In response to impacts COVID-19 has had on the operations, financial security, and well-being of the women in our extended community, our organization launched the Rachel’s Network Community Resilience Fund in April 2020 to provide small, unrestricted gifts directly to nonprofits and women environmental leaders.
The American Chemistry Council has identified $36 billion in potential petrochemical and plastic manufacturing investments in the Ohio River Valley and corporations have already begun building ethane cracker plants, pipelines, storage facilities, and other dirty infrastructure. Rachel’s Network is partnering with the People Over Petro Coalition to fight back.
In 2019, Tompkins Conservation donated one million acres to Chile to help establish 10 million acres of new national parks in the country. Rachel’s Network traveled to Chile earlier this year to meet Tompkins Conservation staff, including president and co-founder Kristine Tompkins, and visit two of the new parks – Pumalín and Patagonia. The trip left an impression on members who subsequently provided a grant to Tompkins to support their continued conservation work.
Rachel’s Network announced that it has awarded climate champion Annel Hernandez with its inaugural Catalyst Award. As associate director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance and member of the NY Renews coalition, Annel was one of the key players in the passage of New York’s new climate law passed in July 2019, the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act.
Rachel’s Network announced that it has awarded tribal attorney Tara Houska with its inaugural Catalyst Award. Tara (Couchiching First Nation Anishinaabe) is former campaigns director of Honor the Earth, former advisor on Native American affairs to Bernie Sanders, and founder of Giniw collective, a grassroots, frontlines effort led by indigenous women to protect Anishinaabe territory from the destruction of Enbridge’s Line 3 tar sands project.
