We envision the Southeastern United States as the leading region for just, equitable and inclusive solutions to the climate crisis while our mission is to facilitate strategic coordination and equitable resource generation to amplify and build power with our members.

Let's get you up to speed! The Southeast Climate & Energy Network (SCEN) along with Care About Climate, People’s Justice Council and Sustaining Way are launching an asset map, which is a tool that will provide information about the strengths, resources, and needs of each organization. SCEN was created in 2008 as a program of the US Climate Action Network to support initiatives related to climate change and the clean energy transition in the Southeastern U.S. Since then, SCEN has become an independent network anchored by its own 501 c3 organization. While SCEN continues to actively support adaptation and mitigation work that ensures a just transition through clean energy policy education, the network has expanded its vision to include solutions to the climate crisis while implementing them from a lens of equity, democracy, and environmental justice.

Through Asset Mapping, we will:

1. Create a geographically accurate map of the SCEN network
2. Support frontline communities through grassroots member organizations
3. Outline the organizational standpoint for each organization (capacities/strengths, areas of development/needs)
4. Foster relationships between our members and with other key stakeholders in the region. This element will help identify relationships that can be leveraged for collaborative projects and to support key environmental campaigns in the region
5. Increase our efforts for diverse, equitable, and inclusive solutions to the climate crisis
   

We must holistically understand our members’ work and missions in order to amplify their voices and
ensure they receive the resources they need. Furthermore, to truly build grassroots power, we must
build intentional, trust-based relationships rooted in a sense of shared values. Building consensus at the
community level is a crucial step towards the strategic alignment necessary to overcome the most pressing environmental and climate justice challenges experienced by those most impacted communities and our society as a whole. To accomplish this, SCEN will activate a shared purpose conversation within a Southern context rooted in the history of communities disenfranchised by race, economics and class. Collectively, these top line goals will strengthen climate and environmental justice work throughout the U.S. and the Southeast while boosting our efforts to build the power needed for equitable social change.

Embarking on an asset mapping exercise is a great mechanism for building relationships across coalitions. This process entails identifying who you are, where you are from, what you have, and what you need in the context of a shared, solutions-oriented vision. Asset mapping will provide a collaboration platform that collects the strengths, needs, and resources of organizations, coalitions and priority communities.

Once these assets are mapped, connections between who holds a particular need, resource and/or strength will be more visible, more accessible and therefore more valuable to the broader collective network. Our asset mapping work will enhance SCEN’s capacity building efforts. Being matched to resources unique to their needs will allow organizations, coalitions and activists to fill capacity gaps with more ease, allocate resources more efficiently, implement projects in a timely and cost-effective manner and propel more impactful projects and outcomes. We don’t want organizations to reinvent the wheel!

Finally, our project will incorporate a power mapping component to help organizations within our collective networks to consider the social and political context within which they are developing strategy and creatively consider allies, opponents, targets, and constituents prior to embarking on a campaign, or as a tool to enhance existing environmental campaigns.

As an organization that is constantly looking for partners to collaborate with, we are very excited about developing this initiative hand in hand with Care About Climate, The People’s Justice Council and Sustaining Way.