September Newsletter

Dear Community Member,

Since the Fall of last year Fresh Air Vallejo has been hard at work advocating and gathering community input focused on Environmental Justice for Vallejo. As you are aware the California law—Senate Bill 1000, passed in 2016—requires Vallejo to address environmental justice in its General Plan. Why is this important? The City’s Environmental Justice (EJ) Element must identify policies and potential solutions across seven key areas, prioritizing the Vallejo communities most burdened by current and historical pollution.

We hosted a series of community engagement events in collaboration with our partners to gather community input and conducted a community survey around the environmental justice priorities that people want to see. Through our findings we prepared and submitted a report to the City of Vallejo. While our work aligns with the EJ Element, the city is still required to gather community input and include disadvantaged communities.

Main Points Submitted to the City in Response to the General Plan Draft

The City of Vallejo released a draft of the General Plan back in March 2026. Subsequently they asked community members to submit comments online. The current draft lacks real community engagement and clear commitments. This is why we ask the City to begin a formal co-development phase and include the following:

Publish the existing record. Release the prior-engagement materials the City relied upon, including dates, locations, methods, participation, languages, neighborhood representation, key findings, and how those findings shaped the March draft.
Go to each impacted area. Hold multiple listening sessions, participatory mapping exercises, and solution workshops in accessible neighborhood locations, with additional recruitment in South and other underrepresented communities.
Remove participation barriers. Provide translated materials and interpretation based on neighborhood language needs; disability access; varied meeting times; food; childcare; transportation support; phone and paper options; and stipends or compensation where appropriate.
Include people most often excluded. Recruit youth, elders, renters, unhoused residents, people with disabilities, non-English speakers, low-income homeowners, workers exposed to environmental hazards, urban Indigenous residents, and appropriate Tribal representatives.
Co-develop and rank alternatives. Ask residents to shape the actual language, identify no-go land-use conditions, rank projects and investments, define success measures, and review the implementation matrix before staff finalizes it.
Show the City’s response. Publish a comment-and-response matrix and a redline explaining what changed, what did not change, and why.
Provide another review period. Release the revised draft for a new meaningful public comment period before Planning Commission and City Council action.

EJ4Vallejo Community Engagement Findings

Image from Environmental Justice event hosted by our partner Diaz & Loera Centro Latino.

Through our community engagement events and survey we have found that there is growing need to address the environmental conditions people are facing. The city needs to gather more community input to identify where there is greater need and come up with adequate solutions.

The graphs below show some our findings from the Environmental Justice Community Survey. Participants were asked questions around the environment, conditions they experience, and to select priorities from a list of responses. FAV compiled the survey results with the input gathered at the community engagement events.

Image from Vallejo Environmental Justice Community Input Event hosted by Fresh Air Vallejo.

Upcoming Events & News

FAV is planning to host more community events. Stay up to date on news and upcoming events by visiting our website and signing up to our newsletter. You can also follow us on Facebook and Instagram where we post updates.

Our Partners

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