Surfrider: 40 Years of Celebrating Community and Coastal Conservation

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A lot of times, being in conservation can make you feel pretty lonely. When

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you start to see and observe things around your local area, you

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start to see maybe flooding or a lot of debris around

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rivers and streams and coastlines, it can be kind

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of weird, just you being aware of it, you telling people, people not

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really caring, your family and friends being like, well, what can we do? We can't do

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much. And it can feel very lonely. I've heard that a lot from

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people in the audience and just people who are trying to get into conservation, and

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they want to do something. but they may not have a marine biology background. They

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may have other jobs and they just can't dedicate their full time to

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it. And they just feel kind of lonesome and just being like, ah, what can

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we really do? But they feel that, you know, climate

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anxiety, ocean anxiety type thing. But there is

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ways that you can feel more of a community in

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and around the issues that you care about the most, like the environment. And that's joining

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a place like Surfrider. And Surfrider has been

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doing conservation advocacy work along

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the coastlines, not only for surfers, but for everybody

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and the entire community who lives in and around the coastline. And

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we are here to talk today with CEO Chad

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Nelson of the 40th anniversary. where

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the surf rider organization originated and

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how it's doing and where it's going to go in the future. We're

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gonna talk all things policy and advocacy work

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and how they created the chapter network, how

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they have all these volunteers and how they make sure that everybody's trained up

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and feeling like a community and some of the great things

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that they've done over the last 40 years and hopefully in

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40 more. So we're gonna talk about that on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast.

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Let's start the show. Hey,

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everybody, welcome back to another exciting episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm

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your host, Andrew Lewin, and this is the podcast where you find out what's happening with

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the ocean, how you can speak up for the ocean and what you can do to

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live for a better ocean by taking action. And on

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today's episode, it's a special one, folks. We got another interview this time

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with CEO Chad Nelson is back from

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Surfrider. on the episode on how to protect the ocean

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to discuss the 40th anniversary of

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Surfrider. We're going to talk about the origins, how a few surfers

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decided to say, hey, you know what? We need to start looking at what's

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happening around us. We're starting to see some hot surfing

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spots go away, move away, get transformed into

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harbors and so forth, and water quality diminishing. We

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need to do something about it. We need to stand up as a community, as a surfing

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community. And that blossomed over the years, over the last 40 years,

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into a network of over 100,000 volunteers, 200 chapters,

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80 full-time staff, and so many good

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things done for our coastlines, for the ocean, and

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for the communities that lie within them. And it's a

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lot of fun to be able to talk to Chad. Chad's been on the podcast a

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number of times. We've talked about his career, why he chose a PhD

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when he did and when he did his PhD. We talked about that in another episode. Today

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we focus solely on his 29 years growing

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as a biologist, as a person into the adult

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he is now, going from an intern now as the CEO of

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one of the largest grassroots organizations in the world. and

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being able to talk about all the great things that he has been

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able to be a part of as a surf rider and what they've been able to do and

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how they feed off of the passion of

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the volunteers that make up the chapter network as

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well as build programs because of that passion and

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be able to share it with other chapters and be able to do something on

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a larger scale. And at the beginning I said, you know, sometimes conservation can

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feel lonely and even myself Sitting in this office talking

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about oceans when I'm not doing an interview and doing a solo episode a

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lot of the times I'm like man I wish I could really be out there and be a part of it well being

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a part of surf rider means being a part of the Action and you can be

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a part of the action in a lot of different ways And I'm gonna put a

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link in the show notes in the description It's

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volunteer dot surf rider org you can join

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as a volunteer because it's one of the greatest organizations around

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and it really is It listens to its volunteer, it trains its

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volunteers, and you can feel like you're doing something for the coastline in

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and around your area. And it's not only in the U.S., it's in Canada, it's in

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other places. So just go to that website, volunteers.surfrider.org, and

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you can join as a volunteer. And for now, you can listen to Chad Nelson

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talking about the wonderful things that's been happening over the last 40 years. with

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Surfrider. Enjoy the interview and I will talk to you after. Hey, Chad, welcome

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back to the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Are you ready to talk about

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Yeah. Hey, thanks, Andrew, for having me back. And these are exciting

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Absolutely, not only for SurfRider, for everybody who's

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not only involved in SurfRider, but who have been following SurfRider

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for a long time. It's not every day where you

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get an organization that hits 40 years and being around

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and doing amazing things. And today, you know trad you've

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been on the podcast before a number of times we've gone over sort

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of your development through ocean science and ocean conservation

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you know your phd work and and so forth we've talked about

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your involvement in surf rider here and there and as the ceo

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and executive director like that's a huge thing but

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we haven't really talked about the your evolution in Surfrider, because

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you've been around, I think it's almost 29 years since

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you started your internships and so forth. And

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it's been around 40 years. So you've been there for a significant portion of over

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50% of the time since Surfrider has been around. So we're

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going to get into where it started, how

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it's going, and then where you're headed into the future. So

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this is going to be a lot of fun. But just to give people a

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little bit of a refresher, can you just let us know who you are and

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Sure. My name is Chad Nelson and I'm the CEO of the Surfrider Foundation.

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Awesome. And now being the CEO

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and starting off where you started off, it's got

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to be an incredible journey. We've seen Surfrider

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be one of the largest, you know, grassroots organizations,

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coastal organizations in the U.S. and maybe

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even the world. You've done some great things from a policy focus

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that we've covered on the podcast before, and we'll talk a little bit about

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that. But it's definitely, it is a grassroots organization,

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started off as a grassroots organization. But can we just start from

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the beginning and just be like, how did it all begin with

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Surfrider? How did this incredible organization become this incredible?

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Yeah, no, it's a great story. And you know, it

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started that the summer August of 1984 is our

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sort of birthday and when we were founded. And, you

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know, as is often the case, it was sort of a confluence of events.

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Okay. The surfers

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were focused on Malibu, you know, First

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Point, Surfrider Beach, famous wave, the wave of Gidget,

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still like a world-class surf spot that,

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you know, the water was constantly polluted, the inlet there

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was being managed without regard for surfing or coastal recreation,

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so they were They were frustrated about surfers

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not having a role. Surf spots in California

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have been destroyed. Killerdana, which is now a harbor, was an

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iconic, famous wave. People weren't

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listening to surfers. And as we were talking about before we

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got on here, there was also this negative stereotype. And

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the Olympics were in Los Angeles in 1984. That's right. And

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these three founders who I'll talk about, you know, sort of saw athletes

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on the world stage at the Olympics. And we're thinking, why aren't

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surfers sort of perceived in that way?

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And, you know, interestingly enough, surfing is also now in

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the Olympics. Yes, it is. Yeah. And so,

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you know, they decided to, I mean, what they did is

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sort of what any good activist does is they saw a problem and

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they decided to do something about it. And so a guy

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named Glenn Henning, another guy named Tom Pratt,

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and a really highly regarded Malibu surfer, Lance Carson,

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were sort of the three guys that were credited with founding Surfrider in

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1984 to try to improve surfing reputation,

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give surfers a voice in coastal

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management decisions. and ultimately sort of start protecting

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surf spots. And in the beginning, we'll talk

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about the evolution, but in the beginning, it was really about surfers trying to

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protect surf spots that were being destroyed. It was somewhat

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myopic. That said, they also

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had something which we don't do anymore called the Baja Assistance Program. A

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lot of surfers were going down to Baja, so it had like a humanitarian arm

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also. And they were bringing supplies and

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stuff down to families in Baja. Again, part of that was to try

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to like change the perception of surfers as being stewards

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and good citizens as opposed to sort of the negative stereotype.

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Now that's what they did that with Surfrider. That was one of the like first

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Yeah, it was like a program in the early days called the Baja Assistance Program.

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How that's so cool. And that's just, it's kind of cool. Cause that's just like

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impact. Like here where you, you know, we're on your waves, you know, we're surfing your

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waves, we're in your area. Here's some stuff that,

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that might help you out. Like let's be a community. Yeah. I

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love that. I love that aspect. What would, you know, when you have these, these

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three founders, what, and obviously they were probably a part of

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a larger surfing community. You're not just a surfer by yourself. You

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usually surfer with some friends and, and, and maybe

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family. And then you build this community. What was sort of

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the first perceptions of Surfrider by other surfers when

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You know, that's a great question. I was 14 years

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old. I was vaguely aware, but I wasn't in the mix.

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I can generally sense that there

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was a lot of excitement about it. Surfer Magazine

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was supporting it. Yvon Chouinard, the infamous founder of Patagonia,

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was an early financial supporter. There

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was a lot of goodwill, certainly in the surf

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industry, to support Surfrider. And I

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think there was a little bit of a sense of, OK, it's about time. Um,

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and actually, you know, we, we ended up developing this

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grassroots model that took a little while. It was, it wasn't until

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1993 that these built the chapter network. But, um, part

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of that was because there was so much interest in other places, uh, and

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the organization was so small. Uh, they were like, Hey, we

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can't help you. However, if you want

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to start a chapter, we can bond together and work on these things together. So

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And it's a difficult model to implement, right? Because it takes a

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lot of trust to other people because it's, you know, you're using the Surfrider name,

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which you've, which at this point is what it's almost 10 years at this

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point where they. after they develop it, where they're developing a good name

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of doing some great things, having some impact on other communities, trying

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to save some iconic surf spots and stop

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development where these surf spots are, obviously preserving

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water quality. You build up this great name, and then people

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are like, hey, we want to be a part of this. It's like, all right, let's think about

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this a little bit. Knowing surfers, though, that community

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feel, you're probably like, this is great. Let's try and figure this out. You

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said it took a while to develop this chapter model. Do

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you know what some of those challenges were? Because probably in

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and around near the beginning where you started, you

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know, volunteering and stuff. But were you around at this point where they developed

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I wasn't around. And when I started, I think there was 24 chapters.

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OK. So it's still relatively small. But what actually what

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happened, which was interesting, is, you know, I think they were A

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couple of interesting things. The guys who started Surfrider sort

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of admittedly didn't know what they were doing. Right. Right. You

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know, oftentimes big environmental

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nonprofits were started by a philanthropist or,

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you know, the Kennedys started the Keepers, you

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know, and so this was just a bunch of scrappy surfers

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who were tired of getting pushed around. And

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so, you know, in the beginning, there was a lot of trials and tribulations. And,

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and so I think they were just trying to like, figure it out. Everyone had jobs.

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Yeah. And what happened was there was a there's

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a really kind of an iconic coastal conservationist in

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California named Mark Massara, who's a surfing lawyer. Yes. Who

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was an attorney for Surfrider in those early days. And

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he helped lead a lawsuit against a

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which we won in 1992. And at the time it was the second

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largest Clean Water Act lawsuit in the country. Wow.

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And that put surfers, uh, surf writer on the map. Yeah. You

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know, people again, like people were like, what a bunch of

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surfers took on, you know, this giant paper

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company and yeah. Yeah. Cause they were dumping effluent in

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the, in the Bay at Humboldt Bay and it was impacting the water quality in the surf. And

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of course, So that made national media.

