CDER Launches Campaign Team, Will Support Rights of Nature Campaigns Across U.S.-4/22/2021
The Center for Democratic and Environmental Rights (CDER) announces the launch of its Rights of Nature Campaign Team – a team of lawyers and activists pledged to assist communities across the United States to qualify and adopt local laws which establish the rights of nature.
The Campaign Team will provide communities with a range of support – from helping to design citizen initiative petitions to qualify rights of nature measures to the ballot, to assisting with campaign literature, messaging, and strategies.
Leading the team are Melissa (“Mel”) Martin, an attorney from Oregon, Chuck O’Neal from Florida, and Nayeli Maxson, a California lawyer.
Melissa Martin, a Florida attorney currently living in Oregon, is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and served as a commissioned U.S. Marine Corps Officer, retiring as a Staff Judge Advocate in 2014. She earned her law degree from Barry University School of Law. Active in clean water advocacy and conservation, in 2016 Mel helped defeat a pro-fracking bill in Florida, and helped to lead a countywide coalition which successfully instituted a sales tax to support restoration projects for the Indian River Lagoon. She has also served as an Adjunct Law Professor, teaching Water Pollution Law and Environmental Ethics at Barry University.
Chuck O’Neal is the Chairman of the Florida Rights of Nature Network and the leader of the 2020 adoption of the first rights of nature law in Florida. That law, to protect the Wekiva and Econlockhatchee Rivers, passed with 89% approval by Orange County voters.
Chuck has a long history of service with the League of Women Voters of Florida, including serving as Chairman of the League’s Natural Resources Committee and as its first Vice President. He is also one of the founders of Speak Up Wekiva, an organization created to protect the Wekiva River basin. Chuck is the author of an early draft of the Florida Springs and Aquifer Protection Act and author of the Florida Black Bear Habitat Restoration Act. He is the recipient of the Cox Conserves Hero Award as a leading conservation advocate in central Florida, and led the League’s participation in its support of Florida’s Water and Land Legacy constitutional amendment. In 2016, he was a candidate for Florida Senate.
Nayeli Maxson Velazquez is a California attorney who served as the Executive Director and CEO of the Alliance for Community Development of the San Francisco Bay Area, a community organization founded to increase equitable access to capital for local, diverse entrepreneurs and visionaries. She served as Vice Chair of the City of Oakland’s Ethics Commission and earned her law degree at U.C. Hastings College of Law. She has worked for elected officials at the federal, state, and local levels, and recently served as the Regional Organizing Director for the Warren for President campaign.
CDER’s Campaign Team is a 501(c)(4) tax-exempt organization.
Mari Margil, CDER’s Executive Director, stated, “We are delighted to make this assistance available to communities across the United States which are working to advance laws to recognize and enforce the rights of nature. The depth of talent and experience that the team leaders bring to this endeavor will enhance the ability of any community to take local laws from being an idea to becoming reality. It’s time that rights of nature laws are passed by communities in every state and that those laws begin to build support toward the adoption of state and federal rights of nature laws.”
The Center for Democratic and Environmental Rights (CDER) partners with tribal nations; local, state, and national governments; as well as communities and NGOs around the globe to advance rights-based frameworks to protect nature. Our co-founders have worked on the first rights of nature law in the world.
Communities interested in advancing rights of nature laws forward in their own cities, towns, and counties, should contact CDER at info@centerforenvironmentalrights.org.