266 mile march to confront legislators on lack of climate change action starts in Paradise
PARADISE, Calif. — Two hundred and sixty-six miles: that's the distance from Paradise in Butte County to San Francisco. A group of California activists began that trek Friday to bring legislative attention to what they consider a lack of action taken on climate change.
Members of the Sunrise Movement, a youth-led political movement advocating for political action on climate change, packed their bags and started marching around noon. While the road ahead may be long, they say it's no mistake their starting point was Paradise.
They say the town, ravaged by the 2018 Camp Fire, represents the devastation that climate change has inflicted. The blaze rapidly spread through the Butte County Ridge in part due to extremely dry vegetation that had not seen significant precipitation for over 200 days.
To this group, the solution to preventing future fires from inflicting the same damage and, more broadly, the worsening climate crisis is to retool the famed Citizens Conservation Corps into the Civilian Climate Corps.
"We're walking for our future," says Sunrise Movement coordinator Nikayla Jefferson, marching down Pentz Road Friday. "We're walking for the Green New Deal and we're walking because the Civilian Climate Corps is the first step to a Green New Deal."
These marchers first traveled to Butte County from their homes elsewhere in California, stretching from Sonoma County all the way to San Diego. For the next two and a half weeks, they'll be sleeping at campsites in cities and towns along their route while holding protests, rallies and visioning sessions with members of each community.
Some are survivors of wildfire and say they'll tell their stories of how climate change has affected them to anyone listening.
"We wrote letters and we are bringing letters to Senator Dianne Feinstein and Congresswoman Speaker Nancy Pelosi with our stories," says Sunrise Movement marcher Madeline Ruddell. "We're telling them your inaction is costing us."
Their vision is to increase funding for the Citizens Conservation Corps which would allow both young and middle-aged people access to health care and a livable wage while working on projects that combat climate change. While president Biden's infrastructure bill does include a group of this nature, marchers say it's too small, not funded enough and does not provide enough jobs.
"The amount of jobs and the amount of work that it'll take to transform our country at the scale necessary to stop the climate crisis is immense," says Sunrise Movement marcher Ema Govea. "It's so much work. Why not put people to work doing that work and have those be good high paying jobs?"
Other supporters and activists are slated to join the march along the way. Regardless of size, the question remains: once at the offices of these legislators, will they listen?
"We don't know what's going to happen," says Govea. "But I know that I need to do everything in my power to fight for a livable future and for good-paying jobs and for the state of California and the home that I love."
Jefferson says 'days of action' will be held when they reach Sacramento on June 2-4, Santa Rosa on June 9-10, and finally San Fransisco on June 14. This march is occurring in coordination with a similar 400-mile march across the Gulf South.
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