This interview was conducted by the Environmental Coffeehouse welcoming Ben Price, CELDF Education Director & Tish O’Dell, Consulting Director of Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) who are working with Max Wilbert, Publicist for CELDF on the NYS Assembly Bill AO5156A, the Great Lakes and State Waters Bill of Rights, which is currently IN the NYS Assembly.
This new bill introduced into the New York State Assembly by Assemblyman Burke of the Assembly District 142, representing New York’s 142nd district, made up of South Buffalo and the surrounding areas on and near the shore of Lake Erie. Lake Erie and Lake Ontario provide drinking water to 6.2 million New Yorkers. All told, the Great Lakes provide drinking water for more than 40 million people, contain 95% of all the surface freshwater in the United States, and make up the largest freshwater ecosystem on the planet. But this ecosystem is struggling. According to experts, billions of gallons of raw sewage entering the lakes, increasing toxic algae blooms, invasive species, global warming, and both historic and ongoing industrial pollution represent serious threats to the ecosystem and human health.
“The rights of nature movement is gaining momentum around the world as global warming, species extinction, fresh water scarcity, and climate-driven migration are all getting worse,” says CELDF’s Education Director Ben Price, who helped draft the law. “Meanwhile, the U.S. is being left behind. For states to take on these issues in the absence of federal action could be a game-changer, as it was for women’s suffrage when the states led the way for years.” The bill would also enshrine the right to a clean and healthy environment for all people and ecosystems within the State, the right to freedom from “toxic trespass,” and would prohibit the monetization of the waters of New York State. This bill is of cross-border interest with Canada since both share the magnificent Great Lakes.