades on homes, streets, infrastructure, get some of the technologies, community solar projects, EV charging station.[00:54:00]
Possibly even wind, who knows, for rural communities to, uh, to see those things come into their community and create economic impact. Like this is the first time that there is a directive from the United States government to ensure that that happens. And so I'm really excited that those opportunities are there, but I'm also nervous because we know that we have a short window in which these dollars are out there because you know, as the changes happen with administrations, we can't guarantee that we'll, this administration will still be there. Right
Eric Benson: to make sure something positive is still happening to
Pamela Fann: make sure something positive continues from this. So all of these fundings and funding and dollars and partnerships that are being created, the people who want to see change like us, we've got to keep it going. We've got to keep talking about it.
We've got to keep the connections [00:55:00] together. And we have to keep it going so it can be a permanent, sustainable thing.
Eric Benson: Yeah, totally agree. I mean, it's, it's, it seems like just, just from this, from the idea of trying to do things better environmentally is, is one hardship. And then you realize to continue to do that, you have to join all these other fights because it's all connected.
Pamela Fann: Yeah, it's a holistic approach and I've told people many times before that we have to take this as a holistic We have to take a holistic approach to fixing The systemic problems, because they not did, they did not, these systemic problems did not just get there from utility and energy burden. No, I started with, you know, it came, got there from real estate.
You know, we know that healthcare has a stake in this because if [00:56:00] we get homes to be, you know, weatherized properly and sealed up and energy efficient homes, And people are able to pay a lower cost on their electric electric bill, then they can put money towards other things and they won't necessarily be spending as much money going to the doctor for asthmatic or C. P. O. D.
Eric Benson: It's all connected, right?
Pamela Fann: Yes. COPD issue. So you, I mean, it's all connected. So they didn't get the, this problem did not happen by itself. But that's when I go back to say, it's a systemic problem. There are a number of roots and it's all rooted. It's all rooted in racism is rooted in racism. And out of that, all of these other things have happening.
So it's not. One industry's problem to worry about. It's not just the climate. Everybody's everybody's problem. And in order to [00:57:00] make these, these communities whole, we do have to take a holistic approach and then to interact define them.
Eric Benson: I agree. I just wish more people could, can see that. That's, that's a challenge.
Pamela Fann: That is the challenge. Yeah. See been. We're the ones that'll work on it. Yeah. Right. And hopefully we'll just have people along with us. You have to .
Eric Benson: Yeah. Well, I'm sad to say we're almost outta time. And I got one more question for you and I'm gonna have you put on my Oracle shoes and turn, turn into a design educator for a minute.
And the question is, is what would you do if you were asked to teach a design class? What project would you assign? How would you structure the class? Whatever. It can be as long or as short as you want it to be.
Pamela Fann: I would, I would actually base equity in the [00:58:00] full design of the course, looking at it from an equitable lens.
So thinking of the makeup of the students who take this course, I'd want to know what their lived experiences are, how it would relate to this course, how could they utilize this in real world examples and case studies. Building equity into, I'd built equity into everything. I don't think that we do that enough.
And I think that that's the lens that I want all the students and everyone who, whether they're students, younger students or lifelong students like myself, I would want us to put an equity lens to all of that work that we're doing and figure out how to, how to solve, if we can solve the problems. For the most at risk people in this world, just think about that.
Eric Benson: Yeah,
Pamela Fann: if we can solve the problems for [00:59:00] the most at risk people, don't you think that that then solves all those other layers in between and higher up? So if we put an equity lens on all of that and think about designing and solving problems for the most at risk people, that's what I would do.
Eric Benson: I love it.
Thank you for that. And it's been a wonderful conversation today, Pamela, and really inspired by your story and wanting to continue my own work in this world of climate justice, just like you. So let's stick together, keep in touch on this because we need a community.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. And you have one, you know, we, we we've got, there's a community of us out here trying to do good things and, and do good work.
And so, but for the first time. Ever in history, we've got some financial models that might be able to really help us do that. So, yeah, let's [01:00:00] all, let's all get together and think through how we get,
Eric Benson: I mean, sometimes I feel so alone. I don't know if you feel alone in it, but it's good to hear that. I guess I'm not.
Pamela Fann: Yeah. It can, it can be lonely, especially doing diversity work and doing environmental justice work. It can, but there's a community out there and I'm telling you, it's so beautiful to see when these communities come together. Yeah. And really want to focus on, on, on seeing that change in their community and knowing that there's a real opportunity right now to do it.
And that's the thing, I would just implore everybody listening to this, there's a real opportunity to make some change right now. And if we can all pull together our resources and, and thinking caps. And work together. Oh, we can do some amazing work for communities. Maybe we won't hit every community, but we can get a lot done.
Eric Benson: Yeah. Well, where can we find you online so we can help connect and support you?
Pamela Fann: Absolutely. So again, we're at [01:01:00] w that impact energy dot energy is our website. You can also reach out to me on LinkedIn under Pamela fan and that's F as in Frank, a N N. And you can also follow us on LinkedIn through, and Twitter.
So we're on Twitter as well under Impact Energy or, and you can follow us there. But yeah, happy to reach out, reach out. If you have any questions, any thoughts, happy to respond back again and create this larger community of resources so we can begin to really start seeing, you know, we can be the change that we want to see.
We really can. And so let's all put those efforts together to do that.
Eric Benson: Agreed. Well, it's nice to have you on the show and thank you for taking about an hour of your time to be with me.
Pamela Fann: Oh, it's no problem. I enjoyed it. Thank you so much.
Eric Benson: Climify is produced, edited, and engineered by me. A huge special thanks this season to Ellen Keith Shaw and Christine Pilot [01:02:00] for their gorgeous work on our new branding.
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Kiana Michaan: Thank you for listening. Climate with Kiana is hosted and produced by me, Kiana Michaan.
This episode was co-produced and edited by Lucy Little Theme Music by Colette Michaan. This podcast is recorded and produced in New York City on unseated Munsee Lenape [01:03:00] land. If you enjoyed the episode, please share it with a friend. Leave a comment and subscribe anywhere you listen to podcasts. For more information about the guests and topics discussed, please visit ClimateWithKiana.com.