Whereas, an environmental condition adversely affecting Earth and its inhabitants once referred to as “climate change” has advanced to become a climate emergency including:

Ocean acidification, damage to marine ecosystems and food sources, and a rise in sea levels resulting in flooding and the displacement of coastal businesses and residences;Extreme weather events, including extremes of temperature as well as increasingly devastating storms and wildfires, causing severe harm to America’s agriculture, forestry and tourism industries;

Adverse impacts on human health, as well as the introduction of new vectors for infectious disease, and

Whereas, the world’s leading climate scientists predict that the climate crisis will catastrophically intensify if prompt public action is not taken through public policy and legislation to curb emissions, and remove atmospheric CO2 through natural and technological sequestration, and

Whereas, the climate crisis disproportionately afflicts the most vulnerable among us:  members of indigenous nations, people of color, rural and coastal communities and low-income households in general—all of whom have fewer resources to cope with the common consequences of climate change, such as property damage, displacement, job loss, and health problems, and

 Whereas, prompt and robust mobilization of civil society acting in concert with all levels of government to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions is necessary to avert, or even to mitigate, the progressive and increasingly catastrophic deterioration of Earth’s environment; 

 Therefore, be it resolved,

We, as delegates of New York State League of Women Voters’ local Leagues assembled at the 2021 LWV NYS Convention, call upon the LWV NYS Board and local Leagues to urge state and local governments to adopt and publicize Declarations of Climate Emergency appropriate to local conditions and take appropriate action to implement the Declarations of Climate Emergency.