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And that's when the phone started ringing. We've got problems

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in New Jersey. We've got problems in Florida. We've got problems in

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Texas. And this staff of five

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at the time was like, I

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don't know what to do. And we had a board member named Gordon

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Labetz. He was on the board of directors. And he was heavily involved

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in the Sierra Club. And so, you know Sierra Club

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has a chapter model also, that's right. So he said hey

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Maybe it's time for surf rider to start chapters And

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so we did it and I have to say I I You

231
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know, I didn't come up with it. I inherited it as an employee

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here, but I cannot tell you how effective it is. Right.

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I truly, you know, now I've been at this for a long time. I've worked with

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just about every other conservation group

235
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in the country. And I really think this grassroots model,

236
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I'm such a big believer. Um, so I think for a number of

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reasons, one, um, I think that like

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matching the bottom up with the top down as a potent sort

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of formula. And that's because, um, we

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have real people in communities who are

241
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passionate about these issues, taking things on

242
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and, um, and that is a scale.

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that a, we understand as humans, right? You talk

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about the country and 400 million people, like nobody really can

245
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wrap their head around what that means. Um, and, and

246
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so part of it, and you, you know, and we're also, we're working with people

247
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who are experiencing the issues firsthand. Um,

248
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and you can have a lot of influence at the local level at your city council

249
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meeting. Um, it's a place where everyone has agency. And

250
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so, you know, can you affect a federal law like the Inflation

251
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Reduction Act in DC? Well, you can try and

252
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we do, right? You call and write and you talk to your representatives,

253
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but that's very different than going into your local city hall and talking

254
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to your city council members. So I think there's,

255
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you know, and I, you know, I get this from some of the big national groups. Sometimes

256
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they'll, they'll call in and they'll be like, I use this

257
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I'm like, yeah, what state? What town? What

258
00:16:27,465 --> 00:16:31,847
kind of fishing? Do you want a commercial guy, wreck guy, spear guy?

259
00:16:32,007 --> 00:16:35,569
And so we're working with people who are really in touch

260
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with what's going on. No, that's not true. I was down there yesterday, and

261
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I saw it. So it's grounded in

262
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reality. And so I think that's the power of

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the model. You

264
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know, it's a lot of work to, of course, for all these volunteers and

265
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activists. And whereas I think a lot of groups focus on

266
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scientists and economists and policy

267
00:17:02,053 --> 00:17:05,194
makers and lawyers, you know, we spend a lot of our

268
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money, time and energy on grassroots organizing because that's

269
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where You know, where we invest to

270
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make this work and all those other things are important

271
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to I, you know, and we work with a lot of those groups

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that are more sort of nationally focused, but I

273
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think so. I think there's a lot of power there, you know, and then our challenges. is

274
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you know the framework of the organization is how do we take that and scale it up to

275
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the state level yeah up to the federal level and even in

276
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some cases in the international level well here's what i i

277
00:17:37,914 --> 00:17:41,197
love about it just from looking outside outside and is

278
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I hear from a lot of people, uh, you know, in sort of

279
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my work as a podcaster and building this community where you hear a

280
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lot of people, it's like, I feel alone. Like I feel like I'm by myself. I see these

281
00:17:52,259 --> 00:17:55,302
things happening in my community or I see it on, on a

282
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video and I feel like I just, I feel helpless. I just can't do

283
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it. And I think what the chapter model does, especially at

284
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surf riders, it gives you that collective home. where

285
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it's like you may not be at the headquarters in California, but

286
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you are, you might be in Florida, you might be in North Carolina, you might be in New Jersey,

287
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but you are, you are sitting there, you are seeing something, and

288
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then you can go back and get resources from the chapter

289
00:18:21,019 --> 00:18:24,461
or from maybe headquarters and be like, hey, look, here's the problem that we're facing.

290
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Have you guys ever dealt with this before? Can we offer some solutions? And

291
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then you have these connections at not only the local level, but

292
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you also, and other local levels around the coastline or

293
00:18:35,205 --> 00:18:38,746
if it's the same coast or different coast, you also have it at the

294
00:18:38,786 --> 00:18:42,046
county level, at the state level, and at the federal level where

295
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you can start to affect change. And so that person who felt so alone by

296
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just volunteering with Surfrider or another chapter,

297
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you get this home and you get the support that you probably never had

298
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before. And I think that's where that benefit is. And then

299
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of course, you want that big voice at the top to

300
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say, hey, federally or state-wise, we

301
00:19:03,490 --> 00:19:07,492
need to make changes. Now you have this influence, because

302
00:19:07,713 --> 00:19:10,914
from the name of it as an organization, you

303
00:19:10,934 --> 00:19:14,576
can walk in and just be like, well, we have this many volunteers

304
00:19:19,139 --> 00:19:22,421
Yeah, it's such a powerful and effective model. It

305
00:19:22,781 --> 00:19:26,723
could probably be scary to a lot of the anti-environmental

306
00:19:26,763 --> 00:19:30,425
policy people that we see. Be like, oh, god, here comes Surfrider.

307
00:19:30,445 --> 00:19:33,687
They've got some power. Yeah, we like to think so. Well,

308
00:19:33,707 --> 00:19:36,969
I'm sure it has. I mean, over time, and we'll talk about it

309
00:19:36,989 --> 00:19:40,632
in just a sec, Surf Rider as an organization, as

310
00:19:40,672 --> 00:19:44,595
a grassroots organization, has been able to do a lot of effective policy work

311
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in collaboration with a lot of organizations. But

312
00:19:48,538 --> 00:19:51,960
you have a name. You have this good name. And

313
00:19:52,000 --> 00:19:55,363
you've worked hard to do that. But before we get into that,

314
00:19:56,003 --> 00:19:59,445
you mentioned that there are challenges that come through with, you

315
00:19:59,465 --> 00:20:02,867
know, building a chapter and, and just taking, you know, time

316
00:20:03,187 --> 00:20:06,708
to, you know, from the beginning to even install that

317
00:20:06,808 --> 00:20:09,970
model and figure out that that model is working. What have

318
00:20:10,050 --> 00:20:13,791
been some of the major challenges that, that Surfrider has been able to overcome over

319
00:20:17,473 --> 00:20:20,914
Yeah, I think, you know, so, um, you know, to fast

320
00:20:20,954 --> 00:20:25,176
forward to today, we have 200 chapters in clubs, you know, up

321
00:20:25,276 --> 00:20:29,149
from 24 and, um, you know, well

322
00:20:29,229 --> 00:20:32,470
over a hundred thousand volunteers that participate with us every year. And,

323
00:20:33,511 --> 00:20:37,092
um, and so all those chapters are volunteer run.

324
00:20:38,652 --> 00:20:42,054
Um, so anytime you're dealing with, you know, I would argue

325
00:20:42,094 --> 00:20:45,755
we have, you know, probably close to a thousand what I call chapter leaders,

326
00:20:46,315 --> 00:20:50,256
people running the volunteer chapters and then tens of thousands of

327
00:20:50,316 --> 00:20:53,558
volunteers volunteering. And, um, so it's a lot of

328
00:20:53,618 --> 00:20:56,660
people. Yeah. Uh, and you know, it's a little bit of

329
00:20:56,740 --> 00:21:00,065
herding cats because they're all volunteers. So, um, you

330
00:21:00,105 --> 00:21:03,850
know, I, I'm not in a position to tell them like what

331
00:21:03,890 --> 00:21:07,294
to do as their boss. I mean, we have guidelines and

332
00:21:07,414 --> 00:21:11,700
structure and you know, it's orderly and, um, actually.

333
00:21:12,223 --> 00:21:15,685
remarkably, people, you know, the network really stays on

334
00:21:15,885 --> 00:21:19,627
task and on mission, we don't spend a lot of time sort

335
00:21:19,647 --> 00:21:23,989
of self correcting. But so just organizing that

336
00:21:24,249 --> 00:21:27,451
number of people, you know,

337
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is a challenge, especially when they're all volunteers. And, you know, be volunteering

338
00:21:31,513 --> 00:21:35,175
is challenging. So there's constantly trying to recruit new volunteers, trying

339
00:21:35,215 --> 00:21:38,496
to manage people so that they they recruit and

340
00:21:40,293 --> 00:21:43,495
transition out before they get burned out. Nobody can

341
00:21:43,515 --> 00:21:46,778
be a volunteer forever. You know, so in

342
00:21:47,038 --> 00:21:50,221
a healthy volunteer organization, you get in,

343
00:21:50,261 --> 00:21:54,444
you're excited, you do some things, you recruit other people, you're

344
00:21:54,484 --> 00:21:57,666
able to kind of take a backseat. They then recruit new

345
00:21:57,706 --> 00:22:02,069
people and there's this ongoing healthy cycle of folks.

346
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So just training volunteers, you

347
00:22:06,413 --> 00:22:09,716
know, retraining new volunteers, kind

348
00:22:09,736 --> 00:22:13,040
of trying to get everybody pointed in the same

349
00:22:13,100 --> 00:22:17,606
direction have always been the challenges. And

350
00:22:17,646 --> 00:22:20,769
the other challenge is really kind of a good challenge is

351
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we've always struggled to keep up with the interest. So

352
00:22:25,745 --> 00:22:29,227
there's so much interest. You know, the

353
00:22:29,347 --> 00:22:32,789
sort of volunteer capacity for good in the country is

354
00:22:33,129 --> 00:22:36,531
extraordinary. Yeah. It really speaks well to

355
00:22:36,571 --> 00:22:39,673
sort of humanity at a time when I think some people are, you

356
00:22:39,693 --> 00:22:42,895
know, frustrated with that. Yeah. And so, you

357
00:22:42,935 --> 00:22:47,026
know, we're always, you know, We have 80 employees now.

