Grijalva Wants to Diversify Environmental Movement

*There’s a growing movement of Chicano/Latino environmentalists, I’m sure Grijalva has it in mind when he talks about diversity. But my feeling is he wants to go deeper, to make the environment an even more prominent issue in the Latino community. VL

By Emma Dumain, Roll Call

It’s not easy being a ranking member on a congressional committee, where any major legislative and policy decision is made primarily at the discretion of the chairman.

That struggle is particularly potent for Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva, the top Democrat on the Natural Resources Committee.

The Arizona lawmaker, who is also the co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, wants to pass bills that address climate change. He wants to reauthorize the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which uses federal oil and gas leases to pay for public parks and historic sites and is operating on a three-year extension secured in the 2015 year-end omnibus bill. He wants to shield Native American tribes from congressional interference.

But addressing those issues via the committee requires Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop, R-Utah, to sign off, and that didn’t happen in 2015. So Grijalva has instead channeled his energy to promote a different topic: Diversifying the environmental movement.

So Grijalva has dedicated much of 2015 reaching out via roundtables and forums to that new constituency, with special attention to the Latino and Native American communities. His emphasis is on public education and empowerment, understanding that legislation will only get passed if there is an expanded constituency demanding it.

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