Equity
Ahead of the 2015 National Bike Summit, we’ve been holding Twitter chats with presenters to hear more about their work and ideas. Today we chatted with Rue Mapp, CEO and Founder of Outdoor Afro.
Mapp is the closing keynote speaker at the 2015 National Forum on Women & Bicycling. We put together a recap of Friday’s discussion below. We hope to see you next Tuesday, March 10, for the Forum! Onsite registration is still available!
Ahead of the 2015 National Bike Summit, we’ve been holding Twitter chats with presenters to hear more about their work and ideas. Last Friday, we chatted with Naomi Doerner, of the Alliance for Biking & Walking, and Simran Noor, of the Center for Social Inclusion, about transportation inequity.
Their conversation at the Summit is focused on the people and policies successfully addressing the root causes of inequity. In addition to Doerner and Noor, Dara Baldwin of the National Disability Rights Network will discussing the topic during the Summit. If you aren’t already registered, click here!
Many people get involved in bike advocacy because they want to promote bicycling and increase safety, yet we all know that not everyone who rides has the time or inclination to become an advocate. Sometimes the people who don’t get involved actually have the most need for better streets in their neighborhoods. How can we ensure that bike advocacy agendas are designed to meet those communities’ needs? Multicultural Communities for Mobility (MCM) in Los Angeles has been experimenting with this question since its early days as a bike light giveaway program housed at the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition in 2008. Today, MCM is leading the nation in innovating ways to transform community-engaged bike advocacy from a good idea into action.
We’re excited to announce the featured speaker at the opening plenary of the 2015 National Bike Summit: Maya Rockeymoore, the President of Center for Global Policy Solutions and director of Leadership for Healthy Communities, a national program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Rockeymoore is an expert in equity in policy, specifically in health care. As a part of her responsibilities as director of Leadership for Healthy Communities, Rockeymoore is dedicated to helping state and local elected and appointed officials advance policies that support healthy eating, active living, and childhood obesity prevention. At the Summit, Rockeymoore will be discussing targeted universalism in policy and how that relates to transportation equity.
Seattle is honored to have our Gold Level Bicycle Friendly Community designation renewed. Residents and businesses continue to raise the bar and expect the delivery of first-rate, family friendly bike facilities. We are striving to meet this demand by building a citywide network that attracts people of all ages and abilities; all income levels; and all ethnicities. We are especially pleased that the league acknowledged the importance we place on equity.
Here at the League, we like heritage, whether it’s drawing on our own legacy like we did when we re-introduced the winged wheel as our logo or recognizing particular individuals’ influence. We know that following history helps us understand where we are today, and where we could go tomorrow. We hope you’ll join us in congratulating Recycle-A-Bicycle in New York City as they celebrate 20 years of turning discarded bikes into opportunities to change young people’s lives. Along with Bikes Not Bombs in Boston, RAB deserves tremendous credit for making community bike shops and earn-a-bike programs a staple of the bike movement across the United States and beyond.
Bike equity means believing the stories people have to share about what it’s like for them to be in the street. There’s more to safety than being seen, and we need to believe when people tell us about insecurity beyond traffic violence. As a national organization, we have a role to play in convening tough conversations.
This Thursday, November 20 at 12 pm, the League will be participating in a Twitter chat on ways to ensure safe passage to and from school for students, with special attention to issues facing communities of color.
Last Friday, the League hosted a live discussion about the term “invisible cyclist” with Dr. Stephen Zavestoski, of the University of San Francisco; Najah Shakir, of Boston Bikes; Do Lee, of the Biking Public Project; and Erick Huerta, of Multicultural Communities for Mobility.
This past year, Women Bike Mini-Grant recipient Marin County Bike Coalition (MCBC) hosted a learn to ride program for women living in the Canal Area of San Rafael. They dubbed the program Latina Women on Wheels. They felt it important to empower this group of women by helping them gain access to independent transportation. They knew that in order to be successful, they would have to align themselves with the community and understand their needs. This led to a partnership with Parent Services Project, a nonprofit focused on strengthening and supporting families in Marin County.