Our Mission
Colorado Rising For Communities is powering a grassroots movement to protect our health, safety, quality of life, and the future of our climate from the harms and impacts of oil and gas operations.
Who We Are
History
Colorado Rising for Communities is a statewide 501(c)3 non-profit organization that works to protect Colorado’s health, safety, wildlife, environment, and the future of our climate from the impacts of oil & gas development.
The organization was founded in September, 2019, to focus on litigation, state agency rulemaking, administrative processes, and public education due to a growing public concern over a number of explosions, spills, leaks, and other catastrophic oil and gas accidents in Colorado.
Commitment to People
We honor diversity. Our board of directors and leadership team is 60% women and BIPOC-led with representation from Latinx, Chicano, Indigenous, African American, LGBTQ and non-binary genders. We are not only committed to increasing diversity, inclusion and representation within our organization at all levels, but within the climate movement as well.
colonialism is a current ongoing process
Land acknowledgement
We pay our respects to Elders past, present, and future, and to all those who have stewarded the land, air, and water for generations.
We affirm that this acknowledgment expresses our commitment to protect the health, safety, quality of life, and future of vibrant Indigenous communities from the injustices of environmental racism along with the exploitation of their precious lands while upholding their sacred relation to our delicate environment.
Meet The Board
HARV TEITELBAUM
Board President
Harv has been an activist for over 50 years and a nontraditional educator for 25. He earned an MA in Ecopsychology and Environmental Leadership and has worked with a variety of organizations including Physicians for Social Responsibility - Colorado in which he is a current board member, Sierra Club, Environmental Health Project, and the Colorado Division of Wildlife. His current focus is on fossil fuels, and environmental and health justice.
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Sasha Stiles, MD, MPH,
Treasurer
Sasha practices medicine and works as the medical consultant for Atomic Worker Advocates helping workers in Nuclear production facilities get funding for the many extraordinary illnesses they now suffer. While chair of PSR Colorado, she engaged in public education about Rocky Flats alongside Beyond Nuclear in DC and three epigenetic academic researchers from Chernobyl. As a survivor of the Marshall Fire and an asthmatic, air quality, climate change and water conservation are of vital importance to her. As a clinician, Sasha is concerned with the epigenetic transmission of diseases from radioactive toxic substances and those caused by heavy metals, solvents, dusts, and other harmful substances.
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Dar-Lon Chang
Board Member
Dar-Lon Chang transitioned from being a Ph.D. research engineer at ExxonMobil Upstream Research Company for 15 years to being the Director of New Product Development for GeoSolar Technologies, a start-up company focused on getting gas out of existing homes through retrofits with technologies used at the Geos neighborhood in Arvada, Colorado. Dar-Lon is a Geos resident and moved to the net-zero, all-electric neighborhood in 2019. He also advocates for whistleblower protections and a just transition for oil and gas workers to move into clean energy jobs.
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Bridget Walsh
Board Member
Bridget attended the University of Nevada, Reno, and studied at university in Grenoble, France. She began her professional career in DC performing research for the National Welfare Rights Organization, the Legal Services Corporation and the National Paralegal Institute. In 1976, Bridget moved to Denver where she served as the Nursing Home Ombudsman before obtaining a real estate license in 1979. Since then, she has worked on campaigns to rid the Denver Zoo of a planned waste-to-energy incinerator, served on the Vasquez Bl./I-70 Superfund Community Advisory Group (CAG) for five years, and fought to stave off the destruction of the historic City Park Golf Course as a member of the Registered Neighborhood Organization - City Park Friends and Neighbors.
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WILL WALTERS
Secretary
Will has been an environmental justice activist, EV enthusiast and advocate for carbon free transportation since the 1990’s. He has worked on numerous campaigns to support renewable energy, sustainable agriculture, river and habitat protection, preventing suburban sprawl, and protecting neighborhoods from pollution. Will designs and builds software to support government health and human services programs.
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Dar-Lon Chang
Board Member
Dar-Lon Chang transitioned from being a Ph.D. research engineer at ExxonMobil Upstream Research Company for 15 years to being the Director of New Product Development for GeoSolar Technologies, a start-up company focused on getting gas out of existing homes through retrofits with technologies used at the Geos neighborhood in Arvada, Colorado. Dar-Lon is a Geos resident and moved to the net-zero, all-electric neighborhood in 2019. He also advocates for whistleblower protections and a just transition for oil and gas workers to move into clean energy jobs.
Contact Sasha Stiles, MD, MPH,
Treasurer
Sasha practices medicine and works as the medical consultant for Atomic Worker Advocates helping workers in Nuclear production facilities get funding for the many extraordinary illnesses they now suffer. While chair of PSR Colorado, she engaged in public education about Rocky Flats alongside Beyond Nuclear in DC and three epigenetic academic researchers from Chernobyl. As a survivor of the Marshall Fire and an asthmatic, air quality, climate change and water conservation are of vital importance to her. As a clinician, Sasha is concerned with the epigenetic transmission of diseases from radioactive toxic substances and those caused by heavy metals, solvents, dusts, and other harmful substances.
Contact