The Apollo Alliance is a strong coalition of unlikely and diverse interests—including labor, business, environmental and community leaders—advancing a bold vision for the new American economy, centered on clean energy and good jobs.
Over the last six years, the Apollo Alliance has built coalitions in 17 states and cities across America—often partnering with local host organizations—that have advanced the nation’s transition to a clean energy economy through innovative policies and projects. In 2009, our state and local Apollo Alliances continued this legacy of success. Read on to learn about their achievements.
Launching New Apollo Alliances Across America
In 2009, the Apollo Alliance added new affiliates in Western New York, Missouri and Indiana. We also added a new affiliate in Massachusetts, at the end of 2008, when the Green Justice Coalition, convened by Community Labor United in Boston, became the Massachusetts Apollo Alliance.
The Western New York Apollo Alliance, organized by Frank Hotchkiss of the United Steel Workers, runs an innovative program called the Home Energy Conservation Kit (HECK). HECK brings union members, students and community members together in an all-volunteer effort to weatherize low-income homes.
The Missouri Apollo Alliance was formed in mid-2009 and has already proven the value of unlikely allies coming together in the “Show Me” state. In north St. Louis County, the Missouri Apollo Alliance is working with the Riverview Gardens School District to roll out a Green Schools Retrofit program that will produce economic and environmental benefits in the community by enlisting the participation of business, labor, community and district leaders. The Green Schools Retrofit program will launch in 2010.
The Indiana Apollo Alliance was formed in autumn 2009 after discussions with scores of state leaders from businesses, labor unions, and the environmental and social justice communities about the need to come together to advance clean energy and good jobs in Indiana. Indiana Apollo provides a valuable connecting point between groups that have historically worked in isolation. In addition to discussing clean energy manufacturing opportunities in the state, Indiana Apollo is engaging in the debate on how best to move a renewable energy standard forward to drive demand for clean energy.
Los Angeles Apollo Wins Passage of Green Jobs Ordinance
In April 2009, the Los Angeles City Council approved a first-in-the nation plan to create jobs, cut carbon emissions, and revitalize the inner city. The council voted to support a plan to green retrofit city buildings that will create hundreds of new jobs at a time when Angelenos are confronting high rates of unemployment, and federal officials are looking to cities and states for “shovel ready” projects to boost the economy. The ordinance, which will also connect the retrofitting to green jobs training programs that link underserved communities to careers in the clean energy economy, was brought to the city council by the Los Angeles Apollo Alliance, which is convened by SCOPE (Strategic Concepts in Organizing and Policy Analysis).
The Green Jobs Ordinance calls for retrofitting all city-owned buildings larger than 7,500 square feet or built before 1978, using energy-efficient and environmentally sensitive guidelines from the U.S. Green Business Council and others. It sets a starting goal of 100 retrofits annually. The program also focuses on career training and placement for local, low-income, and underemployed workers.
The ordinance creates two management positions, an interdepartmental taskforce, and an advisory council of experts and stakeholders to oversee, guide and report on progress. Moreover, it represents the first municipal investment that combines energy efficiency retrofitting with green jobs training in a way that creates quality union jobs, pathways out of poverty for city residents, and significant savings in municipal energy costs.
The Green Jobs Ordinance is part of the Los Angeles Apollo Alliance’s Green Careers Training Initiative (GCTI), which seeks to create green career ladders in construction, the public sector, public and private power companies, and emerging energy industries. The GCTI will connect low-income inner-city residents to union apprenticeship and community college training programs that prepare them for living-wage jobs, and also provide upgrade training to existing workers within those industries.
NYC Apollo Helps Map the City’s Green-Collar Economy
The New York City Apollo Alliance played a key role advising and participating in the development of the New York City Green-Collar Jobs Roadmap, a comprehensive, step-by-step plan for how to grow New York City’s green economy in a sustainable, prosperous and just manner. The Roadmap was published in October 2009 by Urban Agenda, which convenes NYC Apollo, and the Center for American Progress.
