Just a week after his reelection, there’s plenty of talk about how environmental policies will be impacted when former President Donald Trump returns to the Oval Office.
But climate change is not waiting to find out.
This week, representatives from around the globe are discussing what’s to be done at COP29. That’s the annual gathering of nearly 200 countries that evolved from a climate action agreement in 1992.
Among the people thinking about the path forward is Tia Nelson. The lifelong environmental advocate is the daughter of late Wisconsin U.S. Senator and Earth Day founder Gaylord Nelson.
Just days before the November 5 election, Tia Nelson shared her thoughts with WUWM's Susan Bence on what she calls a critical inflection point in history.
After decades of climate policy work and activism, Nelson thought what had been a collective effort should have been accomplished.
“Environmentalists have been [going on] about the climate change issue for a long time. I’ve work at the local level, the state level, … I’ve been involved in international conversations and negotiations. Why aren’t we where we need to be?” Nelson asked.
Nelson thinks back to 1992. At the time, she was senior policy advisor for Latin America with The Nature Conservancy. “I traveled to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for the earth summit and the framework convention on climate change was signed there by I think by 192 signatories,” she recalled.
Republican President George H. W. Bush was one of those signatories. “[He] signed the framework convention on climate change and said the following words, ‘The United States will lead the world in addressing this existential threat.' That was an exciting and hopeful moment,” Nelson said.
Significant climate action did not follow and bipartisanship seems to have vanished.
“It used to be possible for Democrats and Republicans to work together to find solutions and compromise and that seems so difficult and challenging today and this inflection point comes at a time where the urgency of climate change has never been more serious and important,” she said.
That impasse led Nelson to a strategy that’s new to her — cultivating connections with people who don’t wake up every day identifying as environmentalists like she does.
“I’m very interested in figuring out how we meet people where they are, engage a broader community in the conversation. … We are all dependent on clean air, clean water, we are all threatened. … I’m very inspired what’s happening in the faith community,” she said.
Nelson admits that inspiration caught her by surprise. "I was not raised in a religious family, … but the promise of broadening the conversation and finding new language to talk about the awesome that is the natural world and any means by which we can get there is worth exploring,” she said.
That drove Nelson’s decision to serve on the board of ecoAmerica. Its big picture goals include achieving 100% renewable energy by 2030, but day to day, ecoAmerica focuses on individual engagement by cultivating climate leaders people trust within the faith and medical communities.
In Tia Nelson’s words: "To expand and amplify the voices of concern beyond environmental activists like myself."
Nelson believes as the call for climate action broadens and intensifies, people we elect will take notice.
“Elected officials have to respond to the people who elect them and if we prioritize this issue, they have to be responsive to it. It will take time and it will certainly take the engagement of the citizenry to demand that of its elected officials,” she said.
In the meantime, Nelson said she’s prioritizing kindness and working on her listening skills. “To me, this challenge requires individuals and communities and civic orgs to help weave back the torn fabric — thread by thread, through conversations and listening and kindness and through engagement with others, even those with whom we disagree. We’re in a time of very frayed fabric and we each can contribute to sewing this back together and that’s what I’m committed to helping do,” she said.
Nelson returns to nature as often she can, saying it not only grounds her; it’s a reminder of our role in the resilience of the natural world.
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