ORIGIN STORY OF YUCCA
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Earth Care, YUCCA’s mother organization, was founded on the belief that young people’s voices, leadership, and knowledge must be at the forefront of building the world we know is possible. Through programs like Youth Allies and the El Puente Internship, Earth Care has worked to train and empower young leaders while fostering a lasting ecosystem of intergenerational movement-building.
In 2019, alumni of these programs came together to answer the global call for a youth-led climate strike by forming YUCCA, the youth-led arm of Earth Care’s climate justice work.
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YUCCA’s first action–the Global Climate Strike in September 2019–mobilized over 4,000 New Mexicans. But that was only the beginning.
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In the years since, YUCCA has continued to grow, leading a long-term climate emergency campaign to hold polluters and lawmakers accountable while demanding the bold action necessary to address the climate crisis. Most recently, we supported two dozen bills during the 2025 Legislative Session and held a powerful demonstration on the Opening Day of the Session to call on our lawmakers to act with courage and pass meaningful climate justice legislation.
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READ OUR 2019 CLIMATE STRIKE CALL TO ACTION
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"Following a May 23 call to action from Greta Thunberg and 46 youth activists in a Guardian piece, the FridaysfortheFuture movement initiated a youth-led global movement challenging the failures of officials to respond to climate change. Since the inaugural global Friday walk-out this spring, youth from around the world have asserted the need for strong measures regarding the climate crisis and the disruption of business-as-usual. Building on this momentum and positioning our movement as an intergenerational one, youth activists have sought to call-in and hold accountable adult allies and accomplices by declaring a September 20th General Climate Strike, followed by a week of direct action and civil disobedience, and calling for mass participation from students, workers, business owners, and community leaders by stepping out of their schools and workplaces for the day.
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YUCCA (Youth United for Climate Action) echoes the calls for robust and urgent measures in response to the climate crisis. We thereby pledge our support and participation in the General Climate Strike and 7 Days of Resistance in September, and are fastidiously working to ensure that the most vulnerable of our communities can voice their concerns, ideas, and desires for the actions and organizing of the strike to be as reflective of their lives as possible; the vibrancies of our state are being funnelled into our planning efforts as a reminder that any movement for climate justice must be an intersectional one encompassing Indigenous, Black, Latinx, gender, and economic justice.
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The demonstrated inability of elected officials to act on the climate crisis serves to remind us that we cannot limit our efforts to avenues sanctioned by the state; the foundations of the US are built on stolen land supplemented by stolen labor, and this country continues to enrich itself through militarism, imperialism, and extraction to this day. Nonetheless, we are calling on representatives of New Mexico to embrace the Green New Deal – an as-of-yet unsupported resolution by Senators Udall and Heinrich or Governor Lujan Grisham – as one step to tackle the climate crisis, even if only to signal the urgency of the situation and a commitment to act. Plainly, in striving for a guaranteed future away from fossil fuels, we cannot dismiss any and all avenues available; we urge New Mexico officials to Declare a Climate Emergency and meet our demands to secure our future.
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With immediacy, we call on our adult allies to step out of their routines, workplaces, and comfort zones on the 20th of September and the week following to show their support for and invest in our cause and the future."
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– The YUCCA (Youth United for Climate Crisis Action) Steering Committee of Earth Care
Kendrick Manymules, Aspen Coriz-Romero, Castille Aguilar, Veroaylin Campos, Seneca Johnson, Gimena Perez, Faith Pennell-Sutton, Eliza Hillenkamp, Fernando Borrero, Derrick Esquibel, Aaron Tenorio, Artemisio Romero Y Carver, Nayeli Solis, and Josue Damian Martinez
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READ YUCCA'S ORIGINAL DEMANDS
Create a just transition from oil and gas revenues to pay for the research, planning, and implementation necessary to end New Mexico's dependence on fossil fuel revenues, achieve carbon neutrality for our state, and build a sustainable economy that works for all New Mexicans.​
Support comprehensive climate legislation to achieve 100% renewables no later than 2030 (nuclear energy is not renewable energy) with equity, racial, economic, environmental justice & community solutions at the center.​​​​​
A moratorium on fracking to protect our precious water and health, and community solar legislation so that our communities can advance their climate goals now.​
We also call on the Governor and other elected officials in New Mexico to declare a climate emergency, sign on to the Equitable and Just Platform, sign onto and advocate for the Green New Deal, and pledge to stop taking fossil fuel and utility money.
WE WILL NO LONGER ALLOW OUR FUTURES TO BE HELD HOSTAGE.
Transition planning and investment must be designed to address the needs and demands of those most affected by the climate crisis.
