Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) is an environmental advocacy organization based in New England. Since 1966, CLF's mission has been to advocate for New England's environment and its communities. CLF's advocacy work takes place across five integrated program areas: Clean Energy & Climate Change, Clean Air & Water, Healthy Oceans, People & Justice, and Healthy Communities. CLF uses the law, science, and the market to create solutions that preserve natural resources, build healthy communities, and sustain a vibrant economy. CLF works to promote renewable energy and fight air and water pollution; build sustainable fishing communities and protect marine habitat; promote public transit and defend public health; achieve environmental justice; and sustain a vibrant, equitable economy.
Conservation Law Foundation is a nonprofit, member-supported organization with offices in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont.
Structure and goals
With offices in every New England state, CLF works to solve the most significant environmental problems that threaten the region's communities. CLF’s strategies of advocacy concentrate on areas of law, public policy, and science. CLF both defends environmental policy through litigation and petitions and creates it through legislative and regulatory advocacy.
As a result, CLF works to bring local environmental concerns to the attention of legislators and policymakers, and serve as a resource for communicating these concerns throughout the region.
Notable achievements
Founded in 1966 to stop the development of ski slopes on Massachusetts' highest peak, Mount Greylock, CLF has since expanded its advocacy to address both environmental and community issues in all six New England states.
Traditional environmental advocacy
In 1977, the organization successfully fought the expansion plans for a federal divided highway through Franconia Notch in New Hampshire's White Mountains. Since that time, CLF's legal advocacy has focused on several natural resources cases, including the cleanup of Lake Champlain, the prevention of overfishing of groundfish – cod, haddock, and flounder – off the coast of New England (resulting in a settlement requiring the National Marine Fisheries Service to produce a management plan to eliminate overfishing), and the protection of the Vermont black bear habitat (by obtaining a federal court injunction halting destructive U.S. logging practices in southern Vermont's fragile Lamb Brook wilderness area, marking the first time an environmental group in the Northeast successfully challenges the U.S. Forest Service's clear-cutting policies).
Cleanup of Boston Harbor
In 1983, CLF sued the Massachusetts Metropolitan District Commission (a division of the government of the state of Massachusetts) and the Environmental Protection Agency to clean up Boston Harbor, which had severely degraded water quality. The result of this and other litigation, including that of the City of Quincy, was to compel the state to comply with federal environmental laws and to build appropriate facilities to properly treat sewage discharged into Boston Harbor, and establish workable governmental mechanisms to finance the new facilities and pay for their continuing operations. The formation of the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA), taking over the water facilities properties, operations, and legal authority previously held by the Metropolitan District commission, is one byproduct of the litigation. The legal battle was most intense from 1983 into the 1990s.
Community and transportation advocacy
Believing cities and towns to be as important environmental constituencies as forests and rivers, CLF advocated for increased light rail and public transportation options in Boston, New Hampshire, and Maine. In a pre-suit settlement with CLF, state highway officials in Massachusetts agreed to implement measures to reduce air pollution, including rail and transit improvements, as part of Boston’s Central Artery project (also known as the Big Dig).
Additionally, CLF advocated for state laws to protect children from the threat of lead poisoning. In 1988, following a three-year campaign by CLF, Massachusetts passed the nation’s toughest law to protect its citizens, especially children, from lead poisoning. More recently, CLF has continued its work to prevent lead poisoning in children by advocating for bills in New Hampshire and Vermont that require testing of school drinking water sources.
