Primary Submission Category: Place/Communities
Growing Community Power Towards Health Equity: Pre-Pandemic Community Greening Activity, Social Cohesion, and “Activation” for COVID-19 Mutual Aid Response
Authors: Sarah-Truclinh Tran Ryan Petteway
Presenting Author: Sarah-Truclinh Tran*
Background
Social cohesion and civic engagement are core dimensions of community power that shape community resilience and capacity to be “activated” for social action during crises. Drawing from a community-based participatory research project evaluating climate, health, and community social cohesion impacts of a 15-year community tree planting program (CTPP) in communities of color in Portland, OR, we ask: did pre-COVID “activation” for climate justice predict activation for COVID-19 mutual aid?
Methods
We analyze data from a cross-sectional online survey given in fall 2021 to residents of CTPP focus areas. Of 336 respondents, 175 were “Greeners” (had volunteered with CTPP; Gs), 114 were “partial Greeners” (had contact with CTPP, but never volunteered; PGs), and 47 were “non-Greeners” (no contact with CTPP; NGs). Social cohesion was measured using established 5-item instrument on a 5-point Likert scale, with higher score indicating higher social cohesion. We explore relationships between social cohesion, pre-COVID-19 civic engagement, and reports of community connectivity and involvement during the pandemic among the Greener levels.
Findings
Overall, Gs and PGs had higher social cohesion scores than NGs. Higher social cohesion was associated with greater odds of reporting community connectivity (p<.001), involvement (p=.18), and COVID aid response (p=.24) during the pandemic. Compared to NGs, PGs had highest odds of community involvement (OR=1.8 [95%CI: 0.74-4.8]). Gs and PGs who reported more connectivity had greater odds of doing COVID aid response than NG who felt same/less community connection.
Conclusion
Results suggest that social cohesion and previous climate justice activation via CTPP are positively associated with community connectivity and action during the pandemic. Preliminary findings suggest investments in community-led climate justice programs might doubly serve to build social cohesion and community power to better respond to other public health crises.