Healthy Communities

All people have a right to a clean and healthy environment and Sierra Club believes that empowering communities to protect themselves from pollution and destruction of their quality of life is fundamental to our mission. As a grassroots environmental organization, Sierra Club members and activists work to clean up toxic sites and stop polluters, promote sound energy and solid waste policies, work for sound land use and protect open spaces, farmland and wild places. Sierra Club members and staff use all legal means to engage the public and protect communities, from going door to door, to testifying at hearings, to working for the election of environmental champions.

Campaigns

Suburban Sprawl
Sierra Club volunteers in Michigan have led the way to protect open space, farm lands, wetlands and woodlands from development and sprawl. Sierra Club Cool Cities have been established in 23 Michigan communities as a result of Sierra Club volunteers' work. Greening local communities through improved transportion, sound zoning and planning practices and reinvesting in urban areas are at the top of our list. Find out more about our work!

Environmental Justice
The fight for Environmental Justice means working with community members to fight against destructive pollution and assaults on their health and well-being. As Rhonda Anderson, Sierra Club's Detroit Environmental Justice Organizer points out, environmental problems are at the heart of many of the problems in communities, even if they aren't always identified as such. Today, Sierra Club Environmental Justice volunteers and staff are: - fighting against a proposed expansion of the Marathon Oil Refinery in Detroit; - continuing efforts to close down the Detroit Incinerator, the largest municipal solid waste incinerator in the world; - joining the fight against new and expanded coal plants in Michigan to help stop global warming, and much more. Sierra Club organizer Rhonda Anderson spends her days working with Detroit residents and local politicians to fight for the rights of communities already overburdened with polluting industries. In 2007 Rhonda was one of the activists who spurred Governor Jennifer Granholm to sign an EJ Executive Order. Rhonda's powerful voice as a community advocate was recently recognized by the Michigan Chronicle, who named her as "One of the 10 Voices of Change for 2007".