SAN DIEGO — Resistance is justified.
That's the rallying cry of students from San Diego High School Friday as they marched to city hall demanding more be done for flood victims across San Diego.
The school’s Climate Action Club led the march of students from their high school near Balboa Park through the streets of downtown ending at Civic Center Plaza outside of City Hall’s doors. Dozens of students made the less than a mile walk Friday afternoon where they chanted, heard from speakers impacted by the storm and told the adults in charge of the city to "do more."
"When our homes are compromised, resistance is justified," students shouted emphatically in the Charles C. Dail Concourse of Civic Center Plaza.
Eva Amato, president of San Diego High School's Climate Action Club organized the rally with vice president Sanjana Ganguly-Fitzgerald. The high school juniors were joined by dozens of students in their protest against environmental racism and advocating for reparations for survivors of San Diego's January 22 storms.
"We have a lot of students at our school that are from the southeast,” Sanjana shared. “Or would have been affected by the floods or did see it in their communities so it's really important and dear to us. All of the schools that I've been to were Title 1 schools and in communities where we didn't get a lot of the funding and resources and that's an effect of red lining."
The student lead group had to get permission from parents and administrators before they took to the streets of downtown San Diego calling for change.
Sanjana says climate change and corporate greed are killing our planet and hurting lower income communities. But what hurts the most these students say is the flooding could have been prevented if city run storm drains had been cleaned out.
"Especially with the history of redlining,” Sanjana added. “The history of everything the city has been doing to not prioritize these communities and not give these residents what they've been asking for decades."
FEMA has declared the January storms a federal disaster and is now leading local recovery efforts by partnering with the state, county and city. Students say that's not enough as they listened to storm survivors. One speaker, Lydianadia addressed the gathering and described what she saw as she made her way through her neighborhood during the January 22 storm.
"Everyone in Southcrest was trapped. There was no way to leave, even if we wanted to. People were standing on their rooves to escape the water.”
Eva concluded with a call to action for city leaders.
"We're asking you to do your job because cleaning out storm drains in every community is legally required."
Volunteers on the ground helping January 22 storm survivors, intentionally calling themselves survivors, say they couldn't be more proud of this group of student leaders. CBS 8 reached out to San Diego Unified School District which says they support the students right to organize.
CBS 8 contacted the City of San Diego for comment on this story and haven't heard back but local authorities are pointing San Diegans to FEMA for flood related recovery.
WATCH RELATED: San Diego County supervisors vote unanimously to extend hotel vouchers for flood victims