Climate change is an everything and everyone problem. And solving it is a shared responsibility.

Climate change has been called an “everything” issue, meaning it already impacts all aspects of our lives: housing, health, education, economic development and more. It’s also an “everybody” issue. As the climate worsens, we need everybody to begin asking the climate question.

This year, Kresge brought together grantees from two powerful community-led initiatives in one space as it hosted the Climate Change, Health, and Equity (CCHE) and Climate Resilient and Equitable Water Systems (CREWS) convenings in its hometown of Detroit.

CCHE grantees focus on bridging generations

For CCHE, the final convening of the current initiative celebrated five years of partners’ impactful work — partners who address challenges at the local to national level, from San Diego to Miami and many places in between, accelerating equitable practices and policies and deepening collaborations to address issues like extreme heat, systemic flooding, climate gentrification, decarbonization, resilience hubs and more.

The CCHE convening brought together more than 100 community-based advocates, health and health care practitioners, public sector leaders and philanthropic allies. The focus of this year’s convening, “Elders, Yelders & Young Leaders: Intergenerational Care & Movement Building for Climate and Health,” focused on bringing more young people and community leaders into the space to broaden and deepen collaboration across generations.

Bridging generations allows the climate movement to draw on a wide range of expertise, creating more comprehensive and effective solutions, Kresge Environment Managing Director Shamar Bibbins said.

“We continue to see the power and promise of generations working together to achieve equitable climate action and create healthier communities,” Bibbins said. “Intergenerational collaboration ensures that critical knowledge is passed down, strategies and lessons learned from previous movements are shared and that the unique perspective of our young leaders is a critical component of our strategies.”

CREWS grantees strategize

CREWS partners work deeply in place to implement more climate-resilient and equitable green stormwater infrastructure in cities; help build a national water advocacy movement; and work to ensure that local, state and federal water infrastructure dollars are reaching communities that need it the most.

At the convening, participants across the climate and water equity field co-created the agenda, which enabled discussions on issues that were the most relevant to them, and helped foster an engaging and interactive experience that encouraged collaboration, creativity and peer-to-peer learning.

In addition to celebrating Kresge’s deep partnership and investment in cities like Detroit, the co-located events offered opportunities for shared learning and thought partnership space, especially focused on supporting a solidarity movement centered on the intersectionality of water and climate justice.

CCHE and CREWS partners also visited community-based organizations in Detroit to explore grassroots solutions to critical issues such as food sovereignty, flooding, green stormwater infrastructure, air quality monitoring and community benefits.

Downloadable resources, presentations and videos from the event are available on the CCHE and CREWS convening web pages.

Recognizing that climate change profoundly threatens our ability to advance its mission of expanding equity and opportunity in cities across America, Kresge has committed to integrate climate action throughout its grantmaking and operations. To address the foundation’s environmental impact while supporting in-person connections, Kresge partnered with Elevate to offset the carbon footprint of the gatherings.