Important Updates
We hope you enjoy the articles, factoids, features, and spotlights of the…
Newsletters, Resources
The essays in Wouldn’t You Say? ask challenging questions about modern society,…
News from the Grassroots, Publications
A new system of law based on respect for Nature and the…
Issues, News, Resources, Rights of Nature
Oct 15, 2020
A 2020 organizing update from Ohio featured in our fall newsletter.
Read More | Press Releases & BlogsSep 24, 2020
Despite recognizing the Grant Townships local law to ban injection wells the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection continues to sue the township. CELDF files motion to dismiss on behalf of the community.
Read More | Press Releases, Press Releases & BlogsSep 17, 2020
Register today for this virtual Democracy School in the Colorado area!
Read More | UncategorizedAug 26, 2020
While local electeds refused to defend Nottingham’s Healthy Climate Law, the New Hampshire Supreme Court heard the people’s voice. Now residents are able to defend their rights and this historic law while the corporation cries discrimination.
Read More | Press Releases, Press Releases & BlogsAug 9, 2020
The system is constructed to disempower communities, to the detriment of people and the planet. That is why we need to fight back and why we need local elected officials with courage to fight with us… not against us! A guest blog by Ohio organizer Tish O’Dell.
Read More | Press Releases & BlogsJun 17, 2020
Press Release: Petitioners in Columbus file a lawsuit against the state of Ohio for unconstitutional limits on signature gathering during the COVID-19 pandemic in Columbus. The Columbus city charter imposes a one year time limit on signature gathering.
Read More | News, Press ReleasesJun 11, 2020
Press Release: Petitioners in Lincoln County, OR filed a detailed appeal to a court decision that overturned a local law banning aerially sprayed pesticides as a violation of people’s right to clean air, water, and soil and natural ecosystems’ rights. The Siletz River ecosystem was denied intervention in the case.
Read More | News, Press ReleasesJun 9, 2020
Nottingham, New Hampshire residents appeal Supreme Court to defend their Freedom from Chemical Trespass Ordinance. Adopted in 2019, this ordinance secures the right to a climate system capable of sustaining human societies, bans all corporate activities that infringe that right, and grants residents the right to defend the law in court.
Read More | Community Wires, News, Press ReleasesJun 2, 2020
When violent police forces rooted in white supremacy defend property rather than human beings, then property destruction becomes a collective act of self-defense. CELDF stands in solidarity with protesters outraged by racial injustice and violence. #BlackLivesMatter
Read More | Blogs, Defunding Violence, NewsJun 1, 2020
Communities across the country are watching as their rights are violated in the name of Covid. Now more than ever we see people rising up to demand democracy.
Read More | News, Press ReleasesApr 20, 2020
This year CELDF will be hosting an online Q&A with organizers who have been engaging communities across the country in paradigm-shifting work for decades.
Read More | Community Wires, Events, News from the GrassrootsApr 6, 2020
In this interview, Kai speaks on the current state of community rights, gives an explanation of the events taking place in Grant Township, and talks about how we must take this time during Covid-19 to progress forward in the movement.
Read More | Community Wires, News from the Grassroots, Rights of NatureMar 30, 2020
Government allies and corporate interests are treating the global pandemic as a business opportunity. Communities enduring this crisis are taking bold and necessary actions to exercise their powers of self-governance where governments are not functioning in the way people want or need.
Read More | News, News from the GrassrootsMar 17, 2020
Bryan Twitchell shares a guest blog about the Wet’suwet’en First Nation’s ongoing resistance to the Coastal GasLink pipeline in British Columbia, Canada.
Read More | Blogs, Community Wires, NewsMar 4, 2020
A decision fro a judge in Grant Township argues that local governing authority is necessary to protect the community’s constitutional rights in the face of harmful state oil and gas policies.
Read More | News, Press ReleasesJan 27, 2020
Organizations, activists, government officials, and hundreds of others from around the world support the Lake Erie Bill of Rights as oral arguments in federal court are held tomorrow.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsJan 19, 2020
The Lake Erie Bill of Rights is part of a growing movement, and people are joining. What will the courts do?
Read More | Community Wires, News from the GrassrootsDec 19, 2019
2019 has been a remarkable year for CELDF and our partner communities. Check out what we are celebrating!
Read More | News from the Grassroots, Press Releases & BlogsNov 11, 2019
Following settlement of one of the lawsuits against Grant Township, PA, for daring to protect its water from a frack wastewater injection well, the township continues to stand up to the oil and gas industry.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsNov 4, 2019
Efforts are growing to not only determine how people vote, but what gets voted on. Your ballot measures are not yours to democratically determine.
Read More | Press Releases & BlogsOct 16, 2019
The people’s own Department of Environmental Protection in Pennsylvania sues Grant Township to overturn a democratically enacted Home Rule charter that includes a ban on fracking wastewater injection wells. This was their day in court.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsOct 10, 2019
Community Rights advances to the state level as a Pennsylvania legislator introduces the “Local Self-Government Amendment,” elevating people and communities over corporations.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & Blogs, Success StoryOct 2, 2019
Lincoln County, Oregon, community members prepare to appeal judge’s denial of their right to protect themselves from aerial sprayed pesticides.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsAug 22, 2019
The Ohio Farm Bureau and corporate agribusiness urge the Ohio Supreme Court to block Williams County voters from casting ballots on the people’s own initiative.
