Supergirl and Targeted Universalism

It’s a bad idea to be active outside on a day the National Weather Service has tagged for an “excessive heat warning.” But I had to get to the post office so I ignored L.A.’s first extreme-heat day of 2022 and walked east on South L.A.’s treeless Vernon Avenue.

The warning advised Angelinos to stay in an air-conditioned room, (we don’t have air conditioning), stay out of the sun, and drink plenty of fluids – the latter not an option because, like someone suffering from heat prostration, I was muddy headed and had forgotten my wallet when I left my un-air-conditioned home for the three-mile walk.

As I passed, groups of people stood in the blazing heat at bus stops waiting for the east- and west-bound 105. There are no shade structures at any of the stops between Crenshaw Boulevard and Denker. In fact, there are hardly any benches and certainly no hydration stations, which could provide life-saving relief for all those riders waiting in the scorching sun.

My phone said it was 91 degrees in LA, the highest it would hit today, but with no breeze or shade, and with heat pulsing from the black pavement, it felt much hotter – which it probably was. Redlined neighborhoods like this one are approximately 2.6 degrees hotter than non-redlined neighborhoods. The lack of tree canopy, lack of access to park space, and/or presence of high-asphalt infrastructure all contribute to thermal inequities like the one boiling my brain.

Compounding the problem, low incomes mitigate against relief. The census tract I walked through is mostly Black and Hispanic, and has a median household income of approximately $49,000 ­– 39 percent lower than the $80,000 median household income for the state of California. The percentage of households below the poverty line along this strip of Vernon is 17 percent. The neighborhood also has a higher-than-average “lifetime air toxics cancer risk” thanks to the inordinate number of polluting industries sited in the area. The poor air quality also contributes to asthma and heart disease.

Essentially, I’m walking through a manmade micro-climate that makes people of color disproportionately susceptible to climate hazards.

Given that fact, the focus on environmental justice and climate equity when it comes to climate adaptation and mitigation seems more than fair. But as I mentioned in my last blog, for the most part (there are wonderful exceptions) the bounty of Los Angeles City and County reports foregrounding equity fall short when it comes to actual policy, program, and resource recommendations.

Is the focus on equity the wrong approach?

On the northwest corner of Vernon and Western, I stop to admire a mural I’ve dubbed “Supergirl Cradling the World.” I love this image for a lot of reasons, but one is that it captures a concept I think might be a better framing device for bringing climate relief to neighborhoods like the one Supergirl watches over.

It’s called “targeted universalism.” Put simply, the approach sets universal goals for an entire population (a goal like, say, climate-change resilience in the city and county of Los Angeles) but then uses targeted policies to help different groups achieve that goal. Leading with the big picture takes the emphasis off disparities and generates a sense of inclusion while allowing room for targeted solutions to overcome the kinds of barriers that folks along Vernon might face.

According to john a powell, who conceptualized the idea of targeted universalism (full disclosure: he’s a friend), focusing on equity (and therefore disparities) foments and deepens the perception of competition between groups. It becomes a zero-sum contest of winners and losers (if they get more, we get less) when the point of climate activism is to promote an improved future for everyone.

Targeted universalism is not just politically more palatable; it’s arguably more effective and efficient. By focusing on – targeting – those whose path to climate resilience has more obstacles, we will also be focusing on the areas of the city that are hottest and therefore most dangerous to health and wellbeing. Mitigating threats in these targeted areas efficiently advances the universal goal of climate resilience amidst the constant pressure of limited financial resources and political will.

That world Supergirl cradles? It’s ours to heal. And we start by helping Supergirl fight the green fight in her neighborhood.