For those of you interested in environmental justice, there is an upcoming webinar on this topic with Matthew Tejeda (the former head of environmental justice at EPA under former President Biden and now a VP at NRDC) and Julian Agyeman (the Editor-in-Chief of Local Environment journal). Details are below.

Date: Friday 18 July 2025

Time: 9:00am – 10:00am (Pacific Time Zone)

Platform: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/9717498102356/WN_v31wfeHMQMWqlbnaMiFk5w

Join us for A cutting-edge webinar exploring pressing issues at the intersection of science,
policy, and sustainability. This episode focuses on critical environmental topics of the
current time of turbulence in the national policies and international uncertainties. Leading
experts will explore interconnected issues of environmental justice and equity, their
implications for sustainability concepts and practices, and potential paths forward.

Featured Speakers:
• Matthew Tejada will discuss the logic behind many of the environmental justice
advances achieved at EPA over the previous several years with special emphasis on
the creation of a holistic community support program. Tejada will discuss the
implications for the tear down of these programs by the current administration. He
will conclude with a contemplation of a different approach to advancing equity and
justice in our government in the future.
• Julian Agyeman will discuss the concept of just sustainabilities as a response to the
‘equity deficit’ of much sustainability thinking and practice. He will explore his
contention that who can belong in our cities will ultimately determine what our
cities can become. He will illustrate his ideas with examples from urban planning
and design, Food Justice and the ‘Minneapolis Paradox’.

Matthew S. Tejada, Ph.D. is Senior Vice President for Environmental Health at Natural
Resources Defense Council (NRDC). As the chief visionary and strategist for NRDC’s
advocacy to protect human health, Matthew Tejada oversees NRDC’s clean air, water,
toxics, and climate adaptation programs. He is also responsible for leading the teams,
structures, partnerships, and policy initiatives needed to tackle major health threats
facing communities. Prior to joining NRDC, Tejada served most recently as the deputy
assistant administrator (DAA) for environmental justice within the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office for Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights. In his
10-plus years with the EPA as DAA for EJ and prior to that Director of the Office of
Environmental Justice, Tejada led all aspects of environmental justice work throughout the
agency and in coordination with other federal agencies, states, tribes, and local
governments, including the development of an array of grants and technical assistance
vehicles, and the creation and deployment of a nationally consistent screening and
mapping tool that highlights environmental justice issues across the United States. His
work also directed community engagement, outreach and communication, and
management of the National Environmental Justice Advisory Council.
Julian Agyeman Ph.D., FRSA FRGS is a Professor in the Department Urban and
Environmental Policy and Planning, a Secondary Professor at The Friedman School of
Nutrition Science and Policy, and is the Fletcher Professor of Rhetoric and Debate, an
endowed professorship at Tufts University. With colleagues, he developed the increasingly
influential concept of just sustainabilities, which explores the intersecting goals of social
justice and environmental sustainability, defined as: the need to ensure a better quality of
life for all, now, and into the future, in a just and equitable manner, whilst living within the
limits of supporting ecosystems. He identifies himself as a critical urban
planning and environmental social science scholar.