Read More | Community Wires, News from the GrassrootsAug 21, 2019
Williams County, Ohio, residents partner with CELDF to fight for their right to vote in the Ohio Supreme Court.
Read More | Community Wires, Democratic Rights, News, Press ReleasesAug 20, 2019
A Williams County, Ohio, resident speaks out on protecting the rights of communities and nature through a county charter and voting.
Read More | Community Wires, News from the GrassrootsAug 12, 2019
Williams County, Ohio, residents are working to protect their county’s water source from privatization. Their own government is trying to stop them.
Read More | Community Wires, News from the GrassrootsJul 22, 2019
The corporate state attempts to strip democratic rights in Ohio and Washington state. CELDF supports communities as together they fight back.
Read More | Community Wires, News, Press ReleasesJul 17, 2019
The Daily Show’s Michael Kosta covers Toledo residents’ work to protect Lake Erie by recognizing the Lake’s rights…and he takes the Lake’s…hand in marriage?!
Read More | Community Wires, News from the Grassroots, Success StoryJun 6, 2019
With CELDF-supported attorneys, Tacoma, WA, residents filed a 1st Amendment petition with the Supreme Court challenging continued denial of ballot access for qualified citizen initiatives.
Read More | Community Wires, News, Press ReleasesMay 8, 2019
“This idea of a real human right to survive in the 21st century … was born – through the determination and commitment of the people who live [in Denver].”
Read More | Community Wires, News, Press ReleasesMay 8, 2019
As a judge denies Toledoans and Lake Erie intervention to defend the Lake Erie Bill of Rights against an agribusiness lawsuit to overturn it, community members file an appeal.
Read More | Community Wires, News, Press ReleasesApr 16, 2019
The oil and gas industry tried to quash the Lake Erie Bill of Rights at the ballot. The agriculture industry is trying to quash it in court. CELDF is crowdfunding as we represent Lake Erie and Toledo community members to protect the Lake’s rights.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsApr 2, 2019
GRANT TOWNSHIP, INDIANA COUNTY, PA: On April 1, federal Judge Susan Paradise Baxter issued an order that was not a joke: Grant Township (pop. 741), Baxter declared, owes Pennsylvania General Energy (PGE) over $100,000 in attorney’s fees and costs.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsMar 17, 2019
Nottingham, New Hampshire, residents adopt the second right to healthy climate law in the state at Town Meeting.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & Blogs, Success StoryMar 13, 2019
Yesterday, Exeter, New Hampshire, residents adopted their Right to a Healthy Climate Ordinance at Town Meeting. This is the first right-based climate law in the state.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & Blogs, Success StoryOct 3, 2018
Denver, CO, residents advance “Right to Survive” bill of rights for homeless people, turning in petitions for the May 2019 ballot.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsAug 24, 2018
The Franklin County, OH, Board of Elections strips 560,000 Columbus citizens of their right to vote on a rights-based ballot measure to protect the community from fracking waste.
Read More | Community Wires, News, Press ReleasesAug 6, 2018
Facing radioactive fracking waste, Columbus, OH, residents qualify a Community Bill of Rights initiative banning fracking activities from within the City. The measure protects rights to clean air, water, and soil.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & Blogs, Success StoryJul 25, 2018
Join CELDF in this unique opportunity to advance the emerging Community Rights movement in the United States.
Read More | Community Wires, News from the GrassrootsJul 10, 2018
Todd Township, PA, adopts a Community Rights law prohibiting industrial factory farming to protect their community and preserve local farming operations.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & Blogs, Success StoryJun 20, 2018
A right to a healthy climate is preserved in Lafayette, CO, as community members overtake a City Council meeting.
Read More | Community Wires, News from the Grassroots, Success StoryMay 22, 2018
Ohioans know firsthand that the very legal and governing structures we live under are preventing us from governing ourselves and protecting our communities.
Read More | UncategorizedMay 21, 2018
PGE continues to harass Grant Township, a small community in rural Pennsylvania, by attempting to force the Township to pay attorney’s fees. Grant residents are protecting their water by fighting PGE’s proposed fracking wastewater injection well.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsMay 16, 2018
An uninformed, passive public is easy to for the 1% to lead. We must become knowledgeable – not just about what is happening, but how and why. We must take on difficult questions and challenge the status quo if we are going to create a new way of life.
Read More | Press Releases & BlogsMay 9, 2018
It was a questionable election at best for Youngstown, OH, where community members are fighting for their right to clean water in a city that is making it increasingly difficult to even vote on citizen initiatives.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsApr 14, 2018
Courageous local officials in ten Florida cities are fighting punishments enacted by the state legislature under an unjust gun law. But it’s the state’s claimed power of preemption that must be challenged.
Read More | Press Releases & BlogsMar 27, 2018
CELDF, OHCRN, and Ohio communities grieve the loss of Dick McGinn, and celebrate his life and contributions. He was a passionate leader in growing Community Rights in Ohio.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & BlogsMar 19, 2018
The Mahoning County, OH, Board of Elections blocks a duly qualified Community Bill of Rights initiative from the ballot in Youngstown. CELDF assists residents to file a lawsuit with the Ohio Supreme Court.
Read More | Press Releases & BlogsMar 14, 2018
Communities can’t adopt the gun laws they believe would best protect their health, safety, and welfare. Here’s why – and what communities can do about it.
Read More | Press Releases & Blogs