On May 29, 2025, the lawyers at Our Children’s Trust (OCT) filed Lighthiser v. Trump, on behalf of 22 youth from Montana, Oregon, Hawai‘i, California, and Florida, asserting their constitutional rights to life, health, and safety. This youth-led constitutional rights lawsuit challenges three of the Trump administration’s recent Executive Orders, each of which has the capacity to intensify the climate crisis and worsen the youth plaintiffs’ climate-related health injuries.
The annual One Earth Young Filmmakers Contest Global Awards Celebration is gearing up to take place at 10 a.m. Sunday, Sept. 21, both in person at the Davis Theater, 4614 N. Lincoln Ave., Chicago, Illinois, and online virtually anywhere in the world. Featuring the top 10 winning films from among almost 400 submissions, this event is the third with global reach since the contest started 13 years ago.
See a futuristic battle over the last available fresh water resource, peer at wildlife living in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, hear an ironic love song about a polluting power plant, and more. View all 10 winning short films from the One Earth Young Filmmakers Contest at 10 a.m. Sunday, Sept. 22, in person at Davis Theater, 4614 N. Lincoln Ave. in Chicago, or online virtually anywhere in the world. Be ready to stretch your imagination and expand your understanding of going green. A special online screening for those in Asia/ Pacific will also be available.
At One Earth Collective, we have something special for our readers today. In honor of Black History Month, we had the privilege of speaking with a true trailblazer in the environmental justice movement, Cheryl Johnson. Cheryl is the daughter of Hazel M. Johnson, widely regarded as the mother of the environmental justice movement and a local Chicago icon.
In collaboration with One Earth Collective, the Austin Eats’ Verses & Vittles Lyrical Slam aimed to promote healthy eating and advance food justice in Chicago’s West Side neighborhoods. This year’s event featured a screening of They’re Trying to Kill Us, a documentary about the intentional inaccessibility to healthy food options in predominantly black and brown neighborhoods. The poetry slam was a chance for attendees to share their responses to themes in the film, as well as personal observations of food injustice and associated health crises in Chicago.
My path crossed with that of Chef Max Musto in early October, during the wonderful Austin Eats event at the Bethel New Life Mildred Wiley Wellness Center in Chicago’s Austin neighborhood, and I wanted to know more about him. And, in a way, I also crossed paths with Chef Qia C at the same event (or at least my palate did; I tasted her food!), so I reached out to both of them to learn more about these two Chicagoland nourishing nourishers, and here they are. First, Max. Then, Qia.
