Prior to Katrina, the South Bronx and New Orleans' Ninth Ward had a lot in common. Both were largely populated by poor people of color, both hotbeds of cultural innovation: think hip-hop and jazz. Both are waterfront communities that host both industries and residents in close proximity of one another.

We need to work together to embrace and repair our land, repair our power systems, and repair ourselves. It's time to stop building the shopping malls, the prisons, the stadiums, and other tributes to all of our collective failures.

Even when we think or talk about recycling, lots of recyclable stuff ends up getting incinerated or in landfills and leaving many municipalities, diversion rates - they leave much to be recycled. And where is this waste handled? Usually in poor communities.

I personally think that gentrification happens long before you start seeing white people in formerly people-of-color neighborhoods. It starts happening when we start telling the young, hard-working, quote-unquote 'smart' kids that they need to measure success by how far they get away from our communities.

A lot of money could be saved if we ate urban wildlife.

I have a tremendous platform and responsibility to talk to people about these issues about sustainability and about health and wellness when it comes to food.

Moreover, the practical recommendations deduced from ecological principles threaten the vested interests of commerce; it is hardly surprising that the financial and political power created by these investments should be used sometimes to suppress environmental impact studies.

By 2007, 85% of Americans cited climate change as an important issue, compared with just 33% in prior years. The phrase we invented, 'An Inconvenient Truth,' became a part of the lexicon.