July 2025 Newsletter!
Welcome to our July newsletter! Before we share exciting campaign updates and sizzling summer events, we want to express our gratitude for the incredible support and generosity from our community over the past several weeks. We’ve now passed the halfway mark of our goal, and testimonials from volunteers and donors are coming in daily, all expressing what 350PDX means to them and why we all need to step up to support. (Check them out here – it’s an inspiring read!)
We’re starting the first day of the month with an exciting announcement: two committed 350PDX supporters have joined up to create a $35,000 matching fund because they believe in our work and in you. Starting today and for the next 10 days, all donations to 350PDX will be doubled, up to $35,000!
DONATE TO 350PDX
Upcoming Events
Summer’s in full swing and July is a busy month! Stay up to date on all the ways to get involved with 350PDX on our calendar. Here’s some big events we’re especially excited about:
Wednesday, July 16 – Rabble Rouser: a Training in Joyful Resistance and Collective Action (feat. Pattie Gonia)! Our 350PDX Arts Team will be hosting a Puppet Workshop as part of this event, along with many other useful trainings in grassroots organizing, lobbying, mutual aid, and more. Dinner is included, too! If you want to attend and help table for 350PDX, you can get in for free. Reach out to dineen@350pdx.org for more info!
Thursday, July 17 – 350PDX July Action Night & Pedalpalooza Ride! Join us for a two-part Action Night that you won’t want to miss! We will be focusing on bringing joy, curiosity, and thoughtful attention to our urban canopy and its inequities which fall along lines of historical racism and income disparities.
6:00 pm Urban Shade Equity Pedalpalooza Ride – Meet at Lents Park (SE Corner Lents Park near SE Steele St & SE 92nd Ave) We will ride by the newly constructed Trees In the Curb Zone Pilot Project and experience the differences in shade canopy as we make our way to Laurelhurst Park. Kids welcome, though they should be able to keep up with a pace that’s casual for adults. It’s a one-way (not a loop) ride ending at Laurelhurst Park.
7:30 pm Action Night – Laurelhurst Park – Picnic Spot A (Near SE Oak St & SE 35th Ave) We will meet up with the riders for refreshments, speakers, and information from partner organizations. We’ll take some time to celebrate recent shade equity wins and take action to support a more equitable urban forest. There will also be a very exciting SILENT AUCTION raising funds for 350PDX with prizes from local businesses (SymbiOp, Clever Cycles, Oaks Park, Alder Creek Kayaks, and more).
RSVP (not necessary but helpful for planning).
Come to both the bike ride and Action Night, or just Action Night!
TEAM NEWS
Forest Defense Team
Shade Equity:
The forest defense team is hosting the 4th annual Urban Shade Equity Pedalpalooza Ride! See info above!
Starting this month, City Council will be reviewing the Portland Urban Forest Plan – which is critical for protecting, preserving, restoring, and expanding the urban forest in an equitable and sustainable way. Stay tuned for if/how we will get involved.
State Forests:
Our state forests are primarily managed as production forests. To shed light on what this state forest management actually looks like beneath the canopy, our team is going to be following the “Middle Big Noise” timber sale. The coast range is very productive and efficient in carbon fixing, which is important for ecology, habitat, and water quality, but also for offsetting global climate change. As we track this sale, we will be heading out to the land, bringing awareness, and demonstrating what State Forest management means on the ground.
Protecting Forest Park:
PGE has appealed the city council’s decision, which prevented them from clearcutting almost five acres of Forest Park for new energy transmission lines. Crag Law Center is supporting 3 environmental groups defending the city’s decision, and will present their case to the Land Use Board of Appeals.
Industrial Biomass:
Two big wins in the industrial biomass industry:
First, the various proposals from Mike Less to sell off public lands have been struck down. If this went forward, it would have cleared the way for Drax and other climate villains to turn our forests into wood pellets to be shipped overseas. Second, our allies fighting biomass plants in California have defeated Golden State Natural Resources — which proposed to build two industrial-scale wood pellet plants and a storage and export terminal in Northern California. Read the press release here.
GET CONNECTED: Join the Forest Defense Team meetings on the first and third Monday of each month from 6:00-7:30 pm. Contact volunteer team leads Felice Kelly (felice.kelly@gmail.com) or Tyler Gilmore (tyler@350pdx.org) to get involved.
Climate Policy Team
State legislative session concludes.
Oregon’s legislative session finished up with a flurry of activity late Friday night, passing several of our priority bills. Concerningly, the session did not result in large-scale progress on climate justice priorities, and it ended without the approval of a transportation package that’s needed to fund the Oregon Department of Transportation for the next 8 years.
