Environmental Justice, Land Stewardship & Climate Action
Building a Healthier, More Resilient King County — With Frontline Communities Leading the Way
Rebecca has spent decades fighting for environmental justice and a healthier future for our communities. She understands that climate change isn't experienced equally. Communities in South Seattle and South King County that have endured generations of redlining, industrial pollution and public disinvestment are also experiencing some of the greatest impacts from extreme heat, poor air quality, flooding, contaminated waterways and lack of tree canopy.
Rebecca believes climate action must do more than reduce emissions. It must improve people's health, lower household costs, protect communities from displacement, restore our natural environment, create good union jobs, and put the people most impacted by pollution and climate change at the center of decisions about their future.
Rebecca Has Been Leading on Environmental Justice for Decades
Long before environmental justice was embedded in state law, Rebecca was doing this work alongside frontline communities.
As a labor and community organizer, she worked alongside farmworkers and other workers directly exposed to environmental and workplace hazards. Later, as Executive Director of Puget Sound Sage, Rebecca brought together community organizations, labor unions, environmental advocates and communities of color to connect climate action with transit equity, affordable housing, public health and preventing displacement. She helped advance equitable transit-oriented development and community-led transportation solutions and was a founding member of Front and Centered, Washington's statewide environmental justice coalition.
That experience shaped the approach she brought to the Legislature: environmental policy should not simply reduce pollution—it should repair historic inequities and give communities the power and resources to shape their own futures.
A Record of Transformational Climate Action
In the State Senate, Rebecca helped turn years of environmental justice organizing into some of the strongest climate and environmental justice policies in the country.
Healthy Environment for All (HEAL) Act: Rebecca championed the HEAL Act, embedding environmental justice into state government and requiring agencies to consider environmental health disparities and prioritize communities most impacted by pollution. Her work helped institutionalize environmental justice considerations across state agencies.
Climate Commitment Act: Rebecca helped pass Washington's landmark Climate Commitment Act, making major polluters pay for their emissions and creating billions of dollars in investments to improve climate resilience, reduce pollution, and build a cleaner economy—with significant investments directed toward communities disproportionately harmed by pollution and climate change.
Cleaner transportation: Rebecca advanced the Clean Fuel Standard and helped deliver Move Ahead Washington, making major investments in public transit, walking, biking and multimodal transportation. As Vice Chair of the Senate Transportation Committee, she helped secure investments in transit, trails, pedestrian safety, bicycle infrastructure and fare-free transit for youth.
Climate resilience and restoration: Rebecca has supported major investments in salmon recovery, habitat restoration, climate resilience, affordable housing and community-centered infrastructure—recognizing that our natural environment, public health and community resilience are interconnected.
Rebecca's Environmental Justice Agenda for King County
King County has enormous power to shape our climate future through public transit (Metro), land use, wastewater and stormwater infrastructure, parks and open space, housing, roads, buildings and billions of dollars in public investment. Rebecca will use those tools to make King County healthier, more resilient and more equitable.
Reduce Transportation Pollution and Give People Better Choices
Transportation is a major source of climate pollution and poor air quality, particularly in communities near highways, freight corridors, ports and airports. Rebecca will expand reliable Metro service, support light rail, improve safe walking, rolling and biking infrastructure, and connect affordable housing and everyday needs to frequent transit—giving people alternatives to driving that can lower household costs and emissions.
She will also work with regional partners to reduce freight and aviation pollution through cleaner trucks and equipment, electrification and charging infrastructure, freight rail improvements, reduced idling, and lower-carbon fuels such as sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel where electrification is not yet practical.
Rebecca will prioritize pollution reduction in overburdened communities and equitable transit-oriented development that pairs new infrastructure with affordable housing and anti-displacement protections—an approach she helped advance at Puget Sound Sage.
Put Frontline Communities First
Environmental justice requires more than asking frontline communities for input after decisions have already been made.
Rebecca will prioritize climate investments in communities facing the greatest burdens from extreme heat, wildfire smoke, flooding and pollution. She will support community-led planning and co-governance models that give frontline communities meaningful power in determining how public investments are made.
And she will measure climate investments not simply by dollars spent or emissions reduced, but by whether over time they are actually improving health, reducing pollution and energy costs, building community wealth and allowing people to remain in the communities they call home.
