[BNS_members] Day of Climate Action: Support Our Climate Circles Crowdfunding

[Caroline Beddoe]

Good afternoon, 

There is a certain poignancy to today, as we nervously await the arrival
of Hurricane Fiona, a potentially historic storm for our region, on a
day of Global Climate Action. Some climate actions (like the large
Climate Strike in Halifax) have been cancelled today due to severe
weather (however, the Ecology Action Centre is still organizing action
by encouraging people to fax the government calling for climate action
through the EAC website [1] - no fax machine required!). 

This storm threatens to be detrimental to us, but severe storms like
Fiona may be detrimental to other species, like migratory birds along
the shorelines and migrating butterflies. With warming temperatures and
ocean waters, and increasing climate instability, Fiona is a harbinger
of more to come... 

We need to find ways to organize for local climate action and
resiliency. 

THAT'S WHY THE BLOMIDON NATURALISTS SOCIETY IS TRYING TO LAUNCH CLIMATE
CIRCLES - AND WE NEED YOUR HELP! Our Climate Circles crowdfunding
campaign [2] is now live, in partnership with the Small Change Fund. 

While you charge your devices and hunker down for the storm - perhaps
you have a chance to read this request and learn about our Climate
Circles plan? 

The BNS aims to relaunch Climate Circles in the winter of 2023, this
time with the financial resources needed to honour the time and
commitment it takes to support grassroots-level community climate action
on a weekly basis for a whole region.  There's global consensus that we
need collective action for this unprecedented, collective problem, as
well as scalable, and location-specific solutions in every community. It
is also clear that we need a timeline of major action progress this
decade. Sounds like we need to get meeting!  

We are in a climate emergency that is deepening rather than resolving,
but we do have a window to act from now until around 2030. It is more
important than ever that we who care about climate change are
translating our care into effective action to scale up solutions in
time. But any climate action arising from regular folks who care needs a
foundation of community from which to act. That is, we need to be able
to identify who else around us cares, as well as what interests and
skills they have so that we can do climate-responsive projects together.


Climate Circles aims to build these foundational communities in order to
create and sustain local-level, citizen-driven climate action projects. 
We host facilitated, weekly action meetings in Wolfville, Nova Scotia
that are intentionally structured to encourage fun, effective, positive,
inclusive and supportive sessions that address the topics most relevant
and motivating to those in attendance. Climate Circles is a place where
people build community and see that they are not alone in their climate
concerns and desire to act and learn new skills. It is somewhere they
can dream up and begin work on projects that no one person could take on
alone. It is a regional hub of all things climate action where everyone
and anyone worried about climate change and motivated to figure out how
to respond is actively welcomed. It is a place where we believe everyone
has something to offer to the movement and that it is our collective job
to figure out how to make space for everyone to contribute. 

Doing these things well requires learning new ways of being and thinking
that support continued patient, generous and effective involvement. It
also means identifying all the reasons people might get discouraged and
stop attending meetings. It means anticipating and responding to these
reasons before they take hold so meaningful, citizen-driven climate
action can thrive. With this in mind, the Climate Circle facilitators
are both proactive and responsive in creating a system which provides
facilitative structure, just-in-time training, celebrations, fun,
hands-on projects, and more to ensure that participants' needs are met
as they continue to meet together to achieve the climate action outcomes
that we need . 

BUT WE CAN’T DO IT ALONE. We need your help to support this unique,
citizen-driven project so that we can foster climate change action in
Nova Scotia, Canada, and the world. PLEASE CONSIDER DONATING TODAY, AS
AN ACT OF CLIMATE ACTION, TO SUPPORT OUR EFFORTS!

PLEASE VISIT OUR CLIMATE CIRCLES [3] PAGE TO LEARN MORE, AND VISIT OUR
SMALL CHANGE FUND CROWDFUNDING PAGE [2] TO MAKE A CONTRIBUTION. 

Warmly, 

Caroline & the Climate Circles Advisory Committee

-- 
Caroline Beddoe
 She/her
 613-619-1098
 Program Coordinator
 Blomidon Naturalists Society
 Wolfville, Nova Scotia

_ Blomidon Naturalists Society activities take place in Mi'kma'ki, the
traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Mi'kmaq People. We
acknowledge that we have a responsibility to honour and learn about
their histories and current cultures and to actively work in support of
reconciliation. We are committed to fostering respectful and sustainable
relationships with the Indigenous Peoples of this land, with all other
organisms, with the land and with the water._ 

Links:
------
[1] https://ecologyaction.ca/2022-climate-strike-fax-storm
[2]
https://smallchangefund.ca/project/climate-circles-weekly-action-meetings-to-sustain-grassroots-climate-work/
[3] https://blomidonnaturalists.ca/climate-circles/
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