• California Equitable Home Electrification Program
  • From 2021-2022, Emerald Cities Bay Area and RMI facilitated a community of practice between 10 teams representing local government and community organizations, to co-create equitable electrification solutions for existing homes. Teams worked together to identify electrification goals and timelines for their communities, and began to develop ideas for programs and policies to achieve those goals.
  • The Equitable Home Electrification Toolkit grew out of this community of practice, and enables communities across the United States to take meaningful steps toward equitably electrifying their existing housing stock through a planning process designed to maximize engagement and co-ownership between local governments and frontline community groups.

• Building Decarbonization High-Road Training Partnership
  • In partnership with the local pre-apprenticeship training program, construction unions, contractors, researchers and policy advocates, ECBA is working to figure out how to make residential electrification jobs high-quality and accessible.

• San Francisco Building Decarbonization Advocacy
  • Partnered with PODER and the San Francisco Department of Environment to convene the “Anchor Partners Network” to establish equitable zero emissions residential building strategies that informed SF’s 2020 Climate Action Strategy  update. Through a series of stakeholders meetings with over 250 community members, shared the twin goals of residential building decarbonization and racial equity, and collected and incorporated community feedback to prioritize key strategies to promote equitable and just transition to low-emissions, energy efficient all-electric buildings that generate high-value co-benefits such as energy security, job creation, economic stimulus, resilience, and racial and economic justice.

• BAAQMD 
  • The Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD) and Emerald CIties Bay Area have partnered with other organizations to mobilize the Air District to pass market-forcing regulations and lead an equitable implementation process that catalyzes action elsewhere. The Air District is poised to become the first public agency to set a deadline ending the sale of natural gas appliances. In its draft rules 9-4 and 9-6, staff has proposed requiring that all new water heaters, small boilers, and furnaces emit zero-NOX.The proposed compliance dates for the zero-emission standards are 2027 for small water heaters, 2029 for furnaces, and 2031 for boilers and large water heaters. ECBA has meaningfully engaged with organizations representing frontline communities and labor unions to ensure that equity concerns and implementation processes that benefit vulnerable populations are centered in the process.

E-Contractor Academy is a free workshop series designed to build the capacity of small, minority construction contractors to successfully do business in climate critical fields such as renewable energy, energy efficiency and building decarbonization.

Training is tailored to growth sectors in the green construction industry and includes instruction on the regulatory and technical aspects of green projects, how to market themselves in green construction sectors, and how to leverage certifications to win public projects. Contractors also receive instruction on financial well-being and are connected to insurance brokers, sureties and lenders, enabling them to bid on more and larger projects.

E-Contractor Academy includes comprehensive one-on-one business support to ensure that small, minority firms are at the forefront of the emerging green construction industry. Specific support services include:

• Logo design and branding
• Business certifications (MBE, WBE, SBE, LBE, etc.)
• Book-keeping 
• Connections to the construction trade unions
• Estimating
• Referrals to project opportunities

Ready to get started? Complete the application here: https://emeraldcities.org/bay-area-fall2024-econtractor-academy

ECC’s RENEW Multi-Family Housing initiative takes a comprehensive approach to achieving energy and water efficiency savings in multi-family rental housing, particularly in developments that serve low- and moderate-income residents.

Multi-family building owners understand the multiple economic and operating benefits that can be achieved through energy and water retrofits. But too often their operations staff have neither the time nor expertise needed to effectively implement complex efficiency measures. And nonprofit building owners that serve low- and moderate-income communities rarely have access to necessary working capital or project financing for retrofits.

RENEW Multi-Family assists building owners with all aspects of retrofit project implementation and end-to-end technical support including planning and implementing cost-saving measures, tracking energy and water usage. Furthermore, recommendations for upgrades are aligned with federal Weatherization Assistance Program (“WAP”), San Francisco’s Energy Watch and BayREN Programs, utility programs, and building codes.

Interested in learning more about RENEW Multi-Family Housing or retrofitting your affordable housing property? Contact Avni Jamdar at ajamdar@emeraldcities.org

Anchors in Resilient Communities (ARC) addresses the social, economic, and environmental determinants of health by leveraging the assets and capacities of community-based partners and anchor institutions such as hospitals, universities, and local governments. ARC aims to expand community wealth and ownership opportunities, improve health outcomes, and strengthen the capacity of communities of color and low- and moderate- income residents to be resilient in the face of climate and economic disruption. 

ARC operates through an internal team and a steering committee that meets frequently to debrief local issues and find procurement and investment solutions through projects that use the ARC model to strengthen community health, wealth, and climate resilience. ARC holds space for collaborative learning through public learning sessions to discuss topics such as funding opportunities, community-led project support, and policy and advocacy topics. ARC’s first project in the Bay Area has been coordinating the procurement and investment of Bay Area institutions to bolster the regional food system. 

For more information about Anchors in Resilient Communities (ARC), visit our website! Or contact Carli Yoro at cyoro@emeraldcities.org

• San Francisco Community Workforce Agreement
  • ECC organized a broad coalition of community and labor organizations and successfully negotiated a Community Workforce Agreement (CWA) with the SF Building Trades in 2011. This was the first time ever in San Francisco that the Trades sat down with the community to negotiate. Trades would allocate the maximum allowed number of apprentices on a trade-by-trade basis. The Community Apprentice (second apprentice called to jobsite) clause ensures that 50% of all apprentices will be disadvantaged SF residents, who meet the City’s criteria , and come from CityBuild or other pre-apprenticeship programs in SF. The CWA also requires a good faith effort to ensure 30% of all work is done by disadvantaged SF residents. Emerald Cities’ Steering Committee has standing to grieve on certain clauses in the CWA. ECC also has power to monitor outcomes. ECC and the SF Building Trades conduct joint outreach efforts to Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) subcontractors and other DBE community groups in SF to promote DBE work opportunities available on covered projects. Covered projects currently include all of ECC’s affordable housing retrofit projects.