The Roadmap is the culmination of an 18-month process, through which more than 170 stakeholders from businesses, labor unions and community-based organizations worked to come up with a plan to grow an equitable green economy in New York City. The stakeholder convening process, called the Green-Collar Jobs Roundtable, included working groups on the current green jobs landscape; existing training programs; how to make green-collar jobs high-quality jobs; and how to make sure green-collar jobs are accessible to traditionally disenfranchised populations. The working groups’ recommendations form the core of the New York City Green-Collar Jobs Roadmap.
“If the city implemented this roadmap, the result would be a vibrant, green economy that would lift up thousands of people and create pathways out of poverty and into long-term green jobs,” said Mijin Cha, director of campaign research at Urban Agenda and convener of the NYC Apollo Alliance.
Now that the Roadmap has been released, Urban Agenda is kicking off a Roadmap campaign by meeting with various stakeholders and city council members about how to implement the measures recommended in the report. Urban Agenda has received calls from Mayor Noam Bramson of New Rochelle, and Congressman Jose Serrano of the Bronx about how a similar roadmap could serve as a roadmap for other cities and communities.
To read the New York City Green-Collar Jobs Roadmap, visit the Urban Agenda website.
Oregon Apollo Helps Pass Energy Efficiency and Good Jobs Legislation
Oregon Apollo and its partners, including the Oregon AFL-CIO, Citizens Utility Board, and Oregon State Building and Construction Trades Council, strongly supported HB 2626, the Energy Efficiency and Sustainable Technology (EEAST) Act of 2009, which was signed into law in July 2009. Apollo and its partners played a key role in developing the labor standards that were included in the bill.
EEAST addresses a problem that impacts not just Oregon, but the entire nation. Often, residential and commercial property owners want to improve the energy efficiency of their properties or produce their own renewable energy, but they can’t afford the up-front costs or access low-cost, up-front financing. EEAST makes available a low-cost loan that can be applied to weatherizing existing residences and small businesses and producing renewable energy. The loan can be paid back on the property owner’s energy bill over a long period of time—20+ years.
Another key component of EEAST is that it ensures that energy efficiency and renewable energy jobs created by the program will be high-quality jobs. It sets standards for the certification of contractors who work in the program, including an equal opportunity clause; an 80 percent local hiring requirement; payment of at least 180 percent of the state minimum wage; compliance with all health and safety rules; and a preference for contractors that provide health insurance to their employees. EEAST also requires the State Department of Energy to collaborate with the Workforce Investment Board to identify job training opportunities created as the program is implemented.
The first pilot project under EEAST is called Clean Energy Works Portland. “Portland is the first pilot project for this new statewide, low-interest loan program for weatherization work that you can pay back on your utility bill. That’s how we’re going to spread this idea around the state,” said Barbara Byrd, secretary-treasurer of the Oregon AFL-CIO and coordinator of the Oregon Apollo Alliance.
Oakland Apollo Creates Model Green Jobs Training Program
In June 2009, the Oakland Green Jobs Corps graduated its first class. The program, which is among the first training programs of its kind, was developed and proposed by the Oakland Apollo Alliance, which is convened by the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and IBEW Local 595. The group won support from the Oakland City Council, which allocated $250,000 in seed money to create the program. Funds were awarded to a partnership between Laney Community College, Cypress Mandela Training Center, and Growth Sector – a workforce intermediary.
Cypress Mandela, a community-based pre-apprenticeship program, recruits low-income young adults from Oakland to participate in the program by outreaching to high schools, churches, job fairs, and community organizations. Once they are accepted into the program, the students begin with a 16-week “boot camp” in which they learn basic construction and undergo soft skills training, including literacy and life skills such as money management, job readiness, and an understanding of labor unions and apprenticeship programs. They also have access to support services, such as drug and alcohol counseling, childcare assistance, or resolution of driver’s license issues.
