119-hres347

[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 347 Introduced in House

    (IH) ]

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119th CONGRESS
 1st Session
H. RES. 347

 Recognizing the significant impact and legacy of Cecil Corbin-Mark in 
 the environmental justice community and further recognizing that 
 climate change most severely impacts vulnerable and disadvantaged 
 communities in the United States and around the world, and that it is 
 the responsibility of the United States Government to work with its 
 global partners to promote environmental justice.

_______________________________________________________________________

 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

 April 24, 2025

Mr. Espaillat submitted the following resolution; which was referred to 
 the Committee on Foreign Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

 RESOLUTION

 Recognizing the significant impact and legacy of Cecil Corbin-Mark in 
 the environmental justice community and further recognizing that 
 climate change most severely impacts vulnerable and disadvantaged 
 communities in the United States and around the world, and that it is 
 the responsibility of the United States Government to work with its 
 global partners to promote environmental justice.

Whereas climate change poses an existential threat for this generation and 
 generations to come;
Whereas the world is already experiencing the omnipresent danger of climate 
 change;
Whereas the recent, current, and future impacts of changes in the Earth's 
 climate present real and immediate dangers to the United States and 
 countries around the world;
Whereas there needs to be a global approach to addressing issues of climate 
 change and emergency preparedness;
Whereas climate change is a threat multiplier to global conflicts, leading to 
 droughts, floods, hurricanes, heat waves, fires, natural disasters, and 
 food shortages, in turn exacerbating competition and conflict over 
 resources, displacing large populations, and creating migration and 
 refugee crises;
Whereas the Paris Agreement acknowledges that all ``Parties should, when taking 
 action to address climate change, respect, promote and consider their 
 respective obligations on human rights, the right to health, the rights 
 of indigenous peoples, local communities, migrants, children, persons 
 with disabilities and people in vulnerable situations and the right to 
 development, as well as gender equality, empowerment of women and 
 intergenerational equity'';
Whereas the Paris Agreement notes the importance of ``climate justice'' when 
 mitigating and adapting to climate change and recognizes ``the need for 
 an effective and progressive response to the urgent threat of climate 
 change'';
Whereas the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Special Report on Global 
 Warming of 1.5 C acknowledges that already vulnerable and marginalized 
 communities include communities of color, indigenous peoples, and 
 agrarian communities, among others, and that these communities 
 experience disproportionate impacts of climate change;
Whereas the World Health Organization finds that 7,000,000 people die 
 prematurely every year from diseases exacerbated by air pollution, a 
 major contributor to climate change, around 90 percent of which are in 
 low- and middle-income countries;
Whereas the World Health Organization considers air pollution as the greatest 
 environmental risk to health, and estimates that ``between 2030 and 
 2050, climate change is expected to cause 250,000 additional deaths per 
 year, from malnutrition, malaria, diarrhea and heat stress'';
Whereas disparities in poverty and health will only increase as climate change 
 becomes more extreme;
Whereas heat islands, urban areas with little green space leading to constantly 
 higher temperatures, disproportionately harm the health and well-being 
 of people of color and the elderly;
Whereas access to clean water, in the United States and around the globe, is 
 severely impacted by climate change, adversely affecting communities of 
 color that already struggle with clean water access;
Whereas studies demonstrate that catastrophic hurricanes impacting the United 
 States and Caribbean nations in recent years have been magnified by the 
 effects of climate change;
Whereas families in the ``dry corridor'' of Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador 
 lost up to 80 percent of their corn and bean crops in both the first and 
 second harvest seasons of 2018 due to drought;
Whereas rising temperatures, more extreme weather events, and increasingly 
 unpredictable rainfall patterns disrupt agricultural cycles, endangering 
 the livelihood of Central American farmers and driving migration;
Whereas in southern Africa, crop yield losses compounded by climate change would 
 increase food prices by an average of 12 percent by 2030, placing a 
 drastic strain on poor households, who spend as much as 60 percent of 
 their income on food, the resulting malnutrition could lead to a 23-
 percent increase in severe stunting of normal growth and development;
Whereas 800,000,000 people in South Asia depend on water from the Himalayas, and 
 as temperatures warm and the ice recedes, the combination of droughts 
 and the reduced flow threaten Nepal's tourism industry as well as the 
 lives of rural farmers;
Whereas Small Island Developing States acutely face health risks resulting from 
 climate change, which increases flooding due to sea-level rise and 
 raises exposure to infectious diseases due to the contamination of 
 freshwater supplies; and
Whereas Cecil Corbin-Mark, Deputy Director of WE ACT for Environmental Justice, 
 dedicated his career to uplifting environmental justice communities, 
 from his native Harlem to around the globe, fighting to combat systemic 
 inequities faced by communities of color: Now, therefore, be it
 Resolved, That the House of Representatives--

    (1) recognizes the significant impact and legacy of Cecil 
 Corbin-Mark in the environmental justice community and further 
 recognizes that climate change most severely impacts vulnerable 
 and disadvantaged communities in the United States and around 
 the world, and that it is the responsibility of the United 
 States Government to work with its global partners to promote 
 environmental justice and climate justice;

    (2) recognizes that all efforts to adapt to and mitigate 
 climate change must include specific protections for and 
 acknowledgment of the harm to communities of color, indigenous 
 peoples, and other frontline communities around the world;

    (3) recognizes that mitigating climate change must be a 
 global endeavor, in which the United States should act as a 
 leader among the international community;

    (4) urges the United States Government to expand 
 collaboration and cooperation among its global partners to 
 pursue policies that prioritize climate adaptation among 
 vulnerable and disadvantaged communities, given the 
 disproportionate impact climate change has on minority 
 communities, who are least responsible for the causes of 
 climate change yet bear the greatest burden of its effects;

    (5) expresses the need for all countries to promote 
 vulnerable community-focused adaptation to occur across all 
 sectors, including in agriculture, infrastructure, and health;

    (6) recognizes and encourages all countries to undertake 
 inclusive stakeholder engagement when developing policies to 
 address environmental justice and climate justice; and

    (7) expresses that immediate, multilateral action is needed 
 to drastically reduce global greenhouse gas emissions in order 
 to mitigate the effects of climate change.
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