Make Climate Resilience a Public Health Priority
Climate change is already affecting people's health. Extreme heat, wildfire smoke, flooding, sea-level rise, poor air quality and lack of tree canopy disproportionately affect communities that have historically received the least public infrastructure investment. In South Seattle and South King County, many of these burdens overlap in neighborhoods that have experienced generations of industrial pollution and public disinvestment.
Rebecca will treat climate resilience as a public health priority—expanding tree canopy and nature-based solutions, strengthening extreme heat and wildfire smoke preparedness, and investing in flood protection. She will work with communities facing rising seas and flooding to develop solutions that protect both their safety and their investment in their homes, including home elevation, voluntary buyouts and other approaches shaped by residents' needs and priorities.
She will use public health and environmental data to direct investments where they can make the greatest difference, with accessible, multilingual planning that recognizes the needs of seniors, people with disabilities, outdoor workers, Indigenous communities and immigrants. Public facilities like libraries and community centers should also provide accessible clean-air and cooling spaces during extreme weather.
Lower Energy Costs While Building a Cleaner Future
Rebecca believes the transition to a clean-energy economy should make life more affordable, not more expensive, for working families.
She will expand investments in weatherization, energy efficiency, electrification and healthy-building improvements that reduce emissions while lowering utility bills and improving indoor air quality. She will prioritize low-income households and communities facing the highest energy burdens, while supporting home retrofits and other measures to reduce noise, air pollution and visual impacts for families living near King County International Airport and other major transportation corridors. These investments must protect renters and low-income homeowners from displacement and help families achieve lasting reductions in household costs.
Rebecca will also work to ensure these improvements create family-wage union jobs, apprenticeship opportunities and pathways into clean-energy careers.
Invest in Communities Without Displacing Them
Rebecca knows that even well-intentioned public investments can accelerate displacement if the government doesn't plan for inclusive development from the beginning.
At Puget Sound Sage, she helped elevate an approach to equitable development that connected transit and climate investments with affordable housing, community ownership and anti-displacement strategies. Under her leadership, Sage worked to ensure communities that had experienced decades of disinvestment could finally benefit from major public investments without being pushed out as property values increased.
Rebecca will bring that same approach to King County. She will pair major transit, climate and infrastructure investments with strategies that preserve affordable housing, expand community land trusts and other forms of community ownership, support culturally significant small businesses and community institutions, and give community-based organizations the resources to acquire and steward land.
For Rebecca, environmental justice means the people who have borne the greatest burden of pollution and disinvestment should be the first to benefit from public investment—not the first to be displaced by it.
Honor Tribal Sovereignty and Indigenous Stewardship
Tribal governments must be partners from the beginning—not stakeholders consulted after decisions have already been made.
Rebecca will support early and ongoing government-to-government consultation, protection of treaty rights and cultural resources, co-stewardship, salmon and watershed restoration, and greater recognition of Indigenous ecological knowledge. She has also proposed working with Tribes and the County Executive to explore a meaningful and formalized collaboration structure for ongoing Indigenous and Tribal engagement.
Tribal nations have stewarded these lands and waters since time immemorial. Rebecca believes public policy is stronger when Indigenous leadership and knowledge are centered rather than treated as secondary input. Together with our tribal nations we can build creative innovative ways to increase more resiliency, health outcomes and meaningful careers in our county. None of this work can be done without our tribal partners, most particularly how we steward our County’s natural resources. equitable partnership will embed Indigenous knowledge and values into the very foundation of Rebecca’s advocacy to the County.
Protect Clean Water, Salmon and Puget Sound
Climate action also means protecting the lands and waters that sustain our region. King County’s Conservation Futures Fund is an important tool for protecting natural lands, and Rebecca supports expanding opportunities for Tribal nations to access these funds and lead conservation and stewardship projects.
Rebecca will accelerate investments in wastewater modernization, green stormwater infrastructure, floodplain restoration, impervious surface reduction, wetland protection and salmon habitat recovery. She will support a holistic, nature-based approach to watershed stewardship that recognizes rivers, forests, shorelines and urban ecosystems as interconnected rather than treating each as separate infrastructure.
These investments are essential for public health and climate resilience, as well as salmon recovery, Tribal treaty rights and the long-term health of Puget Sound.
