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Activists Hope For Good Turnout As Kalamazoo Considers Declaring A Climate "Emergency"

A sign in blue, green and orange paint says "respect mother." The "o" in the word "mother" is a globe.
Sehvilla Mann
/
WMUK

Climate change is on the agenda Monday evening at Kalamazoo City Hall. A recently-formed coalition hopes commissioners will adopt a resolutiondeclaring a “climate emergency" at their meeting Monday night.

The resolution states that the natural world faces an urgent threat from global warming. It also says that southwest Michigan has already seen increased flooding and heat waves from climate change.

Mary Ann Renz is with the Kalamazoo chapterof the Citizens’ Climate Lobby, a nonprofit group that supports the resolution.

“The heat has been increasing during the summer, the polar vortex in the winter. I know I heard reports of homeless people who were really in dire straits when they had no place to go and the weather was as cold as it was,” Renz told WMUK.

Denise Keele is with the Kalamazoo Climate Crisis Coalition, a recently formed umbrella group of local organizations concerned about global warming. The KCCC has been working to build support for the resolution. It's encouraging members to rally outside City Hall before the commission meeting.

Keele, who teaches political science at Western Michigan University, says declaring a climate emergency is not just a hollow gesture.

“It actually has a huge substantive effect in serving as a catalyst for all the people who work on this issue to say, ‘Oh, wait a minute, we really are now going to take this issue seriously, and what we’re doing is not in vain…,’” she said.

The resolution urges the city to keep working on its climate action plan and to network with other concerned local governments.

Kalamazoo Township declared a climate emergency in June.

Sehvilla Mann joined WMUK’s news team in 2014 as a reporter on the local government and education beats. She covered those topics and more in eight years of reporting for the Station, before becoming news director in 2022.