One year down, one to go: That wasn’t the original plan for the newly named MI Healthy Climate Community Accelerator (launched as the Michigan Justice40 Accelerator), but why slow down when you’ve got a good thing going?

The Office of Climate and Energy and Office of the Environmental Justice Public Advocate in the Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) began the program in October 2024 with equitable clean energy nonprofit partners Elevate Energy and the Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition.

The original yearlong mission was to support 25 selected community-based organizations (listed below) working for enduring and environmentally just climate action in frontline communities across Michigan. Frontline communities are often historically disadvantaged locations that tend to face the impacts of climate change “first and worst.”

Now, instead of winding down, the Community Accelerator will extend programming for continuing cohort members through 2026 – shaped by feedback from participating organizations and the changing policy and funding landscape for climate and environmental justice work.

The group gathered in Lansing recently to celebrate wins, compare notes, and look ahead. Cheering on their work was Lieutenant Governor Garlin Gilchrist II.

“This is the room in which there will be brainstorming. This is the room in which we will challenge one another, and we will pull the best ideas out of one another,” Gilchrist said. “What will not change is this administration’s commitment to making progress on environmental justice.”

In its first year, the accelerator provided each cohort member with $25,000 in participation funding, one-on-one technical assistance, peer-to-peer learning, statewide networking, and more. Participants set goals, tapped into resources, and built partnerships across Michigan communities and sectors. Among successful outcomes, cohort members received over $4.5 million total in public and private grant funding. In all, they applied for more than 55 grants to build their organizational capacity and advance their community visions for workforce development, energy efficiency, resilience hubs, agriculture and food justice, and climate action planning.

Projects ranged from electric vehicle ride share infrastructure, food support, energy efficient home development, and youth engagement and training programs.

The new name reflects the state’s ongoing commitment to community-led climate action and environmental justice. Dedication to the Justice40 commitments outlined in the state’s Michigan Healthy Climate Plan (MHCP) continues, ensuring that at least 40% of state funding for climate and water infrastructure benefit Michigan’s historically disadvantaged communities.

Here’s a look at how four cohort organizations have put their accelerator learning to use:

Executive Director Julius Buzzard said it’s doubtful his organization would have successfully applied for federal funds or met its capital project goals in 2025 without the accelerator.

The organization grows food with and for the community on its 1.5-acre Growing Hope Center and Urban Farm, supplying free produce and inviting people to “get their hands in the dirt” as they build more just and joyful relationships with the food system. It also runs the Ypsilanti Farmers Marketplace and Growing Hope Incubator Kitchen that has supported about 70 entrepreneurs and fledged 15 businesses in four years.

Growing Hope’s $1.2 million budget in 2025 was the largest since its founding in 2003. The group employs about 22 staff, 12 of whom are local teens.

The accelerator and additional investment from private and federal sources helped fund building renovations, an energy audit, and plans to install and upgrade solar power and outfit a second building with a kitchen. A consultant provided coaching to help level up fundraising efforts.

“You have to have money to make money,” Buzzard said. “The capacity that’s required to apply for public dollars is more than somebody could do if they don’t have a team or don’t have any support.”

With a name pronounced like “base,” BASS, Inc., has a core mission of economic development, affordable housing, community engagement and support for youth and young adults ages 7-24 with partner programs My Sister’s Keeper and My Brother’s Keeper.

The accelerator has boosted the reach of BASS’ three-person staff, contractors, and volunteers.

“This cohort has been a phenomenal opportunity for us,” said Program Director Tanesha Windom. “We feel like we’ve been resourced and fueled to carry our projects to completion.”

That includes the group’s three-year Green Revolution youth environmental leadership project, supported by a $500,000 EGLE grant. The three-pronged effort includes workshops, community green spaces, and development of a 5,000-square-foot resilience hub on Woodward Avenue.

The accelerator has helped secure architectural and contracting expertise for a green rooftop meant to mitigate the climate and health impacts of 40,000 vehicles a day traveling on Woodward.

In the year ahead, Windom sees opportunities to give back to the cohort: “as we learn, sharing what we learn.”

Since 1987, the foundation has provided more than $14 million in grants and scholarships for food security, public transportation, economic development, and more in Lapeer, St. Clair, Oakland, and Macomb counties.

Executive Director Kathy Dickens said she enjoys bringing communities together around emerging needs. The accelerator and its peer-to-peer sessions have expanded her horizons.

“It has allowed me an opportunity to reflect on the larger network across the state – all of our cohort partners who are doing great work and have envisioned projects that I should probably be considering,” she said. “I’ve gained a lot of insight and connections and partnerships.”

The foundation leveraged its accelerator grant to hire grant-writing consultants and enable at least one new project already.

Dickens said the cohort has done a great job of addressing issues based on community thoughts and needs.

“It’s important to realize the needs that are out there because of human behavior over years, to recognize what our community problems are, how we’ve arrived at that point, how we remedy them, and how we prevent it from happening again,” she said. “I’m able to think bigger, broader, deeper about community problems.”

The City of Detroit’s century-old Rouge Park covers nearly 1,200 acres with diverse ecosystems and environmental challenges. Luckily, it also has a growing support system of more than 200 Friends of Rouge Park members, plus hundreds of additional volunteers and partners.

“The challenges in the park are many, but the ecological, nature-based solutions also have so much potential,” said Executive Director Lindsay Pielack.

Stewardship Manager Antonio Cosme applied to join the accelerator before Pielack started in January 2025 as part of its new management structure.

Pielack said the accelerator has built capacity as the organization grows in size and budget. Technical assistance dollars helped her attend an intensive accounting workshop in Chicago, and the group conducted its first audit this year.

“I think the real benefit to this program has been the connection with the really wise and accessible staff of the program to help us know what we don’t know and have a really open door to ask the questions,” she said. “It’s not about knowing all the answers.”

The accelerator cohort includes Michigan-based nonprofits, cooperatives, fiscally sponsored projects, and tribal-serving organizations operating in or serving qualifying communities. Here are the 25 organizations that participated in the first year: 

• Architectural Salvage Warehouse of Detroit 
• Avalon Village, Inc., Highland Park 
• Building Assets to Strengthen Society (BASS, Inc.), Highland Park
• Benton Harbor Community Development Corporation 
• Climate Crew Collective (Michigan Health Improvement Alliance/Saginaw Community Alliance for the People)
• Cody Rouge Community Action Alliance, Detroit 
• Community Collaboration on Climate Change (C4), Grand Rapids 
• Concerned Residents for South Dearborn 
• Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network 
• Detroit Dirt 
• Detroit Justice Center 
• Dream of Detroit 
• Flint Community Lab 
• Four County Community Foundation (Hispanic Service Center of Imlay City)
• Friends of Rouge Park, Detroit
• Growing Hope, Inc., Ypsilanti 
• Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan, Sault Ste. Marie 
• Keweenaw Community Foundation, Hancock 
• No Earth Wasted – Living Ecological Awareness Farm (NEW LEAF), Detroit
• One Love Global, Inc., Lansing 
• Soulardarity, Highland Park 
• Urban Development Corp., Detroit
• Washington Heights United Methodist Church and Community, Battle Creek 
• We Want Green, Too, Detroit 
• Young, Gifted & Green, Flint  

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