Rising Tide: Van Jones on Green Jobs

A little while back I mentioned Van Jones in Green is Good Business. Mr. Jones is a civil-rights lawyer and activist whose initiatives hold the combined promise of solving social inequality and environmental problems. They are intertwined or share, in the words of Anne Fahey, roots in “kitchen table issues: jobs, industry, manufacturing, health, education.”

Fahey’s recent article, A Wave of Green Jobs can Lift All Boats, delves into Mr. Jones’ social and environmental leadership in, what she calls, his “moment in history.” If you haven’t met Jones yet, this is a good place to get to know him.

And you should. Van Jones is powerful force for economic and environmental change who “has the ear of every 2008 Democratic presidential contender as well as top policy-makers like Nancy Pelosi. He’s all over the national climate scene,” according to Fahey.

Mr. Jones, who founded the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights which promotes alternatives to violence and incarceration, got the City of Oakland to adopt the Ella Baker Center’s “Green Jobs Corps” proposal, and he is working to create the first-ever Green Enterprise Zone in Oakland.

His latest endeavor is Green for All, an initiative

to help build a green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty. By advocating for a national commitment to job training, employment and entrepreneurial opportunities in the emerging green economy – especially for people from disadvantaged communities — we fight both poverty and pollution at the same time. We are committed to securing one billion dollars by 2012 to create “green pathways out of poverty” for 250,000 people in the United States, by greatly expanding federal government and private sector commitments to “green-collar” jobs.

Here’s Van Jones on Green Collar Jobs…

A Wave of Green Jobs can Lift All Boats by Anne Fahey at GreenBiz.