This article by Tim Jamison (below) appeared in The Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier (in Iowa) on May 22nd, 2019. Iowa has already reached the point where the water contamination crisis caused by massive factory farms has become so severe that dozens of county governments are finally coordinating with each other and demanding a statewide moratorium [...]
This article by John Ahni Schertow was published in Cultural Survival on May 21, 2019. This month, the Yurok Tribal Council voted unanimously in favor of a resolution establishing the rights of the Klamath River. According to the Yurok Tribe, the resolution “establishes the Rights of the Klamath River to exist, flourish, and naturally evolve; [...]
This article by Valerie Vande Panne of the Independent Media Institute appeared in EcoWatch on May 16, 2019. In February, the voters of Toledo, Ohio, passed a ballot initiative that gives Lake Erie and those who rely on the lake's ecosystem a bill of rights. The idea is to protect and preserve the ecosystem so that [...]
As I travel around the country leading Community Rights workshops, I constantly have to remind the mostly progressive audiences I meet with that it’s not just Republican-controlled state legislatures that are constantly trying to stop local governments from exercising any kind of relevant law-making. In my state of Oregon, which has a Democrat supermajority in [...]
This article by Alex Mester and Mark Zaborney appeared in The Toledo Blade on April 3rd, 2019. The Lake Erie Bill of Rights charter initiative in Toledo is reaching the international stage. Two local organizers of the effort have been invited to the United Nations General Assembly in New York later this month to speak about their [...]
Activist Winona LaDuke encourages people to understand that our future depends on humans recognizing the rights of the natural world This article by Alyssa Kelly appeared in the Char-Koosta News on March 28th, 2019. MISSOULA — From blazing temperatures and billion dollar wildfires igniting across the country, to rising sea levels and entire animal species [...]
This article by Alan Guebert was published in the Beatrice Daily Sun on March 21st, 2019. If the ballot box is the ultimate source of power in the United States, then voters in Toledo, Ohio, used that power Feb. 26 to create what’s now being called a “Bill of Rights” for their wide, blue neighbor, [...]
This article by Dana Drugmand was published in Climate Liability News on March 14th, 2019. The town of Exeter, N.H. passed an ordinance recognizing the right to a healthy climate, the second ordinance of its kind to be passed in the U.S,. The law, dubbed the Right to Healthy Climate Ordinance, recognizes the “right to a [...]
"Our right to a healthy climate is an unalienable right. Any new energy infrastructure in our town must align with that right." This article by Andrea Germanos appeared on Common Dreams on, March 13th, 2019. Voters in Exeter, New Hampshire, fearing the impact on their community from a planned pipeline project, declared Tuesday that their [...]
This 5 minute radio story was posted on NHPR's website on March 13th, 2019. Listen to All Things Considered host Peter Biello speak with reporter Annie Ropeik about environmental initiatives passed at New Hampshire town meetings this week. Municipalities across New Hampshire took a range of steps to confront climate change at the local level [...]