Protect Forests, Wetlands and Natural Carbon Sinks
Rebecca will protect forests, wetlands, shorelines, watersheds and other natural carbon sinks while fighting urban sprawl and habitat loss.
Her approach is rooted in long-term stewardship rather than short-term extraction: protecting biodiversity and mature forests, restoring habitat, strengthening climate resilience and preserving the natural systems future generations will depend upon and deserve.
Build a More Sustainable Local Food System
Protecting King County's environment also means protecting the farms, agricultural lands and food systems that sustain our region.
Rebecca will support farmland preservation and climate-resilient agriculture while expanding opportunities for immigrant & refugees, Black, Brown and Indigenous, and young and first generation farmers to access land and build successful agricultural businesses. She will support stronger connections between local farmers and schools, food banks and other public institutions. She will work with farmers, Tribes and conservation partners to protect both agricultural viability and healthy watersheds.
This work also requires recognizing farmworkers as essential partners in our climate future. Rebecca began her career organizing alongside farmworkers, and she will continue fighting for a food system that protects the land while ensuring the people who grow and harvest our food can work safely, earn a family wage and build a future in our region.
Reduce Waste and Build a Circular Economy
King County also has a major responsibility for what happens to the materials we consume after we're finished with them.
Rebecca will work to reduce waste, expand recycling and composting, support reuse and repair, and strengthen King County's long-term solid-waste strategy. She will support investments and partnerships that keep usable materials out of landfills and create opportunities for local businesses and workers in repair, reuse, recycling and material recovery.
As King County plans for the future of its solid-waste system, Rebecca will insist that decisions are made transparently, protect surrounding communities from disproportionate environmental impacts, and advance our broader climate and environmental justice goals.
Make Climate Investments Create Good Union Jobs
The transition to a cleaner economy should create opportunity, not greater inequality.
Rebecca will ensure King County's investments in transit, clean energy, building decarbonization, wastewater, green infrastructure and climate resilience support family-wage union jobs, apprenticeship opportunities and pathways into the trades—particularly for BIPOC workers, immigrants, women, young people and workers transitioning from fossil-fuel-dependent industries.
She will also connect energy efficiency and building upgrades with affordability so that climate investments reduce utility costs for working families rather than leaving them to shoulder the cost of the transition. She will partner with legacy Black homeowners and city, county and state governments to support home repairs, weatherization and improvements that help families preserve their homes, build generational wealth and remain in their communities.
Defend Our Climate Progress
With the federal government rolling back environmental and climate protections, state and local leadership has never been more important.
Rebecca has spent years helping Washington build some of the strongest climate and environmental justice policies in the country. She will fight to protect that progress and use King County's authority, investments and purchasing power to continue reducing emissions and protecting public health—even when the federal government moves in the opposite direction.
King County should also work aggressively to protect federal resources already committed to clean energy, transportation, environmental restoration and climate resilience and partner with cities, Tribes and the State to ensure important projects continue moving forward.
Measure Whether Environmental Justice Investment Is Actually Improving People's Lives
Rebecca believes the government should be accountable not simply for how much money it spends, but for whether those investments actually improve people's lives.
She will push King County to measure whether climate and environmental investments are reducing pollution and health disparities, increasing tree canopy, lowering household energy burdens, improving transit access, restoring salmon habitat and watersheds, protecting forests and wetlands, creating good jobs, and reaching the communities that have experienced the greatest environmental harms.
And Rebecca will pay particular attention to whether public investments are helping existing residents remain in their communities. Climate justice isn't achieved because government adopts the right plan or uses the right language. It is achieved when people can breathe cleaner air, pay lower bills, live in healthier neighborhoods, access good jobs and remain in the communities they helped build.
Climate Justice Means Building a Future Everyone Can Thrive In
Rebecca's vision is not simply a lower-carbon King County. It is a King County where children can breathe cleaner air; families spend less on energy and transportation; salmon return to healthier rivers; neighborhoods have trees and protection from extreme heat; communities aren't displaced when public investment arrives; and the transition to a clean economy creates good jobs and greater economic opportunity.
Most importantly, the communities that have borne the greatest burden of pollution and disinvestment must have the power to help lead that transition and share in its benefits. As Rebecca has consistently argued throughout her work, environmental justice means shifting both public investment and decision-making power toward frontline communities.