358
00:22:47,046 --> 00:22:50,448
We used to have five. We're still trying to keep up

359
00:22:50,629 --> 00:22:53,751
with the amount of interest. Yeah. I want to start a chapter. I

360
00:22:53,791 --> 00:22:57,253
need help here. And so that's a good problem. Yeah,

361
00:22:57,533 --> 00:23:01,076
absolutely. And, you know, and so, you

362
00:23:01,096 --> 00:23:04,278
know, we feel like we're we're always feeling like

363
00:23:04,578 --> 00:23:07,780
we're just tapping into the total capacity of what we could

364
00:23:07,820 --> 00:23:11,062
do with volunteers out there. You know, the better you are

365
00:23:11,082 --> 00:23:14,225
at organizing, the more people want to

366
00:23:15,662 --> 00:23:20,145
Well, that's it. And the more things you do, you're able to, I

367
00:23:20,165 --> 00:23:23,308
guess, accomplish, too, as an organization, the more people will be like, oh, a

368
00:23:23,328 --> 00:23:27,010
surfrider would be great. Plus, they're known as a grassroots organization. So

369
00:23:27,030 --> 00:23:30,733
they like to work with volunteers. And that's

370
00:23:30,753 --> 00:23:34,015
always wonderful. As you grow, though, I think one of the, I

371
00:23:34,075 --> 00:23:37,758
see one of the challenges is like, how do you remain like

372
00:23:37,798 --> 00:23:41,321
the same? Because you've got some great quality volunteers. You

373
00:23:41,341 --> 00:23:44,906
know, like they do some great work. And when we say volunteers,

374
00:23:44,946 --> 00:23:48,214
a lot of them have full-time jobs. And so they're doing this

375
00:23:48,655 --> 00:23:51,985
on top of that, right? It's it's

376
00:23:52,005 --> 00:23:55,227
a it's a challenge for them to do, but that's like their hobby. That's what they

377
00:23:55,287 --> 00:23:58,509
want to do. They want to protect the environment in their in their area. So

378
00:23:58,529 --> 00:24:01,991
you have a lot of great quality volunteers. Is

379
00:24:02,031 --> 00:24:05,373
there like an onboarding process for each volunteer so

380
00:24:05,413 --> 00:24:08,995
that, you know, they know the mission, the values of

381
00:24:09,115 --> 00:24:13,118
the organization so they stay true so you can continue to,

382
00:24:17,937 --> 00:24:21,079
Yeah, I mean, you're right. And, you know, before I started, I just want

383
00:24:21,099 --> 00:24:24,642
to say these, these, I'm, you know, I've been at this for a long time,

384
00:24:24,702 --> 00:24:28,024
and I am always humbled by the people

385
00:24:28,065 --> 00:24:31,247
who are volunteering for Surfrider. Yeah, because you're right. These

386
00:24:31,287 --> 00:24:34,990
are people with jobs and families, in many cases,

387
00:24:35,010 --> 00:24:38,692
you know, from high school kids to senior citizens,

388
00:24:38,752 --> 00:24:43,061
retirees, and everything in between. And They

389
00:24:43,101 --> 00:24:46,366
are doing the hard work volunteering because they

390
00:24:46,386 --> 00:24:49,891
want to protect our ocean waves and beaches. So it's just it is an extraordinary. I

391
00:24:49,952 --> 00:24:54,438
mean, I feel privileged to be working with such a like extraordinary, you

392
00:24:54,478 --> 00:24:58,163
know, group of people. And so. Yeah.

393
00:24:58,183 --> 00:25:01,746
And we invest a lot of time and energy in that. So we have like an online

394
00:25:01,786 --> 00:25:05,468
learning platform, you know, with training that

395
00:25:05,488 --> 00:25:09,591
we're sort of developing. It used to be sort of fairly crude. And

396
00:25:10,151 --> 00:25:13,714
now we're, you know, used to be, it started in the early days

397
00:25:14,034 --> 00:25:17,576
as a Xerox hard copy book.

398
00:25:18,097 --> 00:25:21,499
Yeah. Activist toolkit. You know, then

399
00:25:21,559 --> 00:25:24,920
it got online. And, you know, then at one

400
00:25:24,980 --> 00:25:28,223
point it was like an intranet and now it's actually like a

401
00:25:28,644 --> 00:25:32,607
online learning, uh, management system with like online courses.

402
00:25:32,627 --> 00:25:36,283
Um, we do a lot of, uh. We

403
00:25:36,303 --> 00:25:39,848
do a lot of regional training, and then we have a

404
00:25:39,908 --> 00:25:43,772
network of regional managers of staff that

405
00:25:43,792 --> 00:25:47,076
are out supporting the chapters. And so part of our goal

406
00:25:47,156 --> 00:25:51,201
is to have one chapter manager support

407
00:25:51,522 --> 00:25:55,667
a regional manager for every six or seven chapters. Gotcha.

408
00:25:56,267 --> 00:25:59,770
We have staff that are like everyday support

409
00:25:59,970 --> 00:26:03,313
to a region. So in California, we have

410
00:26:03,874 --> 00:26:07,437
18 chapters and we have three staff whose jobs southern

411
00:26:07,477 --> 00:26:10,900
central and northern that are, you know, supporting their chapters

412
00:26:12,561 --> 00:26:16,024
Love it. I love that. And it's so interesting, too,

413
00:26:16,064 --> 00:26:19,928
because there's so many different projects that must be going on at each individual

414
00:26:20,628 --> 00:26:23,903
chapter. Is there like

415
00:26:23,943 --> 00:26:27,147
a common, like what

416
00:26:27,167 --> 00:26:30,591
kind of projects are going on in some of these? Like I know there's

417
00:26:30,631 --> 00:26:33,735
so many, you don't have to name all of them obviously, but can you just talk about a

418
00:26:34,677 --> 00:26:37,961
Yeah, that'd be great. Yeah, so we really

419
00:26:38,021 --> 00:26:41,989
work on five issues. So clean water, beach

420
00:26:42,129 --> 00:26:45,772
access, plastic pollution, coast

421
00:26:45,812 --> 00:26:49,095
and climate, which is a sort of flooding and development work, and then ocean

422
00:26:49,115 --> 00:26:52,979
conservation. You know, that could range from the marine

423
00:26:53,019 --> 00:26:56,782
protected areas like the new Chumash National Marine Sanctuary to

424
00:26:56,842 --> 00:27:00,025
stopping bad things in the ocean, like offshore drilling. So

425
00:27:00,065 --> 00:27:04,048
those five pillars are one organizing, those

426
00:27:04,088 --> 00:27:07,310
are the issues that we focus on. Other issues like

427
00:27:07,370 --> 00:27:11,173
fisheries, we don't. That's one way of kind of focusing

428
00:27:11,213 --> 00:27:14,635
the work. And those are issues that tend to be relevant to

429
00:27:15,136 --> 00:27:19,639
people on the coasts and coastal recreation. And

430
00:27:19,879 --> 00:27:23,201
then we have a series of programs that are like stewardship programs, beach

431
00:27:23,241 --> 00:27:26,362
cleanups, Ocean-friendly gardens, which is, you know,

432
00:27:26,402 --> 00:27:31,103
turning your landscape into a solution to pollution. Ocean-friendly

433
00:27:31,183 --> 00:27:34,504
restaurants, helping restaurants get rid of plastics. We just

434
00:27:34,524 --> 00:27:37,664
launched ocean-friendly hotels and a climate action program, which

435
00:27:37,684 --> 00:27:40,965
is, you know, restoring coastal ecosystems. And

436
00:27:41,005 --> 00:27:44,625
so we build toolkits for all of those programs. Blue

437
00:27:44,645 --> 00:27:48,346
Water Task Force is another one. We do water quality monitoring. So those

438
00:27:48,386 --> 00:27:51,587
are like a suite of everyday programs that are hands-on. This

439
00:27:51,627 --> 00:27:54,928
is also why I think the organization is attractive. You can roll

440
00:27:54,968 --> 00:27:58,030
up your sleeves and actually do something in

441
00:27:58,071 --> 00:28:01,954
your community. And so we do those. And then we have advocacy

442
00:28:02,014 --> 00:28:05,437
campaigns at the local, state, and federal level on those five

443
00:28:05,497 --> 00:28:09,220
issues. And at any given day, there's about 140 of

444
00:28:10,341 --> 00:28:16,720
That's incredible. For

445
00:28:16,760 --> 00:28:20,701
all the stuff that goes, like you talked about a bottom-up, top-down

446
00:28:21,201 --> 00:28:25,103
type of organization that works in both ways, where

447
00:28:25,123 --> 00:28:29,104
you have this headquarters and like you said, right now you have about 80 employees and

448
00:28:29,124 --> 00:28:32,225
then you have this volunteer network, hundreds of

449
00:28:32,265 --> 00:28:36,326
thousands of people. When you

450
00:28:36,366 --> 00:28:39,787
develop these programs or you've been developing these programs over the years

451
00:28:40,705 --> 00:28:44,226
is are these programs from feedback of projects that

452
00:28:44,266 --> 00:28:48,228
are coming in as well as sort of directions the

453
00:28:48,288 --> 00:28:51,489
organizations from an organizational standpoint wants to

454
00:28:53,970 --> 00:28:57,211
Yeah, in many ways that the chapter network and we give a

455
00:28:57,251 --> 00:29:01,652
you know, you kind of referenced this earlier, we give the chapters a ton of autonomy. Right?

456
00:29:01,672 --> 00:29:05,193
So once you're a chartered chapter, you can Pick a program or

457
00:29:05,233 --> 00:29:08,654
a campaign or an issue you choose based

458
00:29:08,734 --> 00:29:11,876
on what's relevant and important to your issue. There's no reason to be

459
00:29:11,916 --> 00:29:15,137
working on beach access if you don't have a beach

460
00:29:15,238 --> 00:29:18,599
access issue in your community. For sure. Beach access

461
00:29:18,659 --> 00:29:22,041
is the biggest issue in your community and you come along and say, hey, let's talk about

462
00:29:22,061 --> 00:29:25,804
this marine protected area. No one's going to care. Right. And

463
00:29:25,884 --> 00:29:29,449
so we do give them a lot of autonomy to sort

464
00:29:29,489 --> 00:29:32,914
of pick and choose the issues that

465
00:29:34,316 --> 00:29:39,123
are most relevant to them. So

466
00:29:39,143 --> 00:29:42,505
that's a part of it. I'm now I'm forgetting

467
00:29:44,586 --> 00:29:47,668
Well, just like in terms of like, are there, I guess one of

468
00:29:47,688 --> 00:29:51,669
the things is, can you identify some of the projects that have come in that have really contributed to

469
00:29:53,630 --> 00:29:56,812
So they also experiment. And

470
00:29:56,872 --> 00:30:00,433
so it's like an R&D out in the field. Right.

471
00:30:00,533 --> 00:30:03,594
So, for example, you know, we're trying to figure out how to

472
00:30:03,614 --> 00:30:06,896
get rid of all these single use plastics in communities and we're trying to pass

473
00:30:06,956 --> 00:30:10,572
laws and policies and You know, sort

474
00:30:10,592 --> 00:30:14,514
of our our Huntington Beach chapter and our San Diego chapter

475
00:30:14,654 --> 00:30:17,836
and our Oahu chapter. We're like,

476
00:30:17,876 --> 00:30:21,599
hey, why are we asking restaurants to get rid of single use plastics? And

477
00:30:21,819 --> 00:30:25,922
so, you know, they started the ocean friendly restaurants program. And

478
00:30:26,162 --> 00:30:29,465
then they started trading information, and they kind of figured out what

479
00:30:29,565 --> 00:30:32,788
worked. And we were like, wow, this is cool. I

480
00:30:32,848 --> 00:30:36,652
think there's interest in this elsewhere. So we just sort

481
00:30:36,712 --> 00:30:41,016
of adopted it, nationalized it, and standardized it, and then reissued

482
00:30:41,036 --> 00:30:44,356
it to the whole network. Um, so a lot

483
00:30:44,376 --> 00:30:47,959
of it comes from the, from the, from the chapter network

484
00:30:48,019 --> 00:30:51,202
itself. Um, and you know, our

485
00:30:51,262 --> 00:30:54,965
chapters, this climate action program, which is restoring habitats, you

486
00:30:55,005 --> 00:30:58,848
know, Cape Fear chapter was doing a, uh, they'd

487
00:30:58,888 --> 00:31:02,111
collect Christmas trees after Christmas. And, uh, and then they'd

488
00:31:02,411 --> 00:31:05,874
in the spring, they'd plant them in the dunes, uh, you

489
00:31:05,894 --> 00:31:09,517
know, and, uh, Miami chapters doing dune restoration and,

490
00:31:10,177 --> 00:31:13,335
uh, folks in, um, Up in

491
00:31:13,375 --> 00:31:16,657
Maine, we're doing wetland restoration. And so we were like, and then, you

492
00:31:16,677 --> 00:31:20,239
know, we had mangrove planting in Puerto Rico and we're like, hey, a

493
00:31:20,359 --> 00:31:23,580
lot of chapters are actually doing coastal restoration work.

