By Kate Lunceford, LWVWA Issue Chair for Forests

A six-city, Washington tour sparking the launch of a campaign to secure constitutional protection of environmental rights in the state starts Sept. 14 in Seattle.

The Constitutional Change for a Livable Future: The Green Amendment Tour  also will stop in Olympia (Sept. 15); Vancouver (Sept. 16); Yakima (Sept. 17); Richland (Sept. 18); and Spokane (Sept. 19).

LWVWA supported the call for an amendment to the state constitution to establish protection for environmental rights during the 2023-2024 Legislature, based on the League’s positions on forests and resource management.

The amendment recognizes and elevates citizens’ rights to clean air and water and a stable climate to an inalienable standard.

Furthermore, the amendment would set a foundation for sustainable practices and reinforce the state’s responsibility to safeguard the environment for the benefit of its citizens.

The amendment would provide broad guidance that ensures thoughtful government decision-making, substantively and procedurally. It considers environmental impacts early in the process when prevention of pollution, degradation and environmental harm is most possible.

Two other states—Montana and Pennsylvania—have passed Green Amendments. In Montana. 16 youngsters—ages 2 to 18—succeeded in a lawsuit against the state—Held v. Montana—based on the amendment. The plaintiffs argued that the state's support of the fossil-fuel industry had worsened the effects of climate change on the lives and in doing so, had deprived them of their constitutional rights.

The state Supreme Court upheld the ruling last year.

The tour will feature Maya van Rossum, founder of the national nonprofit, Green Amendments: For the Generations.

Kate Lunceford, LWVWA Issue Chair for Forests, is a retired Certified Property Manager most recently with Trammell Crow Company. She owned the bakery Rudy's Patisserie in west Baltimore, MD, for 10 years. She began managing commercial property with the shopping center where one of her bakery outlets was located. Kate joined LWV of Snohomish County in 2013 where she found talented, interested people engaged in the work of strengthening democracy.

Her interest in forest issues grew out of the LWV of Snohomish County’s Tree Campaign. LWVSC is shepherding an Urban Tree Canopy Policy in the 2024 county Comprehensive Plan Update. Laws and policies governing urban trees in state law led to the question of whether trees in urban areas and in forest lands could be better managed to provide climate mitigation and biodiversity.