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Rebuilding Puerto Rico From the Grassroots Up

Longtime environmental justice activist Elizabeth Yeampierre is helping spearhead a national day of action on creating a “just recovery” for Puerto Rico. Here’s what that means.
Efrain Diaz Figueroa, right, walks by his sister's home destroyed in the passing of Hurricane Maria, in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The 70-year-old is waiting for a sister to come take him to stay with family in Boston. “I’m going to the U.S. I’ll live better there,” he said.
Efrain Diaz Figueroa, right, walks by his sister's home destroyed in the passing of Hurricane Maria, in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The 70-year-old is waiting for a sister to come take him to stay with family in Boston. “I’m going to the U.S. I’ll live better there,” he said.(Ramon Espinosa/AP)
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The Climate Justice Alliance has declared Wednesday “A National Day of Action,” on behalf of Puerto Rico, which was nearly devastated by Hurricane Maria last month. Millions of people are still without power and have limited access to food, water, and many have even lost their homes. The alliance is calling for people to hold marches, rallies, and events in cities across the U.S. to build support for a “just recovery and transition” for Puerto Rico—meaning a rebuilding effort that won’t lead to the involuntary displacement of millions of Puerto Ricans from their homes.

Helping spearhead this effort is the environmental justice organization UPROSE, which is based in Brooklyn, and is led by executive director Elizabeth Yeampierre, a Puerto Rican-American who’s been at the forefront of climate justice campaigns for years. You may have spotted Yeampierre drum-majoring the mega-voluminous People’s Climate March in 2014, Leonardo DiCaprio marching near her—a protest for which she was a lead organizer, as she was for the follow-up People’s Climate March earlier this year.