After an invitation from local environmental nonprofit Seven Generation Ahead, a long day of travel and a 10-hour time change, Oak Park Village President Vicki Scaman arrived at the annual United Nations Climate Change Conference in Baku, Azerbaijan last month.
Upon arrival at COP29, Scaman said she immediately took note of the beautiful representation of the nearly 200 countries present at the climate change conference.
“When you arrive at the conference, there’s an area that is just where all of the countries are represented, and it’s absolutely beautiful,” Scaman said. “You’re seeing all these different stages, platforms of different countries where they’re highlighting their culture, but they each have a message around why they’re there.”
The messages included advocacy about themes of climate change, environmental justice and reparations, Scaman said.
Among the youngest advocates in attendance were high school students from the Chicago area, including some “very impressive” students from Oak Park River Forest High School, according to Scaman.
“Their voices were very, very influential in the advocacy for what this is all about,” Scaman said. “With the presence of young people, you couldn’t help but to take it very seriously. That’s the most affected population and their leadership was one that I sought out.”
Other prominent voices included Senator Ed Markey, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm and Former Vice President Al Gore. Scaman said much of their discussions revolved around what the incoming Trump administration would mean for environmental issues.
A key theme of their messaging was the progress of the Biden administration toward creating new jobs in the area of sustainability and energy that would be difficult for future leaders to roll back without harming the job market and industry, Scaman said.
“The clear statement from those elected officials was that they were going to continue to be strong advocates,” Scaman said. “Even if Trump himself is going to pull out from a Paris Climate Agreement, which everyone does anticipate, that they were going to be stepping into the roles of continuing that advocacy strongly, and then we also heard from other countries that they were going to be ready and anticipating stepping up.”
Scaman echoed a similar sentiment of commitment to sustainable progress and plans to use the information she learned at COP29 to inform environmental policy going forward.
Oak Park is an environmental policy leader in the Midwest, being the first Midwest municipality to create an ordinance that all new buildings have to be completely electric, with a few exceptions, and Scaman said she plans to continue advancing policy to protect the environment.
“Spending this amount of time to take a real deep dive into where the future of a sustainable action plan exists is a commitment,” Scaman said. “I hope it is as impactful as it was inspirational for myself.”
The greatest lesson from the conference, Scaman says, is to work toward 100% renewable energy. Other takeaways include ensuring collaboration is genuine and engagement is meaningful.
Above all, Scaman hopes the community will unite as one with a common purpose: fighting climate change.
“This is not a village agenda,” Scaman said. “This is a municipal agenda. This has to be owned by all of us, as residents, as churches, as businesses, as schools, as libraries, as parks [and] as every sector of our community, participating in the way that we live and our policy direction. Moving everything towards renewable energy is kind of that guiding light.”
Scaman noted that no village funds were used for the trip and that it was supported in part by resident Paul Beckwith. Beckwith sits on the Development Steering Committee of Growing Community Media, owner of Wednesday Journal. He is also a donor to the company.
Update, Dec. 18, 1:12 p.m: This article was updated to include who funded Scaman’s trip and to be transparent about the donor’s relationship with GCM.