494
00:31:23,640 --> 00:31:27,002
This is great for resilience. Same thing.

495
00:31:27,082 --> 00:31:30,444
Let's aggregate this, start building some tools and

496
00:31:30,564 --> 00:31:34,866
build a formal program. So a lot of it comes from, from

497
00:31:34,906 --> 00:31:38,488
the bot, observing what the network's doing and then

498
00:31:38,808 --> 00:31:42,675
picking and choosing the ideas that seem to have, um, some

499
00:31:42,755 --> 00:31:45,898
momentum and some impact and kind of the same with the

500
00:31:46,038 --> 00:31:49,520
advocacy we see local action happening in different places

501
00:31:53,718 --> 00:31:57,580
Decade ago, like, let's, let's build a toolkit.

502
00:31:58,080 --> 00:32:01,421
Yeah. And redistribute it. And so it really

503
00:32:01,541 --> 00:32:05,003
is a kind of, we have the fortune of

504
00:32:05,083 --> 00:32:08,604
like being able to observe the whole network. And these chapters

505
00:32:08,664 --> 00:32:11,946
are out there being social entrepreneurs, and we can kind of cherry pick

506
00:32:13,660 --> 00:32:16,901
And you could see what works and what doesn't. I love that.

507
00:32:16,921 --> 00:32:20,102
I love that. And they're communicating, you know, we're trying to do as much,

508
00:32:20,422 --> 00:32:25,044
you know, connecting the network to communicate so

509
00:32:25,084 --> 00:32:28,385
that they're sharing learnings. And we all are, you know,

510
00:32:29,346 --> 00:32:32,567
as we go. And, you know, I want to make sure we get

511
00:32:32,587 --> 00:32:36,708
to it, but we're starting tomorrow. We're

512
00:32:36,728 --> 00:32:40,069
having a big 40th anniversary summit. Oh,

513
00:32:40,149 --> 00:32:44,281
nice. Nice. And that's awesome. Bringing

514
00:32:44,301 --> 00:32:47,662
together 400 of our sort of top chapter leaders across the

515
00:32:47,702 --> 00:32:50,863
country, you know, for exactly to celebrate 40 years, but

516
00:32:50,903 --> 00:32:54,505
also to, you know, learn, share and network across

517
00:32:56,886 --> 00:33:00,247
Well, and that's I think that's where this this network comes through.

518
00:33:00,267 --> 00:33:03,929
You talk about 200 chapters across the country in

519
00:33:04,009 --> 00:33:07,412
other countries sometimes. And

520
00:33:07,652 --> 00:33:11,474
each chapter has their own unique set of problems

521
00:33:11,515 --> 00:33:14,856
and also a unique set of attributes within the community of

522
00:33:15,397 --> 00:33:19,059
different people, different cultures. Like we even know within the States, there are different cultures within

523
00:33:19,079 --> 00:33:22,340
the States, you know, in the different coastlines and so

524
00:33:22,401 --> 00:33:26,143
forth. So you probably have some unique problems within each

525
00:33:26,183 --> 00:33:30,045
of those chapters. But then you can take some of those programs like

526
00:33:30,525 --> 00:33:34,427
the single-use plastic bag ban and be like, okay, Let's

527
00:33:34,467 --> 00:33:37,850
take this. This is actually a really good idea. We'll take the

528
00:33:37,950 --> 00:33:42,053
core of this and we'll build the toolkit. We'll give it to Florida

529
00:33:42,133 --> 00:33:45,535
from Washington or from San Francisco. Give it to Florida, see how they do.

530
00:33:46,096 --> 00:33:49,218
OK, these are the challenges that they faced. Let's go back to the

531
00:33:49,258 --> 00:33:53,101
toolkit. Let's rejig it a little bit to lessons learned. And

532
00:33:53,121 --> 00:33:56,563
then let's hit it out to New Jersey. And then let's go to Hawaii.

533
00:33:57,023 --> 00:34:00,366
And so you're almost like a data center from

534
00:34:00,386 --> 00:34:04,029
the headquarters looking in. and and you're you're you're

535
00:34:04,109 --> 00:34:07,572
sort of your your stations your field stations are the chapters and

536
00:34:08,073 --> 00:34:11,176
Being able to work with them and having going back and forth and be like,

537
00:34:11,456 --> 00:34:14,779
how do we support you? How can we help? You know, what what

538
00:34:14,799 --> 00:34:18,223
do you need from us? And what can you provide us that we can tell other chapters to

539
00:34:18,283 --> 00:34:23,038
do that would that would work. It's it's such a That's

540
00:34:23,058 --> 00:34:26,400
where the model comes in, where it becomes such a good feedback tool,

541
00:34:28,001 --> 00:34:31,463
I love that. And you're right. What makes sense on a Texas beach

542
00:34:31,523 --> 00:34:34,585
is different than an urban beach in Los Angeles, or a

543
00:34:34,725 --> 00:34:39,068
remote beach in Oregon, or the

544
00:34:39,108 --> 00:34:42,590
beaches of Florida. And so that's part of it, right? They do. They have different

545
00:34:43,351 --> 00:34:47,133
cultural norms, different histories, different uses,

546
00:34:47,233 --> 00:34:50,551
different impacts. you know, and

547
00:34:50,571 --> 00:34:53,732
so what makes sense in one place may or may not make any sense in the other, or

548
00:34:57,193 --> 00:35:00,214
Yeah, absolutely. Now, over this 40 years, a

549
00:35:00,274 --> 00:35:03,654
lot of things have happened, obviously, the development of the network and the continued development and

550
00:35:03,674 --> 00:35:06,895
the growth of the, of the organization, not only

551
00:35:06,915 --> 00:35:10,996
from a headquarters, headquarters standpoint, but from a chapter standpoint, what

552
00:35:11,016 --> 00:35:14,697
have been some of the major wins that you that you remember

553
00:35:14,777 --> 00:35:17,958
over your 29 years working with with Surfrider that

554
00:35:18,498 --> 00:35:22,120
you know, people should know about Surfrider that may not, they may not realize

555
00:35:22,160 --> 00:35:25,782
that you guys helped win or helped, you know, get something passed

556
00:35:25,902 --> 00:35:29,263
or, you know, helped institute certain things that could, that people

557
00:35:33,308 --> 00:35:36,811
Yeah, no, I thank you for that question. It's funny because we,

558
00:35:37,291 --> 00:35:40,473
you know, because of this grassroots nature and this sort of distributing the

559
00:35:40,533 --> 00:35:43,836
power, I think, you know, we're always worried that

560
00:35:43,856 --> 00:35:47,878
people are like, oh, they're the like surfers who do the beach cleanups. Yeah,

561
00:35:47,918 --> 00:35:51,281
you know, but there's there's not really a lot of impact beyond that.

562
00:35:51,541 --> 00:35:54,863
And, and so, you know, and we have

563
00:35:54,923 --> 00:35:58,146
had some significant impact. A couple things that stand out that I'm

564
00:35:58,166 --> 00:36:01,466
really proud of is, um, A few years back, we

565
00:36:01,506 --> 00:36:05,207
won a landmark Clean Water Act lawsuit that

566
00:36:05,267 --> 00:36:09,109
went all the way to the Supreme Court and we won and strengthened

567
00:36:09,129 --> 00:36:12,411
the Clean Water Act. Again, it started locally with a

568
00:36:12,751 --> 00:36:16,072
wastewater treatment issue in the county of Maui on Maui Island in

569
00:36:16,232 --> 00:36:19,554
Hawaii. And it had to do with sort of how

570
00:36:19,674 --> 00:36:23,155
far the Clean Water Act extends, sort

571
00:36:23,195 --> 00:36:27,199
of, you know, the reach of the Clean Water Act and you

572
00:36:27,239 --> 00:36:30,461
know, there was an argument that it was only sort of this quote, unquote,

573
00:36:30,481 --> 00:36:33,983
like sort of physical connection. And we were talking about a functional

574
00:36:34,043 --> 00:36:37,125
connection, right? We're injecting sewage into the

575
00:36:37,305 --> 00:36:41,687
groundwater. It was seeping up through the ground and impacting

576
00:36:41,727 --> 00:36:45,429
coral reefs because the the the island

577
00:36:45,509 --> 00:36:48,791
is so porous. Yeah. And we were like, hey, that

578
00:36:48,931 --> 00:36:52,453
that means that the wastewater treatments responsible for

579
00:36:52,473 --> 00:36:56,956
that pollution, we could see it through like dye pollutants. And

580
00:36:57,216 --> 00:37:00,818
they argue that wasn't because it was, you know, it went through the earth before

581
00:37:00,878 --> 00:37:04,161
it came out into the ocean. And so we won that strength

582
00:37:04,181 --> 00:37:08,924
and they called it the Clean Water Act case of the century. Wow. Dependents.

583
00:37:09,424 --> 00:37:13,867
Yeah. We're proud of that. In

584
00:37:13,927 --> 00:37:17,449
2000, we passed a federal bill called the Beach Act. OK.

585
00:37:17,509 --> 00:37:21,212
Standardized and funded water quality monitoring. all

586
00:37:21,252 --> 00:37:25,559
across the country, recreational water quality monitoring. I

587
00:37:25,599 --> 00:37:29,345
like to think of it as the equivalent of like the grades in restaurants.

588
00:37:29,966 --> 00:37:33,531
Right. Right. ABC. Yeah. We now

589
00:37:33,591 --> 00:37:37,116
know when you go to a restaurant, if they're Up to par.