Students then move to Laney Community College, where they spend 12 weeks taking environmental education classes and learning construction and technical skills with an emphasis on green construction and solar photovoltaics – all while earning college credit. Part of the solar skills training is done on-site with GRID Alternatives, an Oakland volunteer-based non-profit that installs solar panels on low-income homes. After completing the classroom portion, Growth Sector connects students with three-month, full-time internships at local green businesses, where they gain on-the-job experience. During their internships, students earn $15 an hour. Upon completion, Growth Sector works with participants to place them in jobs with local firms.
Although the economic downturn has made it more difficult to place graduates in jobs, the program still placed 21 students from its first graduating class directly in jobs with local employers. The program has won grants from the California Employment Development Department and the California Energy Commission and is eligible for a Department of Labor Recovery Act grant.
Massachusetts Apollo Wins Key Equity and Economic Development Victory
In October 2009, the Green Justice Coalition, an Apollo Alliance affiliate based in Boston, won a major victory for equity and economic development by convincing the Energy Efficiency Advisory Council (EEAC) of Massachusetts to not only develop long-term goals for increasing energy efficiency throughout the state, but also to commit to make the energy efficiency program and jobs associated with it accessible to low-income communities.
Under the Green Communities Act of 2008, the EEAC’s primary task is to review and approve utilities’ three-year energy efficiency plans. The Green Justice Coalition was also able to convince the EEAC to review utilities’ progress in creating equitable and effective energy efficiency programs.
For example, for low- and moderate-income families, the cost of home energy efficiency retrofits can be insurmountable. To address this barrier, the Green Justice Coalition worked with the EEAC and utilities to design an innovative financing mechanism that includes a commitment by the utilities to procure $300 million in external funding over the next two years to set up a revolving loan fund. Homeowners can access these funds to pay for energy efficiency retrofits and pay them back incrementally through their utility bills.
For their part, the utility companies have agreed to do a better job communicating their programs to economically marginalized communities, and have included in their three-year plans a commitment to work with and fund existing community groups to perform community outreach and education. The utilities have also committed to partnering with union-supported training programs to ensure adequate safety and quality training.
Finally, the Green Justice Coalition also sought a mechanism for community participation in planning and overseeing energy efficiency projects, and the EEAC has made a verbal commitment to community leaders that an equity subcommittee will be formed in the coming months to allow greater community participation in implementing energy efficiency projects.
The key to the Green Justice Coalition victory was the coalition’s ability to draw upon a broad base of working class and marginalized communities across the state. The Green Justice Coalition is convened by Community Labor United.
California Apollo Calls for Stimulus Accountability
The California Apollo Alliance is a strong coalition that has been a leader in the green jobs movement for several years, and 2009 was no exception. The unprecedented $100 billion federal investment in clean energy from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) sparked the formation of the California Green Stimulus Coalition to ensure the accountable and effective use of ARRA funds in California. The California Apollo Alliance was a founding member of this 53-member coalition and instrumental in developing the principles and criteria that policymakers were urged to consider when evaluating ARRA-funded projects.
Furthermore, their work reflects the Apollo Alliance’s long history of finding common ground amid diverse interests and forging a path ahead. “California Apollo Alliance members are playing a pivotal role on the CA Green Stimulus Coalition and fostering a heightened, cooperative culture among activists in which it is not uncommon for environmental groups to speak loudly for prevailing wage and for unions to walk the halls of Sacramento pushing for stronger environmental protections,” said Peter Cooper of the California Labor Federation.
One of the CA Green Stimulus Coalition’s major achievements in 2009 was helping develop the California Energy Commission’s “Clean Energy Workforce Training Program,” which awarded $37 million in workforce training grants in the fall of 2009. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger held a press conference in Los Angeles to announce the $75 million program, which combines funds from several state and federal sources and involves collaboration with other state agencies including the EDD and California Green Collar Jobs Council. The core of the program is funded from the State Energy Program, which received $226 million in stimulus funds for energy efficiency programs and workforce development that could create thousands of jobs and benefit tens of thousands of homeowners in California.
