Our Times host Craig Barnes interviews CELDF's Executive Director Thomas Linzey on the Community Rights Movement emerging out of CELDF's grassroots work across the country with local municipalities to subordinate corporate rights to the rights of communities to self-governance.

Sidsel Overgaard of KUNM, New Mexico's Community Powered Public Radio, interviews CELDF's Thomas Linzey about elevating community rights and rights of nature above corporate "rights" to protect local communities and ecosystems.

CELDF's Executive Director Thomas Linzey is interviewed by Faren Dancer of KTRC 1260 AM "Unicopia Green Radio" on corporate "rights", and how communities are using their local municipal government to elevate community rights above those claimed by corporations.

Which president told Congress: “I recommend a law prohibiting all corporations from contributing to the campaign expenses of any party…let individuals contribute as they desire; but let us prohibit in effective fashion all corporations from making contributions for any political purpose, directly or indirectly?” If you recognize this Presidential quote, it probably means you’re a history buff (or you watch too much Jeopardy). The correct answer: Who was Theodore Roosevelt? While the speech has become a notable quotable, it’s often forgotten that it followed public outrage surrounding Roosevelt’s acceptance of huge corporate contributions that locked-in his election in 1904.

Rose Alguilar, host of Your Call in San Francisco, CA on KALW 97.1FM, interviews CELDF's Executive Director Thomas Linzey and Global Exchange's Director of Community Organizing Shannon Biggs about how communities can organize to change local laws to protect themselves from corporate interests and create the communities they envision.

William Evans, host of KDNK Community Radio program Shifting Gears in Carbondale, CO, interviews CELDF's Associate Director Mari Margil on the structure of law we live under that limits us from asserting our rights to health and the rights of nature--and how we can assert those rights through a grassroots movement.

William Evans, host of KDNK Community Radio program Shifting Gears in Carbondale, CO, interviews CELDF's Executive Director Thomas Linzey on using municipal law-making to stop unwanted corporate projects and create the sustainable communities people envision.

William Evans, host of KDNK Community Radio program Shifting Gears in Carbondale, CO, interviews CELDF's Executive Director Thomas Linzey on using municipal law-making to stop unwanted corporate projects and create the sustainable communities people envision.

When it comes to taking action against a corporation that has violated your rights, it seems as though it is going to be an uphill battle. The corporations are equipped with an army of attorneys, have very deep pockets and seem to have mastered the art of manipulation, especially when it comes to dealing with beaurocracy. However, there is hope. Citizens can actually take matters into their own hands at the local level, where justice can be served. Enter the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund. The CELDF works with communities across the country – from New England to California, from Pennsylvania and Virginia, to Spokane, Washington....In this segment of The Organic View Radio Show, host, June Stoyer talks to Ben Price about how citizens can take action at the local level!

The recent “occupy” movements across the country – including a now bundled-up contingent in the center of Spokane – continue to raise one of the major political questions of our times: “How do people fix a clearly broken system?”

The stone is cast and the amendment to ban drilling will appear on the Peters Township ballot. The stage is set and as maybe predicted based on past behavior, the informal fallacy argumentum ad baculum (appeal to the stick) will be launched by those opposed to the drilling ban.

I oppose the City of Warren bringing suit (using our tax dollars) against the referendum question proposed by the Westside Alliance group of which I am a member.

With a corporate challenge to its local law, you might think South Fayette finds itself in the middle of a battle over democratic local self-governance. But by avoiding the core question of who has rights in South Fayette Township (the people, or corporations?), and by attempting to regulate the location of fracking in a way the State seems to say is legal, rather than banning it on the grounds that fracking is a violation of fundamental rights that belong to everyone, the municipality set up its residents for a fall nine months ago, and hundreds of other municipalities are following the same legal advice: to color inside the lines; work within the system; and don’t rock the boat.

CELDF Comment: ex-PA Governor and gas fracking industry consultant Tom Ridge: "Critics of the industry...you have to ignore those folks,” Mr. Ridge said. “Accidents will happen. If you’re going to make the perfect the enemy of the good, that’s the wrong mindset.” ...and Matt Pitzarella, spokesman for Range Resources, one of the largest players in the industry...believes there is a “highly organized, highly motivated base of opposition” to gas drilling. Organizations like the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund visit small towns and work with local officials to draft ordinances designed to keep gas companies out, he said.

Thomas Linzey, Executive Director of CELDF, participates in a panel discussion on the history and development of the rights of nature, hosted by The Pachamama Alliance.

Join us! CELDF’s Gail Darrell will be on KMUD radio in Humboldt County, California this Sunday, April 3rd from 1:30 pm – 3:00 pm PT.

On February 28th, 7:30 – 9:30 p.m. in the Marwick Boyd Auditorium at Clarion University, Shireen Parsons will participate in the public forum discussion regarding fracking, or hydraulic drilling, in the Marcellus shale.

Claims that drilling corporations, shielded by a state law lobbied for by drilling corporations, possess the right to do what they want, when they want and where they want is an assault on people’s rights to protect their communities. Human beings alone should have constitutional rights, not corporations.

"Drilling into the Marcellus Shale and its effect on our environment is something that we, as a community, need to start talking with each other about," said group member Ellen Mavrich. "The risk involved for our residents must be understood and all options must be carefully considered. Ultimately, the citizens of Peters Township should decide what happens in Peters Township."

CELDF note: Here's a commentary from one of our Democracy School graduates. Maybe it's time for you to host a School in your community... "Among the many notions I took away from that class, the two that have stayed with me is that corporations once had to serve the public’s interest. If it failed to do that, its charter could be revoked. The other one is the idea that nature, in some way, has rights, that can codified, at least locally, and now I learn, throughout a country."

When the state acts to deny the rights of the people, it is the state and not the people who stand on the "wrong ground." Self-government is being denied when the Oil and Gas Act of Pennsylvania, written under the influence of the oil and gas industries, develops "preemptive" laws. The people have the right and the duty to protect themselves, their communities, their families and the livability of their environment for future generations. Rights are higher law than state regulations. If we have no control over our local community governance then we really do not live in the democracy we think we do.