590
00:37:37,516 --> 00:37:40,739
Yeah, we didn't we should know the same about the ocean for sure. You

591
00:37:40,759 --> 00:37:45,403
know if I go swimming I'm gonna get sick or not That's

592
00:37:46,583 --> 00:37:50,066
Yeah, we take it for granted, but that's a huge huge deal,

593
00:37:50,487 --> 00:37:53,789
Yeah That that would really you know water

594
00:37:53,809 --> 00:37:57,572
quality monitoring prior to that was spotty. Yeah different

595
00:37:57,612 --> 00:38:00,835
standards And, you know,

596
00:38:01,335 --> 00:38:05,058
here in our backyard, we stopped this massive toll

597
00:38:05,118 --> 00:38:08,901
road project that was going to destroy San

598
00:38:08,941 --> 00:38:12,184
Onofre State Park, the fifth most visited state park in

599
00:38:12,764 --> 00:38:16,027
California and home to Trussell's, arguably the best

600
00:38:16,467 --> 00:38:19,630
surf spot in the United States. It was

601
00:38:19,690 --> 00:38:23,873
a David and Goliath fight that we won. So

602
00:38:26,395 --> 00:38:29,818
So how did that how did that win happen? Like, you know, you talk about David

603
00:38:29,838 --> 00:38:33,101
and Goliath type of fight You're trying to save a surf spot. You're trying

604
00:38:33,121 --> 00:38:36,544
to save a state park that obviously it's like you said, it's the fifth most visited

605
00:38:36,804 --> 00:38:41,688
state park Those are really Effective

606
00:38:41,788 --> 00:38:45,011
tools to use to say hey this needs to be protected and

607
00:38:45,051 --> 00:38:48,394
this toll roads gonna gonna destroy that but you're

608
00:38:48,414 --> 00:38:52,138
working against you know, maybe the government you're working against,

609
00:38:52,458 --> 00:38:55,962
you know, maybe it's a private company that's putting in these tolls. There's

610
00:38:55,982 --> 00:38:59,486
some big, big things to go up against. How, how

611
00:38:59,646 --> 00:39:03,710
did you, if you can just say briefly, how did you, uh, window

612
00:39:05,532 --> 00:39:12,322
Yeah. It was like a $500 million toll road and huge. traffic-laden

613
00:39:12,442 --> 00:39:18,324
Southern California, like the land of the car. Arnold

614
00:39:18,384 --> 00:39:22,305
Schwarzenegger was our governor at the time. He was supportive

615
00:39:22,405 --> 00:39:25,687
of the project. We were told, don't

616
00:39:25,727 --> 00:39:31,609
take it on because you won't win. But

617
00:39:31,969 --> 00:39:36,311
it really is a testament to people power. The

618
00:39:36,471 --> 00:39:40,373
toll road authority had all the money. They

619
00:39:40,413 --> 00:39:43,758
had the political influence, but we

620
00:39:44,479 --> 00:39:47,604
had a huge number of people and worked in

621
00:39:47,624 --> 00:39:51,109
a very effective coalition. Parks

622
00:39:51,149 --> 00:39:55,935
Commission hearing most attended in California history. Wow. California

623
00:39:55,975 --> 00:39:59,417
Coastal Commission hearing, 2,500 people

624
00:39:59,477 --> 00:40:02,838
showed up. They had to move the venue three times to

625
00:40:02,958 --> 00:40:06,019
accommodate the crowd. And I called it the Woodstock of

626
00:40:06,099 --> 00:40:10,101
surfing conservation because there were people in costumes, celebratory,

627
00:40:10,261 --> 00:40:16,415
music, costumes. And then US,

628
00:40:16,475 --> 00:40:20,057
the Commerce Department, which is above NOAA, which is above the Coastal Commission,

629
00:40:20,798 --> 00:40:24,059
held an appeal and I think 3,500 people

630
00:40:24,099 --> 00:40:29,102
came out. And so the

631
00:40:29,262 --> 00:40:32,984
public overwhelmingly opposed the project and

632
00:40:33,044 --> 00:40:36,766
sort of that massive movement of

633
00:40:36,946 --> 00:40:40,168
people, you know, overcame all of

634
00:40:40,228 --> 00:40:44,317
the sort of Political and financial advantages

635
00:40:44,417 --> 00:40:47,582
that the road had You know,

636
00:40:47,662 --> 00:40:51,628
so not only was it like I surfed there this morning. It's magical

637
00:40:51,788 --> 00:40:55,261
beautiful place and And it's

638
00:40:55,301 --> 00:40:58,862
got a wetland and it's full of birds and there's endangered species.

639
00:40:58,922 --> 00:41:02,123
I mean, it really is a gem. It's a

640
00:41:02,684 --> 00:41:06,385
largely intact watershed. So the water's clean after

641
00:41:06,445 --> 00:41:09,886
it rains. It's really just a place

642
00:41:09,906 --> 00:41:13,087
that shouldn't be spoiled. And so a

643
00:41:17,052 --> 00:41:21,533
Well, and I think this goes to show that the chapter model

644
00:41:22,033 --> 00:41:26,334
works really well, because I'm sure a lot of the abilities

645
00:41:26,394 --> 00:41:29,615
to get people out in that, those types of numbers probably started from

646
00:41:29,655 --> 00:41:32,835
an internal email being like, Hey, everybody, here's what's going on.

647
00:41:33,355 --> 00:41:36,876
You know, this is what's at risk. So here we start off with surf rider

648
00:41:36,996 --> 00:41:40,537
people, uh, you know, the, the chapters, the volunteers, and

649
00:41:40,557 --> 00:41:43,797
then they get their friends and their people that may not be

650
00:41:43,837 --> 00:41:47,758
in the know. And then they, all of a sudden they start to come out in droves. I

651
00:41:47,778 --> 00:41:51,080
think that's, so that, like from an organizational point of view, when you talk about

652
00:41:51,220 --> 00:41:54,942
advocacy, that's where the power, it's in the people, right? It's

653
00:41:55,062 --> 00:41:58,404
in the ability for organizations, whether it's a coalition or not,

654
00:41:59,024 --> 00:42:02,166
to be able to get the number of people out that

655
00:42:02,226 --> 00:42:06,268
will be able to influence politicians and decision-making. And

656
00:42:10,810 --> 00:42:14,053
It absolutely does. And I think, you know, um, I

657
00:42:14,113 --> 00:42:17,415
hear all the time, well, the system is corrupt. Uh,

658
00:42:17,855 --> 00:42:21,258
the, the money rules the day it's

659
00:42:21,338 --> 00:42:25,100
the, it's the lobbyists, you know, blah, blah, blah. And,

660
00:42:25,321 --> 00:42:28,843
um, and I'm like, well, that is

661
00:42:28,943 --> 00:42:32,165
true to some degree. And I, you know, um, the, the sort

662
00:42:32,185 --> 00:42:35,468
of people who are destructive of the coast have more money and more

663
00:42:35,508 --> 00:42:39,084
power. However, We actually

664
00:42:39,444 --> 00:42:43,047
have all the people, right? You

665
00:42:43,067 --> 00:42:46,330
know, there's there's more people who want to visit the beach than people

666
00:42:46,370 --> 00:42:50,494
who want to destroy the beach. And so and

667
00:42:50,534 --> 00:42:53,857
we live in a democracy. Lucky us. So

668
00:42:53,977 --> 00:42:57,186
if we choose to. We actually have a

669
00:42:57,226 --> 00:43:01,088
lot of control and agency over what the future looks

670
00:43:01,148 --> 00:43:04,929
like. We have the solutions to almost all of these problems. What

671
00:43:04,969 --> 00:43:08,411
we lack is public and political will, and

672
00:43:08,471 --> 00:43:12,392
political will comes from public will. So

673
00:43:12,592 --> 00:43:15,914
I think if more people voice

674
00:43:15,934 --> 00:43:19,675
their opinion, more people get involved in local civics, more

675
00:43:19,715 --> 00:43:23,017
people vote, we can carry

676
00:43:25,096 --> 00:43:28,337
Yeah, that's that's that. You're right. That's the

677
00:43:28,477 --> 00:43:31,819
great motivational words, because I think a lot of people lose hope. And

678
00:43:31,859 --> 00:43:35,220
again, it's being isolated from other people who feel

679
00:43:35,260 --> 00:43:38,522
the same way. Your words probably reign true

680
00:43:38,542 --> 00:43:41,623
with if I talk to any surf rider supporter or

681
00:43:41,703 --> 00:43:44,944
surf rider volunteer to just be like, it's probably the same.

682
00:43:44,964 --> 00:43:48,206
They'll probably say the same thing. We can actually do something when

683
00:43:48,226 --> 00:43:51,547
we're part of a larger community. And let's be honest here, Chad, not

684
00:43:51,587 --> 00:43:54,649
everybody's a surfer that's part of a surf rider the, you know, the origin of

685
00:43:55,850 --> 00:43:59,034
And, you know, sort of back to that origin story, the way I like to think

686
00:43:59,054 --> 00:44:02,158
of it is, you know, in the beginning, it was surfers trying to protect surf spots. Um, and then, you

687
00:44:02,178 --> 00:44:05,722
know, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,

688
00:44:05,742 --> 00:44:08,866
the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,

689
00:44:08,886 --> 00:44:12,190
the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,

690
00:44:12,230 --> 00:44:15,612
the, the, the, the, the, the And then they sort of connected with community members and

691
00:44:15,652 --> 00:44:18,874
it became community members protecting their communities, right? So

692
00:44:19,294 --> 00:44:22,615
if you if you swim in the ocean, if you've got kids that play at the beach, if

693
00:44:22,655 --> 00:44:27,183
you walk your dog out the beach in the morning, you know. or

694
00:44:27,203 --> 00:44:30,344
you like to swim, you had a stake in it.

695
00:44:30,425 --> 00:44:35,767
So it kind of expanded to communities and beyond surfers. And

696
00:44:35,787 --> 00:44:38,968
then it became kind of surfers protecting the ocean. And now

697
00:44:38,988 --> 00:44:42,350
that we know the role the ocean plays in climate

698
00:44:42,390 --> 00:44:45,831
change, it's really surfers and beachgoers and

699
00:44:55,617 --> 00:44:58,879
Yeah, and it happens so fast, too. I think that's

700
00:44:58,959 --> 00:45:02,161
what the beauty is, is it starts local and

701
00:45:02,621 --> 00:45:06,183
you can affect global as you do local. I've

702
00:45:06,203 --> 00:45:09,445
been really onto this for a long time. We've been hearing

703
00:45:09,485 --> 00:45:13,127
it all our lives, you know, as we grew up, where we're like, okay,

704
00:45:15,172 --> 00:45:18,734
you know, act local, think, think, think, was it think global act locally?

705
00:45:19,014 --> 00:45:22,275
And after a while, it seemed like people like, no, that doesn't work, that doesn't

706
00:45:22,295 --> 00:45:25,557
work. But now, it really does. I think it's it's being a

707
00:45:25,657 --> 00:45:28,878
part of the right community. And the right people have the

708
00:45:28,938 --> 00:45:32,300
experience who have the guidance. And like surf rider is

709
00:45:32,360 --> 00:45:36,101
that community, you know, or at least one of those major communities

710
00:45:36,281 --> 00:45:39,463
in the US and even North America that people know, it's like, if

711
00:45:39,523 --> 00:45:42,804
I need if I need guidance, I can go there, you talk about the learning

712
00:45:42,864 --> 00:45:46,430
tools that you have, and the training tools that you have, It's all just, uh,

713
00:45:46,850 --> 00:45:50,031
uh, you know, incredible to be able to already have that developed. So when

714
00:45:50,111 --> 00:45:53,512
somebody comes in new, they're just like, okay, here we go. Like this is, this

715
00:45:53,572 --> 00:45:57,213
is where I can, I can be guided and really helped out. And then you

716
00:45:57,233 --> 00:46:00,534
can have that, that effective level. Now, you know, surf riders have also had like

717
00:46:00,835 --> 00:46:04,115
some major wins locally. Um, let's talk some of the federal, uh,

718
00:46:04,616 --> 00:46:08,117
wins with some of the coalitions that you've had, like, you know, as a surf rider,

719
00:46:08,217 --> 00:46:11,498
as an, as an organization talked about the clean water, it

720
00:46:12,958 --> 00:46:16,579
Yeah, that was like a Supreme Court win. Yeah. They helped pass

721
00:46:16,659 --> 00:46:20,641
the Beach Act. Yeah, that's right. On sort of playing defense,

722
00:46:21,521 --> 00:46:24,703
the Trump administration wanted, when they

723
00:46:24,723 --> 00:46:28,044
were in office, wanted to open all coasts of the United States to

724
00:46:28,184 --> 00:46:31,786
offshore drilling. Yes. Drilling in

725
00:46:32,006 --> 00:46:35,329
federal waters is an executive action through

726
00:46:35,349 --> 00:46:38,711
the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. So

727
00:46:38,731 --> 00:46:43,215
that's also like a federal effort.

