Issue: Organizational Development

Environmental nonprofits often need to alter their board practices, build connections, and create co-powered solutions in order to recruit and retain Black members on their boards. This report argues that philanthropic funders don’t trust BIPOC-led organizations as much as white-led organizations, and this causes fewer Black placements onto nonprofit boards. Environmental nonprofit boards need to be “ready” for Black board members by showing true dedication to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and to combatting racism. Boards need to “recruit” by creating and network and pipeline of potential board members, and they need to “retain” by doing comprehensive onboarding, dealing with microagressions and overt racism, and not tokenizing Black board members. This report breaks down all these lessons in more detail.

Lack of racial and ethnic representation among journalists may relate to the common misperception that White Americans are the most concerned about climate change. Although news reporting on climate change plays a crucial role in shaping public understanding of the issue, little is known about racial/ethnic representation in climate change reporting. In a survey of over 1,000 professional journalists, this resource finds that White journalists were much more likely than Black, Hispanic, or multiracial journalists to have reported on at least one local climate change story in the past year. This lack of representation may contribute to the common misperception that concern about climate change is the domain of affluent Whites, when, in fact, people of color are actually more vulnerable to, and more concerned about, the impacts of climate change than their White counterparts. This resource also reports journalist perceptions of, and interest in, climate change reporting by race/ethnicity.