That said, several of the bills we advocated for did pass, and none of the bills we opposed moved forward. Bills that passed included HB 2081 (requires the Treasury to analyze and manage climate risk in our state’s PERS investments), as well as several bills related to a more efficient electrical grid and to utilities oversight and affordability. Farmworker disaster relief received a bit of funding as well. Read more about the results for our priority bills here.
Though this was a difficult budget year amidst a challenging political situation at the federal level, we are disappointed our lawmakers chose to delay necessary actions to transition to a more sustainable social and economic system. Putting off climate justice today will only become more costly tomorrow. Thank you for working together as a community to speak up about these important topics!
Fossil Fuel Resistance Team
June was a successful month! We finished the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) comment period and submitted thousands of comments against Zenith’s Air Contaminant Discharge Permit. In the final days of the comment period we personally delivered 3,095 handwritten comments to the DEQ! Now we await DEQ’s decision.
We also co-hosted a fantastic Rumble on the River at Green Anchors, along the banks of the Willamette. It was the 24th Rumble community forum in our series, with over 100 people in attendance! Thank you so much for joining us.
GET CONNECTED: The Fossil Fuel Resistance Team meets every 2nd and 4th Tuesday of the month at 5:30 pm, rotating between meeting in-person and virtually on Zoom. Our next meeting is on Tuesday, July 8 at 5:30pm and is virtual. It’s a great time to jump in! Please RSVP to dineen@350pdx.org for the Zoom link. New to the team? Our team leads can also meet with you 1:1 before our meeting for an orientation, if you’d like! Just reach out to dineen@350pdx.org
Community Development
The 350PDX Book Club meets Wednesday, July 2nd, for our virtual meeting from 6:30-8:00pm. Our July book choice is We Will Be Jaguars by Nemonte Nenquimo. If you’ve read the book, or just want to join for an enriching conversation about climate justice and resistance movements in the Global south, feel free to attend!
We’ll meet in person on August 6th at the 350PDX office to discuss The Land of Milk and Honey by C Pam Zhang.
More info about both meetings and RSVPs can be found on the 350PDX Book Club page.
Volunteer Spotlight
Lizy Johnson
Lizy came to 350PDX seeking opportunities to learn and build community around issues of climate justice, but she was so new to the field that she didn’t know where to start. She tried out a few teams but found a home in the Book Club. Her professional background is in museums, which has shaped her belief in the power of inclusive learning spaces. Stories can be that entry point for individuals, regardless of background, to gain exposure to new knowledge and perspectives and to build the confidence to talk with others about difficult topics like climate change.
350 Washington County Team
We’ve been working on a big new project to put on an Electrification and Sustainability Fair in Hillsboro on August 9; lots of planning is happening in partnership with the City of Hillsboro and with local allies. We have tabling opportunities for green energy and environmental advocate groups – let us know if you are interested. And we need volunteers for the event! If you’d like to volunteer, please check out the opportunities here, and you can email 350WashCo@gmail.com with any questions.
Our team tracked the legislative session and are glad that a few bills got across the finish line! We fought a losing battle to keep the County Sustainability Office funded; the last staff member is gone.
Our next online meeting will take place at 6:30pm on Tuesday, July 8. For the link, join us here. Our general activities include: tracking government at multiple levels around climate and environment, connecting with the Beaverton and the Tigard Climate Action teams, stewarding our Pollinator Garden at Bagley Park in Hillsboro, and more! We always welcome newcomers to our events and to our monthly online meetings (6:30pm on the second Tuesday of the month).
SW Team
Welcome to the Southwest Neighborhood Team, which includes neighborhoods on the south and west sides of Portland. We work together to raise awareness of the climate emergency.
Our street corner demonstrations continue weekly in July, every Friday from 4:00-5:00pm at SW Garden Home & SW Olsen Road. We reach hundreds of commuters with our climate action signs in a highly visible location. Parking is available in the Garden Home Community Center lot, or reach us via bus or bike. We have extra signs to share!
GET CONNECTED: Join our monthly Zoom meeting on Monday, July 21st, from 6:30-7:30pm. To get involved, please contact Pat Kaczmarek at patk5@msn.com.
DONATE TO 350PDX
Thank you for reading our monthly newsletter, and for being part of the 350PDX community. Before we close our July newsletter, we’d like to remind you of our matching fund. A $50 donation now becomes $100 to power climate justice organizing when we need it most. We know it’s a tough time for many — and that’s why this opportunity is so powerful. Your gifts now go twice as far, starting today and until July 10.
With so much gratitude,
Cherice, Dineen, Irene, Jessica, Katie
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