728
00:46:44,075 --> 00:46:47,738
And so we oppose that. And again, it was interesting, right?

729
00:46:47,818 --> 00:46:53,162
Are you going to convince Trump and his administration

730
00:46:53,743 --> 00:46:57,987
not to do this? No. But, you

731
00:46:58,007 --> 00:47:01,330
know, we organized in, for example, in every community in

732
00:47:01,390 --> 00:47:04,973
South Carolina on the coast. Yeah. And we made an economic argument.

733
00:47:05,353 --> 00:47:09,416
Hey, business owner, restaurant, surf shop, kayak

734
00:47:09,536 --> 00:47:12,819
rental hotel. You've got nothing to

735
00:47:12,879 --> 00:47:16,342
gain from these offshore platforms and everything to lose

736
00:47:16,422 --> 00:47:20,826
if there's a spill. Why would you support

737
00:47:20,866 --> 00:47:24,368
this? And they said, well, we don't. So we start passing resolutions at the local level.

738
00:47:25,369 --> 00:47:29,012
Um, which don't have any teeth, but sent a strong signal.

739
00:47:29,032 --> 00:47:32,455
And then, um, and then all of a sudden, you know, if you're the

740
00:47:33,336 --> 00:47:36,999
congressional rep for South Carolina and every coastal

741
00:47:37,040 --> 00:47:41,205
community in your district is opposed. real

742
00:47:41,225 --> 00:47:44,366
hard to support it. Again, we kind of had

743
00:47:44,386 --> 00:47:47,466
this, you know, and by the end of the Trump administration, he

744
00:47:49,066 --> 00:47:52,687
was actually trying to pull Florida and

745
00:47:52,707 --> 00:47:56,408
the Carolinas out of his proposal because

746
00:47:56,508 --> 00:48:00,889
he was worried they were making it was making him vulnerable in the election. Yeah.

747
00:48:01,409 --> 00:48:04,609
And that was, again, sort of like grassroots organizing at the

748
00:48:04,789 --> 00:48:08,190
base, scaling up to the federal level and

749
00:48:09,964 --> 00:48:13,986
It's a huge thing, especially looking at which

750
00:48:14,026 --> 00:48:17,647
administration is in charge federally, state-wise. There's

751
00:48:17,667 --> 00:48:21,028
a lot of things to do. I'm sure there's always something to do in the U.S. with

752
00:48:21,048 --> 00:48:26,018
so many things going on these days. Environment is

753
00:48:26,118 --> 00:48:30,080
a big deal right now, should be a big deal right now in

754
00:48:30,960 --> 00:48:35,202
these election talks. But I find it interesting that

755
00:48:35,302 --> 00:48:38,684
you don't really hear a lot in the debates of these upcoming elections. You

756
00:48:38,724 --> 00:48:41,925
haven't really heard a lot about climate change. You haven't really heard a lot

757
00:48:41,965 --> 00:48:45,407
about the environment. Um, how

758
00:48:45,567 --> 00:48:48,769
do you, uh, talk to your, like,

759
00:48:48,850 --> 00:48:52,673
talk to your volunteers, talk to your networks about the importance of

760
00:48:52,793 --> 00:48:56,175
this election in terms of this federal election, as well as there's, there's

761
00:48:56,195 --> 00:49:00,139
a number of different elections going on, um, in November in

762
00:49:00,159 --> 00:49:03,661
the US. How do you talk to your, your network of

763
00:49:03,822 --> 00:49:07,405
the importance of these elections and voting, uh, in,

764
00:49:07,525 --> 00:49:10,847
in terms of protecting the environment when the environment isn't really being talked

765
00:49:15,100 --> 00:49:18,282
Yeah, it's a great question. I'm gonna hold one time out. I've been sitting in this room and the

766
00:49:22,223 --> 00:49:26,765
No problem. Energy

767
00:49:28,766 --> 00:49:32,008
I love it. Yeah. So for one thing,

768
00:49:32,068 --> 00:49:35,610
we have to be a little bit careful because we're a 501 c three. So

769
00:49:35,650 --> 00:49:40,272
like a nonpartisan organization. Gotcha. And I'll

770
00:49:40,292 --> 00:49:43,466
get to something interesting in a second. But um, and And

771
00:49:43,506 --> 00:49:47,131
so, you know, we can't advocate for specific candidates. Right.

772
00:49:47,892 --> 00:49:51,537
You know, and we can't be partisan in our actions.

773
00:49:53,139 --> 00:49:56,984
So we really are just encouraging people to get out and vote. Right.

774
00:49:57,905 --> 00:50:02,376
You know, without picking a side. Gotcha. And,

775
00:50:02,637 --> 00:50:06,000
uh, but you know, so if you're a, if you're a local activist

776
00:50:06,060 --> 00:50:09,223
and you're, you're actually advocating for local action at your

777
00:50:09,323 --> 00:50:12,646
city, you know, you're, you're paying attention to those city

778
00:50:12,666 --> 00:50:16,470
council members, you know, about ones that are, um, are,

779
00:50:16,590 --> 00:50:19,773
are, are with you or not with you. And so I

780
00:50:19,813 --> 00:50:23,197
think, you know, um, the, our,

781
00:50:23,357 --> 00:50:27,204
our, our network certainly gets the value of, elections

782
00:50:27,345 --> 00:50:31,627
and down ballot, right? They talk about this. Don't just vote for the president. Right.

783
00:50:32,028 --> 00:50:35,370
Vote for your federal reps, state reps down

784
00:50:35,390 --> 00:50:38,652
to your city council and your school board. And I

785
00:50:38,772 --> 00:50:42,895
really want to emphasize that is, you know, because those those

786
00:50:43,176 --> 00:50:46,998
local decision makers have a lot of power. You

787
00:50:47,018 --> 00:50:50,241
know, you think about something like the Clean Water Act, you know, which

788
00:50:50,341 --> 00:50:53,823
regulates water pollution. We want to have things fishable and

789
00:50:53,843 --> 00:50:57,166
swimmable. Well, The Clean Water Act on paper

790
00:50:57,186 --> 00:51:01,050
in Washington, D.C. does nothing but set standards. And

791
00:51:01,090 --> 00:51:04,875
then it's it's the behavior in your town, right? It's is

792
00:51:04,975 --> 00:51:09,080
that business polluting

793
00:51:09,380 --> 00:51:12,549
water out of their factory? you

794
00:51:12,589 --> 00:51:15,831
know, are people hosing off

795
00:51:15,871 --> 00:51:19,334
their driveways and contributing to

796
00:51:19,414 --> 00:51:22,756
urban runoff? Does the car wash treat its

797
00:51:22,836 --> 00:51:26,198
water? So, you know, at the end of the day, the water quality

798
00:51:26,218 --> 00:51:29,780
in your town is a cumulative impact of all these little things that are happening,

799
00:51:30,221 --> 00:51:33,323
not the Clean Water Act that's a piece of

800
00:51:33,343 --> 00:51:36,765
paper. 100%. So yeah, so

801
00:51:37,526 --> 00:51:41,515
we're encouraging everyone to vote. You know, the largest party

802
00:51:41,555 --> 00:51:44,942
in America today is the did not vote party.

803
00:51:46,939 --> 00:51:50,520
It's true, which is crazy to hear people not voting than voting

804
00:51:50,560 --> 00:51:53,781
for any of the one side or the other. Yeah. You know,

805
00:51:53,821 --> 00:51:58,482
and again, uh, it, you know, it's arguably

806
00:51:58,502 --> 00:52:02,163
a relatively easy action to take harder

807
00:52:02,183 --> 00:52:05,524
in some places than others. Um, but, um, you

808
00:52:05,584 --> 00:52:08,885
know, so we, we just actually launched a, get out the vote

809
00:52:08,925 --> 00:52:12,246
campaign, um, yesterday and we

810
00:52:16,935 --> 00:52:20,679
And Protect Our Winters is the winter and snow athletes.

811
00:52:21,059 --> 00:52:25,524
So it's sort of like the surf rider of the mountains or the snow. Gotcha. You

812
00:52:25,564 --> 00:52:29,107
know, and they're really focused on the impacts of climate change. Yeah. Shortening

813
00:52:29,187 --> 00:52:33,363
winters, you know, and yeah, they're their

814
00:52:33,564 --> 00:52:37,246
favorite activity is at risk. But like Surfrider,

815
00:52:37,447 --> 00:52:41,350
you know, they understand that, you know, snowboarding

816
00:52:41,410 --> 00:52:44,972
and skiing is a luxury, but the impacts of climate change

817
00:52:45,012 --> 00:52:48,055
are serious for the globe. They're just using sort of their passion to

818
00:52:48,075 --> 00:52:51,277
advocate too. And so we partnered with them

819
00:52:51,337 --> 00:52:54,500
to say, hey, look, this is a really important election. Get

820
00:52:54,620 --> 00:52:57,762
out there and vote. Um, you know, and we know, uh,

821
00:52:58,782 --> 00:53:02,805
make a plan to vote that increases people's voting, you

822
00:53:02,845 --> 00:53:06,807
know, and the other thing is, um, get

823
00:53:06,827 --> 00:53:09,889
your friends to vote. You know, there, those guys have a

824
00:53:09,949 --> 00:53:13,471
saying that says friends don't let friends not vote. So

825
00:53:13,851 --> 00:53:17,233
let's use peer pressure. And, uh, Hey,

826
00:53:19,774 --> 00:53:23,379
especially for that that disenfranchised friends or those disenfranchised friends

827
00:53:23,399 --> 00:53:26,683
where there's like, oh, it'll never make a difference ever make a difference like you

828
00:53:26,703 --> 00:53:30,148
start making a difference when you get more and more people to vote and you know, whichever

829
00:53:30,188 --> 00:53:33,792
way they decide to vote that's when you make a difference and you you

830
00:53:33,832 --> 00:53:37,742
tell the people who you know, may be in power now that you may not like You

831
00:53:37,762 --> 00:53:40,944
know, no, I don't like what you did or I don't like what you didn't do. And

832
00:53:41,124 --> 00:53:44,206
so I'm going to vote for the candidate that does, you know, and I

833
00:53:44,246 --> 00:53:47,348
think that's what's that's what's important, you know, is to is to

834
00:53:47,868 --> 00:53:51,070
pay attention. I think a lot of those those users you

835
00:53:51,110 --> 00:53:54,512
mentioned, the recreational users of skiing and

836
00:53:54,592 --> 00:53:57,833
snowboarding and surfing in the ocean and so

837
00:53:57,873 --> 00:54:01,214
forth, you know what you want because it

838
00:54:01,254 --> 00:54:04,714
affects you personally. And so I think you're

839
00:54:04,754 --> 00:54:08,735
right. You guys are knowledgeable on

840
00:54:08,855 --> 00:54:12,936
what the issues that are important to each user, and then you

841
00:54:12,956 --> 00:54:16,077
just let them know what we need to vote for.

