The Trump administration has announced plans to expand offshore drilling in the Atlantic, Pacific, Gulf of Mexico, and Arctic Ocean. This drastic proposal opens over 90% of the Outer Continental Shelf to new drilling and puts our nation’s coastal communities, beaches, surf breaks, and marine ecosystems at risk of a catastrophic oil spill. There is at least one lease sale proposed for the Washington/Oregon coast. We have ONE opportunity to engage, in person, with staff from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management on this important issue. Join us Monday February 5th, from 3-7pm at the Landmark Catering & Convention Center in Tacoma. If you would like to carpool, send us an email. Please share the Facebook event widely to make as much of an impact as possible.
Our January chapter meeting, on Wednesday January 31st from 7-9pm at the Puget Sound Estuarium, will focus on this issue, with Surfrider Washington staff on-hand to talk about the proposed lease sale of our coastal waters for offshore oil drilling. We will be making signs, drafting our public comments and planning logistics for our chapter's presence at the February 5th Offshore Oil Drilling Public Meeting. Beers and sodas are on us!
We will also be holding an election for our Ocean Friendly Restaurant Program Coordinator position for our Executive Committee (EC). If you are interested in this role, or other roles within our EC, please send us an email!
A Florida native, Liz started her career as a marine biologist, working with sea turtles and commercial fisheries in the Florida Keys and spending her vacation time teaching at Duke University's marine science summer camp. While completing her master's degree in Sustainable Development & Conservation Biology from the University of Maryland, she taught sustainability to undergraduate students while also volunteering as a docent at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum’s Ocean Hall and leading overnight camps at the National Zoo. After graduating, she got hitched and moved out west, where she’s spent several years studying salmon and streams and trying to embrace this thing called elevation. She learned about Surfrider’s programs and campaigns as the Olympia Chapter’s Volunteer Coordinator before being hired on as the Washington Regional Manager. When she’s not supporting our five Washington chapters and three BC chapters in their amazing work, she likes to run on trails, bike around volcanoes, freedive, play frisbee, read in the sun with her chickens, play guitar when no one's around, and make maps. Liz has a special fondness for swamps, cypress trees, and thunderstorms, is recreationally obsessed with ocean sunfish, and will shamelessly eat any unattended leftovers.