—Systemic change begins with personal change—
Tia Lee Nelson is an American academic, environmental activist, and politician from the state of Wisconsin. A Democrat, she served as Executive Secretary of the Wisconsin Board of Commissioners of Public Lands. She is the daughter of former United States Senator and governor Gaylord Nelson.
Tia is internationally recognized as a tireless champion for environmental stewardship and climate change education. She spent 17 years with The Nature Conservancy as a policy advisor for Latin America and then, the first director of the Global Climate Change Initiative. For this work, she received the EPA’s Climate Protection Award in 2000.
Tia later returned home to Wisconsin to serve as Executive Secretary to the Wisconsin Board of Commissioners of Public Lands, which included a gubernatorial appointment as coâ€chair of Wisconsin’s Task Force on Global Warming.
Tia has been active on the environment for a long time, working with government, non profits, as an individual, and since birth deeply connected with federal and state government. And of course Earth Day from the start. We covered topics including planned obsolescence, politics, carbon taxes and accounting, Vince Lombardi, Brent Suter from the Milwaukee Brewers, Oprah Winfrey, and individual action. Many people, when considering acting on their environmental values, say how much they're already doing, implying isn't it enough already. They miss what I hope came across with Tia: Acting on your values improves your life. You gain from it. Describing acting environmentally that way may sound abstract. It's more delicious. It saves money. It connects you with your community. The switch to acting instead of reading, writing, analyzing, debating, etc can challenge, especially in a world designed for convenience, but past systems are decreasing the amount of life and human society earth can sustain. After switching, you won't want to go back.
One of my main goals for this podcast is to bring people who love acting on one's environmental values, seeing stewardship not as an obligation but as being a part of something greater than yourself, than any of us, benefiting everyone, and yourself. As you'll hear, Tia's roots precede the first Earth Day. Her father started it. Despite so many problems remaining -- basically all of them -- she's the opposite of jaded. She's enthusiastic. Her joy, even in the face of setbacks, and as a democratic politician in Wisconsin, she's faced big ones lately, tells me the joy anyone feels from nature -- walks on the beach, picking apples, whatever you love about experiencing nature -- is available to anyone. In other words, if you act more, you'll love it. As you'll hear, you'll very likely influence others, who will thank you. I love hearing the transformation from talking about potential to determined action. I love hearing the transformation from talking about individual action in the abstract to individual action.</p>