842
00:54:16,097 --> 00:54:19,417
And I think that's really important. Climate change is

843
00:54:19,477 --> 00:54:24,199
rearing its ugly head in the last few years, especially. Even

844
00:54:24,259 --> 00:54:28,382
this year, you know, in Florida, where a Category 3 hurricane

845
00:54:28,462 --> 00:54:32,224
followed a Category 4 hurricane in the Tampa region and

846
00:54:32,244 --> 00:54:35,527
the Gulf States, and a lot

847
00:54:35,567 --> 00:54:39,270
of damage and things like that. So, you know, 40 years of

848
00:54:39,370 --> 00:54:43,433
great work and continuing to try and help,

849
00:54:43,813 --> 00:54:47,576
you know, not only the people that are part of your volunteer

850
00:54:47,616 --> 00:54:52,459
network and your chapters, but also the country and the globe. What

851
00:54:53,000 --> 00:54:57,562
is Surfrider focused on in terms of

852
00:54:57,702 --> 00:55:01,344
the consequences of climate change that we've been seeing and

853
00:55:01,404 --> 00:55:05,486
how to fight climate change, as well as other matters? Talking

854
00:55:05,546 --> 00:55:08,728
about plastic pollution, talking about water quality, which they're all

855
00:55:08,768 --> 00:55:12,349
related in some way, which makes it even more complex.

856
00:55:12,369 --> 00:55:15,491
So where do you see the organization as you lead it

857
00:55:19,961 --> 00:55:24,625
Yeah. Um, you know, we, uh, it's

858
00:55:24,645 --> 00:55:27,948
a good thing. I think that we're like finding ourselves at the strongest point

859
00:55:27,989 --> 00:55:31,191
we've ever been as an organization, because I think the challenges are

860
00:55:31,211 --> 00:55:34,474
bigger than ever. So, you know, 40 years ago

861
00:55:34,495 --> 00:55:37,978
we were cleaning beaches, thinking trash plastic pollution

862
00:55:37,998 --> 00:55:41,501
was a local problem. Now we know it's a global ocean problem

863
00:55:41,561 --> 00:55:44,764
and basically a global problem, right? It's in the atmosphere. It's in us.

864
00:55:45,565 --> 00:55:48,986
Um, And same with climate change, 40 years ago, probably should

865
00:55:49,006 --> 00:55:53,406
have been, but wasn't a major topic. And

866
00:55:53,426 --> 00:55:58,567
I think I read a stat that

867
00:56:00,027 --> 00:56:04,588
70% of Americans have felt some impact of climate change, fires,

868
00:56:04,828 --> 00:56:09,069
flooding, hurricanes, storms. And

869
00:56:09,169 --> 00:56:12,770
so we used to say climate change is coming. And now

870
00:56:12,810 --> 00:56:16,055
we know climate change is here. So I

871
00:56:16,095 --> 00:56:20,402
think that's part of the reason why there's a much wider

872
00:56:20,522 --> 00:56:24,068
recognition. Yeah, so we definitely

873
00:56:24,128 --> 00:56:27,757
face some big problems. I'm

874
00:56:27,958 --> 00:56:31,321
somewhat optimistic about them because we can solve all

875
00:56:31,341 --> 00:56:34,764
of them. For

876
00:56:34,804 --> 00:56:37,926
the most part, we have the solutions. We just need to build the

877
00:56:37,966 --> 00:56:43,832
public well. Our focus

878
00:56:43,872 --> 00:56:48,392
on climate change is really about the coasts. and

879
00:56:48,552 --> 00:56:52,213
focused on using the coast as a solution through nature-based solutions

880
00:56:52,293 --> 00:56:55,774
and coastal restoration. Blue carbon

881
00:56:55,834 --> 00:56:59,175
or coastlines can suck a lot of carbon out of the atmosphere and

882
00:56:59,255 --> 00:57:02,515
buffer us from the worst impacts of storms by

883
00:57:02,575 --> 00:57:05,896
building natural habitats. Mangroves and wetlands and

884
00:57:10,410 --> 00:57:13,991
And on the other side of it, we're really trying to work with communities to

885
00:57:14,332 --> 00:57:17,533
figure out how to adapt, right? The sea level rise is coming no

886
00:57:17,573 --> 00:57:21,214
matter what we do, and we can either wait and

887
00:57:21,374 --> 00:57:24,656
armor the coast and see a lot of disaster, or we can

888
00:57:24,776 --> 00:57:28,337
start figuring out how to adapt for

889
00:57:28,797 --> 00:57:32,319
the sea level rise that's coming. So those are our really big focus areas

890
00:57:32,419 --> 00:57:35,820
for climate change. I think the, you know, manage,

891
00:57:35,880 --> 00:57:39,561
retreat, coastal adaptation thing is in

892
00:57:39,581 --> 00:57:42,802
its infancy, really, and we didn't get on top of that. So we've got

893
00:57:42,822 --> 00:57:46,403
some good demonstration projects we're working on to

894
00:57:46,463 --> 00:57:49,624
show what that can look like. The best one is Surfer's Point up

895
00:57:49,684 --> 00:57:53,324
in Ventura. You know, if people

896
00:57:53,484 --> 00:57:57,505
Google Ventura, C Street, Manager

897
00:57:57,545 --> 00:58:00,926
Tree, they'll just see a beautiful coastline that's been moved back from

898
00:58:00,986 --> 00:58:04,767
the coast, you know, from the ocean and erosion. You

899
00:58:04,807 --> 00:58:09,529
know, and then we're really trying to scale up our plastic pollution work. There's

900
00:58:09,549 --> 00:58:13,732
a global treaty right now to reduce plastic pollution. And

901
00:58:13,752 --> 00:58:16,914
we're working with our affiliates and other coalition partners to try to

902
00:58:17,395 --> 00:58:21,377
get the U.S. and other nations to come

903
00:58:21,438 --> 00:58:24,640
up with a kind of like climate change, some realistic goals to

904
00:58:24,680 --> 00:58:27,922
eliminate plastic pollution. And another trend

905
00:58:27,942 --> 00:58:31,645
that's interesting, I feel like, is there's a real movement

906
00:58:31,745 --> 00:58:36,449
towards holding these big businesses accountable. Last

907
00:58:40,011 --> 00:58:43,212
Let me just drop it. You know, we just sued them, you know, just last week. We

908
00:58:44,913 --> 00:58:48,375
That's huge. Yeah, it is. So we sued Exxon

909
00:58:49,435 --> 00:58:53,137
for sort of disingenuous policies around

910
00:58:53,197 --> 00:58:57,539
recycling, right? This is a connection between ocean and climate, plastics

911
00:58:58,879 --> 00:59:02,342
Yeah, I think it accounts for what 30 percent of

912
00:59:02,362 --> 00:59:05,944
fossil fuel pollution on the increase.

913
00:59:06,204 --> 00:59:09,447
Yeah. Yeah. And so, you know, as the number one

914
00:59:09,467 --> 00:59:12,729
supplier of the base materials for plastic pollution, they've

915
00:59:12,749 --> 00:59:16,212
been spending billions of dollars trying to convince us recycling works

916
00:59:17,392 --> 00:59:21,776
and it doesn't. We're still at, you know, five, six percent recycling. Yeah.

917
00:59:22,316 --> 00:59:25,513
And so, you know, You're seeing that you're

918
00:59:25,553 --> 00:59:29,256
seeing lawsuits against major fossil

919
00:59:29,276 --> 00:59:32,619
fuel companies for the impacts of climate change, you

920
00:59:32,659 --> 00:59:36,642
know, so that and we're passing these extended producer responsibility,

921
00:59:36,702 --> 00:59:40,385
which is, you know, producer pays bills. Yes. Plastic pollution.

922
00:59:40,806 --> 00:59:44,649
So there's a movement towards corporate accountability for these impacts.

923
00:59:46,270 --> 00:59:50,214
I think that's appropriate. Yep. And

924
00:59:50,715 --> 00:59:53,938
you know, these these major manufacturers of

925
00:59:53,998 --> 00:59:57,682
plastic, oil and gas can choose to be responsible or

926
00:59:59,304 --> 01:00:02,786
Yeah. Yeah, especially with the amount of sort of

927
01:00:02,846 --> 01:00:05,989
disinformation they've been putting out and confusion they've been putting out

928
01:00:06,069 --> 01:00:09,592
over the last God knows how many decades, you

929
01:00:09,632 --> 01:00:12,934
know, right? Like we're not talking about just like a social media

930
01:00:12,974 --> 01:00:16,818
campaign that happened yesterday. This has been ongoing and has

931
01:00:16,878 --> 01:00:20,381
been a huge impediment to climate

932
01:00:20,501 --> 01:00:23,683
action for decades and something that we, you know, could

933
01:00:23,703 --> 01:00:27,367
have been installed a while ago, but they put corporate greed

934
01:00:27,447 --> 01:00:30,710
over over and profits over over

935
01:00:30,870 --> 01:00:34,074
action. And it could have been just as heralded for the

936
01:00:34,154 --> 01:00:37,358
action that they took back in the day. So I'm glad that

937
01:00:37,398 --> 01:00:40,742
there, you know, you that surf riders part of that. I'm

938
01:00:40,802 --> 01:00:44,006
glad that you're able to do that. And I think we're going to need to see

939
01:00:44,046 --> 01:00:47,749
that more in the future as well. with with different companies

940
01:00:47,769 --> 01:00:51,370
to just be like look you can't just start confusing the people and

941
01:00:51,530 --> 01:00:55,592
And put it pitting us against each other of trying to do some good Because

942
01:00:57,332 --> 01:01:01,214
I mean, yeah in the same game, you know that

943
01:01:01,274 --> 01:01:04,915
you know, the big tobacco is ultimately held accountable for

944
01:01:05,876 --> 01:01:09,277
billions of dollars and you know that money was used

945
01:01:09,317 --> 01:01:12,945
to significantly reduce Smoking rates.