The Green Stimulus Coalition also shaped the $10 million California Green Jobs Corps, which is training 1,500 at-risk youth for green jobs.
New York Apollo Helps Pass Green Jobs/Green New York
In October 2009, Gov. David Paterson traveled to the New York State Weatherization Directors Association training center in North Syracuse, where New Yorkers are being trained to weatherize and retrofit homes. There he signed legislation creating the Green Jobs/Green New York (GJ/GNY) program. The bill commits the state to investing $112 million on a program to retrofit and weatherize private homes and small commercial buildings. Over the next five years, the program’s implementation will create thousands of jobs in the home and commercial building retrofit industry.
The New York State Apollo Alliance was part of a broad coalition of labor, workforce training, clean energy, and environmental groups that joined together to support the green jobs initiative, which is poised to become the centerpiece of New York’s plans to become a more energy-efficient state. Funding for the program comes from the auctioning of pollution credits to in-state emitters of fossil fuels through the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). A collaboration of 10 northeastern states, RGGI is the nation’s first cap-and-invest program designed to limit carbon emissions from power plants.
Members of the state Apollo Alliance are active in committees and groups working with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), the state agency charged with implementing the GJ/GNY program. Buffalo-area Apollo leader Frank Hotchkiss of the United Steelworkers union has been named to the state Advisory Council that must approve and monitor the program’s implementation.
“Apollo Alliance is an important partner in helping us build the green workforce envisioned in the Green Jobs/Green New York program,” said Francis J. Murray, president and CEO of NYSERDA. “This innovative program will create thousands of good green jobs and help us meet Governor David Paterson’s ambitious clean energy targets by providing homeowners and businesses with critical incentives to invest in weatherization and energy efficiency improvements. NYSERDA looks forward to continuing to work with the Apollo Alliance and our other organizational partners as we collectively green New York’s homes and buildings and invest in the training of the clean energy workforce of the future.”
Other Recent Apollo Alliance State and Local Highlighted Achievements
*The Ohio Apollo Alliance helped launch an exciting new statewide green job training initiative for dislocated workers with the Ohio Department of Development’s Energy Office and the Ohio Board of Regents.
*The Washington State Apollo Alliance partnered with the Manufacturing Industrial Council and the Aerospace Joint Apprenticeship Committee to create pathways out of poverty and into clean energy manufacturing jobs. Those groups were awarded a green jobs training grant through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
*The Wisconsin Apollo Alliance worked with the state AFL-CIO to create quality labor standards for the state’s Regional Transit Authority to ensure that public transit jobs are high-quality jobs.
*The Oakland Apollo Alliance launched the innovative Oakland Climate Action Committee to bring together a diverse coalition to help make sure economic, equity and environmental principles would be included in the city’s Climate Action Plan.
*The Hawaii Apollo Alliance hosted a forum of the candidates for the Kaua’i Island Utility Co-Op.
*The Michigan Apollo Alliance helped roll out ReEnergize Michigan, a statewide energy policy platform.
*The New York State Apollo Alliance convened nearly 100 political, labor, business, community and environmental leaders as part of its Reindustrialization Strategies Conference to discuss ways to ensure that growing clean energy demand in New York State leads to a revitalization of its manufacturing base.
*The San Diego Apollo Alliance released a study, San Diego County’s Potential to Develop a Clean Energy Sector, in partnership with San Diego State University’s MBA program.
*The Colorado Apollo Alliance incorporated training and job-quality standards for solar installers into a renewable energy bill that is currently being considered by the Colorado legislature.
*Apollo Alliance affiliates across America gained the support of 150 businesses for clean energy manufacturing policies that would promote American production of clean energy components.
NEW YORK — Whenever Forbes Magazine puts out a list of most miserable, stressful or otherwise impaired cities, Chicago always seems to be on it. 
