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Washington Community Rights NetworkA special project of the Community Environmental Legal

Defense Fund

Washington Communities Launch Statewide NetworkTo Advocate for Community Rights

The corporate state is not science fiction. Its barreling through my

community in the form of coal trains. Government isnt going to stop thiskind of destructive behavior. Its going to take people, in the placeswhere we live, to break the chokehold of law favoring corporate rule toone of community rights. Rick Dubrow of Bellingham, Washington.

MEDIA RELEASEAugust 7, 2012CONTACT: Kai Huschke509.607.5034info@celdf.org

SPOKANE: In late July, citizens from Washington communities gatheredin Spokane to launch the Washington Community Rights Network(WCRN).

Network members released The Spokane Declaration, calling uponcommunities across the state to join together in a movement to elevatethe rights of people, their communities, and nature above the claimedrights of corporations. This comes with an understanding, as stated inthe Declaration, that:

(O)ur communities are under siege from corporations exploiting our communitiesfor resource extraction and a variety of other uses harmful to us and the natural

environment...from a structure of law that has bestowed greater rights on thosecorporations than the communities in which they operate

The creation of the Washington Community Rights Network comes out ofactive community campaigns on both sides of the Cascades. Bellinghamhas qualified a Community Bill of Rights initiative for the November 2012

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ballot. The measure would secure residents rights to clean air andwater, along with prohibiting coal trains from passing throughBellingham.

In Spokane, an effort is underway to qualify a third Community Bill of

Rights for the November 2013 ballot. In 2011 voters nearly passed asimilar measure that wouldve given neighborhood residents decision-making power over major development, greater protections for the riverand aquifer, and worker rights over that of corporate rights. Seattle,Vancouver, Skagit County, Whatcom County, and other Washingtoncommunities are at various stages of community rights efforts.

The Network will expand its grassroots organizing to communities acrossWashington. Kai Huschke, Legal Defense Fund Organizer and WCRNCoordinator, explained, As a growing number of communities facethreats including massive coal shipments, they are reaching the shared

conclusion that corporations, along with our state and federalgovernment, have more power to decide what happens in ourcommunities than the people who live there. They are now comingtogether through the Washington Community Rights Network toorganize for local self-governance to elevate community rights overcorporate rights.

The Washington Community Rights Network is a special projectof the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund. TheLegal Defense Fund, headquartered in Mercersburg, PA, with

offices in Spokane, has been working with people andcommunities in Pennsylvania, across the United States, andinternationally since 1995 to assert fundamental rights todemocratic local self-governance, recognize natures rights, andend destructive corporate actions aided and abetted by stateand federal governments.

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