946
01:01:13,045 --> 01:01:16,790
So it's a good case study on what

947
01:01:20,195 --> 01:01:23,385
Yeah. And I mean, let's be honest. Those campaigns those

948
01:01:23,425 --> 01:01:26,748
tobacco campaigns like we're now able we see a lot of places where

949
01:01:26,768 --> 01:01:29,950
you can't smoke inside And I mean remember when we grew up where you

950
01:01:29,990 --> 01:01:33,293
had like smoking and non-smoking sections in the same place Which

951
01:01:33,333 --> 01:01:37,116
was like you think about it now, you're like that's just ridiculous on the airplane on

952
01:01:37,836 --> 01:01:41,239
Yeah Right one row in front of the smoking section. Oh

953
01:01:46,731 --> 01:01:49,953
It's insane to think about. But again, it takes a lot of

954
01:01:50,013 --> 01:01:53,375
people to get together and focus in on

955
01:01:53,495 --> 01:01:56,696
certain aspects. And that's what you're able to do. That's what

956
01:01:56,716 --> 01:01:59,878
you've been able to do for the last 40 years. You're continuing to be able to do

957
01:01:59,918 --> 01:02:03,079
for the next 40 years and beyond. I

958
01:02:03,159 --> 01:02:06,721
really like what surf riders have done. And so it's been a pleasure, Chad,

959
01:02:06,741 --> 01:02:10,343
to have you on and talk about these accolades. I

960
01:02:10,363 --> 01:02:13,490
always like to do this, especially with Surfrider, get our

961
01:02:13,550 --> 01:02:16,616
audience involved. If somebody wants to become a volunteer at

962
01:02:16,676 --> 01:02:19,783
Surfrider, how would you recommend they go about it?

963
01:02:20,517 --> 01:02:24,020
Yeah, if you go to volunteer.surfrider.org, you

964
01:02:24,080 --> 01:02:27,604
can either sign up for your local chapter or actually see what volunteer

965
01:02:27,644 --> 01:02:31,167
activities are taking place. This weekend probably would

966
01:02:31,187 --> 01:02:34,390
be one of the only weekends of the year where there's not a lot going on because

967
01:02:34,410 --> 01:02:37,713
they're all going to be in Long Beach with me. Yes, that's right. Celebrating, but

968
01:02:37,853 --> 01:02:42,965
almost every other weekend of the year, there's something going on out there. And

969
01:02:42,985 --> 01:02:46,368
so if you go to our website at Surfrider.org, you can sort

970
01:02:46,428 --> 01:02:49,851
of zoom in and join your local chapter, find

971
01:02:51,412 --> 01:02:54,795
Awesome. And one thing I forgot to ask, you said tomorrow is the beginning of

972
01:02:54,855 --> 01:02:57,998
the celebrations. 400 volunteer leaders are coming in.

973
01:02:58,478 --> 01:03:01,601
What can people expect from those celebrations and

974
01:03:04,904 --> 01:03:09,566
Yeah, I mean, this is really about sort of, you know, strengthening

975
01:03:09,606 --> 01:03:12,850
and energizing this incredible network of people that are doing all this

976
01:03:12,930 --> 01:03:16,934
great work. So we've got some great inspirational speakers,

977
01:03:17,075 --> 01:03:20,358
a lot of training about organizing and

978
01:03:23,973 --> 01:03:28,836
I love it. I love it. And to be honest, I give a lot of advice for people

979
01:03:28,876 --> 01:03:31,917
who want to be marine biologists and get into marine conservation. I

980
01:03:33,298 --> 01:03:37,120
feel like volunteering with organizations

981
01:03:37,160 --> 01:03:40,582
like Surfrider is a huge benefit because you

982
01:03:40,622 --> 01:03:43,784
learn so much. Like you said, you get training. You get to

983
01:03:43,824 --> 01:03:47,126
build this network. You get to do some great things. So it motivates you

984
01:03:47,186 --> 01:03:50,327
even more to do even more later on. Plus, it

985
01:03:50,347 --> 01:03:53,590
kind of shapes you. Chad, even you yourself, you didn't do your

986
01:03:53,630 --> 01:03:56,874
PhD until, you know, what was it like 15 years

987
01:03:58,816 --> 01:04:02,160
Yeah, yeah, I, I finished in 2012. And

988
01:04:02,180 --> 01:04:05,423
I probably started in 2008. But yeah, I'd been a writer for

989
01:04:07,530 --> 01:04:10,892
Exactly. So it kind of shapes where you where you think you can impact

990
01:04:10,912 --> 01:04:14,555
the world in terms of academically as well as through

991
01:04:14,595 --> 01:04:17,957
conservation. So I highly recommend people who are early career

992
01:04:17,997 --> 01:04:21,199
scientists looking for experience. It's sometimes right

993
01:04:21,239 --> 01:04:24,902
in your backyard. You don't have to go across the world and pay thousands

994
01:04:24,922 --> 01:04:28,244
of dollars to get experience for two weeks. You can do work and

995
01:04:28,284 --> 01:04:31,606
continue that work throughout your career as a volunteer. So I

996
01:04:31,646 --> 01:04:36,348
highly recommend that. I'll put that up, thevolunteer.surfrider.org in

997
01:04:36,368 --> 01:04:39,548
the show notes and in the description so that people can sign up for

998
01:04:39,588 --> 01:04:42,789
that and fuel your passion more to

999
01:04:42,849 --> 01:04:46,450
do more for the ocean and the coastlines and water quality. Chad, thank

1000
01:04:46,470 --> 01:04:49,831
you so much for joining me. Congratulations on 40 years.

1001
01:04:49,911 --> 01:04:53,111
Looking forward to another 40 and enjoy the festivities and

1002
01:04:56,292 --> 01:04:59,493
Hey, thanks for having me back, Andrew. It's always a lot of fun, so

1003
01:05:00,458 --> 01:05:03,760
You bet. Thank you. Thank you, Chad, for joining us here once again on

1004
01:05:03,780 --> 01:05:07,121
the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Really appreciate you sharing all the wonderful

1005
01:05:07,181 --> 01:05:10,763
stories of Surfrider over the last 40 years. Congratulations on

1006
01:05:10,783 --> 01:05:14,665
the 40th anniversary of Surfrider, a great organization that

1007
01:05:14,965 --> 01:05:18,647
uses its volunteers as its method

1008
01:05:18,827 --> 01:05:22,409
to change policy, to create policy, to

1009
01:05:22,449 --> 01:05:25,591
do so many great things. sue the government when

1010
01:05:25,611 --> 01:05:28,896
they're not acting properly, create the Beach Act, just do

1011
01:05:28,996 --> 01:05:32,380
so many more things, beach cleanups, getting people involved, listening to

1012
01:05:32,420 --> 01:05:35,685
volunteers, training volunteers, and building that

1013
01:05:35,785 --> 01:05:43,094
chapter network to 200 chapters, over 100,000 volunteers worldwide. doing

1014
01:05:43,174 --> 01:05:58,940
amazing things. follow

1015
01:05:59,000 --> 01:06:02,542
Surfrider in all the things that they do. They have a lot of different chapters,

1016
01:06:02,862 --> 01:06:06,124
they care about their volunteers, and they just are a great

1017
01:06:06,184 --> 01:06:09,786
organization. For the last 40 years, they've done some amazing things,

1018
01:06:10,326 --> 01:06:13,628
and some of them are too much to count, but they've done some great

1019
01:06:13,668 --> 01:06:16,749
things from an advocacy role, from a policy role, from an

1020
01:06:17,009 --> 01:06:20,811
action like beach cleanup and water quality testing role. It's

1021
01:06:20,851 --> 01:06:23,932
just so many different ways that you can get involved and

1022
01:06:23,972 --> 01:06:27,353
so many ways that you can watch what they do and it's such a great

1023
01:06:27,493 --> 01:06:30,874
opportunity to feel like you're part of a community and not by yourself when

1024
01:06:30,894 --> 01:06:34,155
you want to do conservation. So think about Surfrider next time you're doing

1025
01:06:34,235 --> 01:06:37,355
you want to do something good for the planet and I just want

1026
01:06:37,375 --> 01:06:40,916
to say thanks to Chad for all the work that he's done over the last 29 years

1027
01:06:41,236 --> 01:06:44,377
over the last 10 as CEO and then in the future, all

1028
01:06:44,397 --> 01:06:47,798
the work, the great work that he's going to be doing with a wonderful staff of

1029
01:06:48,118 --> 01:06:51,959
80 people, a wonderful 200 chapters and amazing

1030
01:06:52,759 --> 01:06:56,020
100,000 volunteers and growing. So we want to see that

1031
01:06:56,200 --> 01:06:59,401
organization grow. Look, they're not paying me to do this. I just think

1032
01:06:59,441 --> 01:07:02,562
it's such a great opportunity. We don't get these chances a lot to

1033
01:07:02,602 --> 01:07:05,964
be able to You know, build a network like this to

1034
01:07:05,984 --> 01:07:09,106
be a part of a group like this and to have a voice and to be

1035
01:07:09,146 --> 01:07:13,970
able to actually affect change. Like, think about mobilizing 2500 people

1036
01:07:14,030 --> 01:07:17,152
to a public meeting where the government has to actually change the

1037
01:07:17,232 --> 01:07:20,514
venue three times to accommodate the amount of people. Think about

1038
01:07:20,534 --> 01:07:24,396
that as one voice, the power of that as one voice.

1039
01:07:24,496 --> 01:07:27,638
And the big thing here, the big message just in terms of

1040
01:07:27,678 --> 01:07:31,160
its timeliness, it's almost time to vote in the US.

1041
01:07:31,520 --> 01:07:35,042
If you haven't registered to vote, register to vote today. It doesn't

1042
01:07:35,082 --> 01:07:38,263
matter who you vote for, but you have power in voting. You

1043
01:07:38,323 --> 01:07:41,507
want to have that power. You want to be able to vote. You want to be able to

1044
01:07:41,547 --> 01:07:44,910
have a say for your country. You want to be able to do something,

1045
01:07:44,950 --> 01:07:48,614
especially if you're part of a democratic society. If you need more information

1046
01:07:48,734 --> 01:07:52,998
on what the big issues are, you can go to the Surfrider organization

1047
01:07:53,058 --> 01:07:56,261
website. I'll put in the link below. And also just talk to

1048
01:07:56,281 --> 01:08:00,002
your local representatives, talk to your state representatives and your federal representatives

1049
01:08:00,342 --> 01:08:03,484
and find out where you can vote, how you can vote and who you can

1050
01:08:03,524 --> 01:08:06,845
vote for and do that today, register today. So thank you so much

1051
01:08:07,045 --> 01:08:10,667
for joining me on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast.

1052
01:08:11,087 --> 01:08:14,168
I want to just, it's just amazing to be able to connect with you. If you

1053
01:08:14,188 --> 01:08:17,350
want to connect with me, you can do so by DMing me on

1054
01:08:18,450 --> 01:08:21,713
Instagram at how to protect the ocean. You can also comment in

1055
01:08:21,753 --> 01:08:25,115
the description or in just down below in the YouTube video Also,

1056
01:08:25,195 --> 01:08:28,258
you can watch the video on Spotify and give me a

1057
01:08:28,318 --> 01:08:32,281
comment there But I'm always available in any any capacity that

1058
01:08:32,341 --> 01:08:35,523
you just heard Always looking forward to hearing you because it's the beginning of

1059
01:08:35,544 --> 01:08:38,906
a conversation. I'd love to hear your conversation and your conservation efforts So

1060
01:08:39,226 --> 01:08:42,629
thank you again for joining me on today's episode of the how to protect the ocean podcast. I'm

1061
01:08:42,649 --> 01:08:45,872
your host Andrew Lewin Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time and happy