Renewable energy investment must explicitly address equity issues, be paired with investment in energy conservation and efficiency, and be designed to maximize community benefits and control (such as community solar).
We are committed to centering the voices of Indigenous, (low-income) youth (of color) in the planning process, as our voices have historically been divested of any semblance of decision-making authority.
We demand a just transition that prioritizes Indigenous sovereignty, establishes reparations and remediation led by and for Indigenous people, people of color, and poor communities for years of environmental injustice, establishes legal rights for ecosystems to thrive and regenerate in perpetuity, and repairs the effects of ongoing ecocide to prevent extinction of human and all species, in order to maintain a livable, just planet for all.
Dear Honorable Governor Lujan-Grisham,
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In New Mexico we have incredible renewable energy resources. We also have long-standing cultural traditions of protecting and stewarding our beautiful environment on which our communities depend. We appreciate the positive steps your administration has taken to advance renewable energy and increase fuel efficiency standards. We appreciate your January 2019 Executive Order for New Mexico to join the US Climate Alliance that upholds the 2015 Paris Climate Accord and for creating the New Mexico Climate Change Task Force, calling on all state agencies to contribute to a statewide climate strategy. However, in the last year, we have seen increased oil and gas production from our state and do not believe we are on track to meet carbon reduction goals nor end our dependence on fossil fuel revenues. We need a comprehensive plan to achieve carbon neutrality in the state of New Mexico and we need it now.
As you may know, the world’s leading scientists have warned that we have only a decade to drastically reduce our carbon emissions or face the existential threat of runaway climate disruption. In New Mexico, we are already experiencing increased drought, water scarcity, and wildfires. Around the world, we are seeing the devastating impacts of severe weather events and increased temperatures caused by climate change including death, injury, food & water shortages, forced displacement, extremely costly damage to infrastructure and people’s homes, ecological collapse, and the beginning of the 6th mass extinction. We are faced with a climate emergency and we need to start acting like it.
All our lives we’ve heard about the impending climate collapse threatening our future, yet very little, almost nothing has been done. And, in fact, while indigenous and other land-based communities have been warning of the impacts on ecosystems and experiencing the horrors on the frontlines of extraction, and scientists have been warning government leaders about the threat of climate disruption for over 40 years, older generations have continued to burn fossil fuels at increasing rates and have run out the clock for the rest of us.
Finally, for the very first time in our lifetimes, the world is taking serious action. But it is not the politicians who we elected to work for us who are sounding the alarms and taking swift action to protect us. Nor is it the adults who’ve used up our carbon budgets who are taking responsibility to redress the negative impacts of our current energy systems. It’s the kids - scared for our future and fed-up with the inaction of those who came before us.
On Friday, September 20th and in the week following, over 7.5 million young people around the world sent a powerful message -- we will no longer accept a business as usual approach to the climate crisis. We have declared a climate emergency and we are calling on our government leaders, like you, to follow our lead. More than 5,000 students from across Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Las Cruces, Silver City, Española, Taos, Farmington and Indigenous Nations in the region walked out of their classrooms and took to the streets to demand urgent action.
Collectively along with our adult allies and partnered groups across the state, we call on you to take urgent action;
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Immediately declare a Climate Emergency in the State of New Mexico
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Create A Just Transition Fund from Oil & Gas Revenues to support the research, planning, and implementation necessary to end NM's dependence on fossil fuel revenues, to achieve carbon neutrality for our state by 2040, and build a sustainable economy that works for all New Mexicans -- no more sacrifice zones.
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Pass a moratorium on fracking to protect our water and our health and preserve the countless sacred Indigenous sites threatened by fracking.
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Pass community solar legislation by 2020.
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Ensure New Mexico is powered by 100% renewable energy by 2030.
The science is clear. We only have a few years left to rapidly shift to a carbon neutral economy. We see the extraction of fossil fuels in New Mexico as a threat to our future, and we recognize that our state is ripe with potential for renewable resources. New Mexico can be a leader in the necessary shift to a carbon neutral economy with the leadership of our elected officials. So we call on you, as our Governor, to help us achieve this. We ask you to declare a climate emergency in the state of New Mexico today. Further, we ask you to take action in the next month to demonstrate your commitment to implementing our public policy demands. Please meet with us before October 30th and share with us how you plan to treat the climate crisis as the emergency it is.
Thank you for sharing our concern for our future and we are looking forward to working with you as we fight to protect it and all life on Earth.
YUCCA (Youth United for Climate Crisis Action) with the Climate Strike Northern NM and the ABQ Climate Strike Youth Organizers.
READ OUR 2019 LETTER
TO THE GOVERNOR