Are we stuck in an archaic view of an ecosystem that keeps people and Nature separate? How do we foster ecosystem repair AND community healing?
This month’s featured webinar guest, Layel Camargo, has deeply explored these topics and will share their experience as a person dedicated to restoring our diverse relationship with Nature.
Over the last few years, Layel has been involved in stewarding an organization called Shelterwood, a 900-acre forest and former church camp right above what’s called the Russian River in Sonoma County, California, on Unceded Kashaya and Southern Pomo territory.
Shelterwood is a Black, Indigenous, and LGBTQ-led community forest and retreat center, healing people and ecosystems through active stewardship and community engagement. As a collective of land and community protectors, they model how ecosystem health can only be achieved by communities who are in deep relationship with the Earth and with one another.
They are dedicated to enriching the waterways, filling the food baskets, quickening the forests, rematriating laughter, painting the future, rewilding hearts, and healing people.
About Layel
Layel Camargo (they/them) is an indigenous descendant of the Yaqui and Mayo tribes of the Sonoran Desert and is an advocate for the better health of the planet and its people. Layel is a transgender and gender non-conforming person. They graduated from UC Santa Cruz with dual degrees in Feminist Studies and Legal Studies. Layel is an organizer with the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective and is also the founder of ‘Woke n Wasteless‘ an online platform on waste reduction and people of color issues. Layel is a builder & a novice carpenter by way of taking classes in the Carpentry department at Laney Community College and has worked on building tiny homes for homeless people in the bay area, CA. Layel is also a big advocate of spreading the Just Transition Framework in the arts and an advocate of both low waste/low impact lifestyles. Most recently, Layel was named on the Grist 2020 Fixers List. Layel is also a staff member at Movement Generation’s Justice and Ecology Project
“I think the outdoors community is one way to kind of connect with nature, but it needs to get diversified. You don’t need to be rock climbing or hiking with sticks or doing this Instagram-fed way of how you interact with nature. Just go out, touch the soil, hug the tree, take a deep breath of fresh air, walk 0.2 miles and consider that a big adventure. We need to diversify the way we engage with nature.”