KSEC wants you for its Just Transition Working Group

Editor’s Note: The following is a guest blog post from a guest blogger. The views and opinions expressed in this guest blog do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Renew Appalachia or of the Mountain Association for Community Economic Development (MACED). Over the past year, I’ve had the privilege of working with the Kentucky Student Environmental Coalition’s Just Transition Working Group. The working group is made up of students and non-student youth from across the state who wish to promote a transition to local-based economies in which workers, citizens and the environment are protected. This fall semester, we laid the groundwork to launch a fair coal severance campaign. Through this campaign, we’ll be working to assure that taxes collected from coal companies for mining coal are used in coal producing and coal impacted counties in a way that enhances sustainable economic development. Growing up in a former coal town in Eastern Kentucky, I had little hope for the region. The coal industry that once thrived in my town left the land, water and economy in ruin. For several years, I vowed to leave Kentucky as soon as I possibly could, and saw escaping the area as the only course to success. Finding a community of environmentalists and other progressive-minded people, however, made me feel differently. The skills I learned from KSEC led me to discover my power as an activist and feel that I have the power to change the broken systems that allow Appalachia’s problems to persist. This drive to create a...