We’re excited to introduce to the community our new Youth Environmental Justice Alliance Organizer, Alejandra Gallegos-Chacón. Alejandra was born in Quito, Ecuador. “I was born two weeks later than planned,” she says, “because even back then I wasn’t about to let a man tell […]
By Shanice Clarke In early November, Black people in the environmental justice movement organized together to co-create solutions for liberation in Detroit, MI for the Black 2 Just Transition Training & Assembly. Within environmental justice movements, Black people often experience erasure and invisibility, while […]
OPAL is proud to present our 2017 Annual Report! This year, we decided to create a consolidated publication to share our many victories from the past year with our community. OPAL tackles many different issues around Environmental Justice, but in this one place you […]
Organizers in Training is now the BRU Fellowship! This new, six-month cohort program will enable OPAL to have a more consistent presence organizing on Portland’s buses, while we deepen our investment in developing leadership in our communities. Last Saturday, we onboarded the five leaders […]
We are so proud of 2017 Organizer-in-Training Alex Mijares, who is now advocating in our community and across the country for a safer, healthier environment. In this national PBS Newshour special on Oregon’s diesel exhaust problem, he talks about living in low-income housing in […]
For the past seven years OPAL has conducted Organizers In Training (OIT). This program has produced a number of organizers who have gone on to do amazing work in the Social Justice movement. We are proud of the work we have accomplished through OIT. In […]
We’re excited to announce a major shift in how OPAL builds power for transit riders through our Bus Riders Unite membership program! In previous years, OPAL and BRU brought together a cohort each summer in the Organizers-in-Training program, a ten-week intensive that gave new […]
Hello, my name is Alex Mario Mijares. I grew up in a rough environment in San Fernando Valley, California. My neighborhoods were diverse in race & class. Communities there were, and still are today, experiencing issues with affordable housing, illnesses, jobs, drugs, and gang […]
My name is Tristan and I am a member of OPAL’s Organizers-in-Training cohort this summer. I’ve always been perplexed by the question, “Where are you from?” My family were wanderers. My parents were both in the military. Strictly speaking I was born in North […]
By Julie Reardon, Organizer-In-Training I was born and raised in a suburb outside of Riverside, California to a Mexican mother and Irish-German father with three siblings. As a child of the 80’s, I thrived on pop-culture, climbing trees with a book in hand and […]