Staff
Executive Director & EcoNews Editor
A resident of Eureka since 2017, Caroline Griffith is an avid public meeting attendee and can often be found at City Council and Board of Supervisors meetings. When asked as a kid what she thought she might be when she was 35, her response was “environmental something”. That prediction was fairly accurate, as environmentalism has been a factor in much of the political work that she has done. She is excited to highlight the intersections of environmentalism and social justice that are happening in Humboldt County.
Email: director@yournec.org (she/they)
Public Lands Director
Larry Glass is a life-long environmental advocate and former retail business owner for 40 years. He has served in various capacities on the NEC board for over 35 years – currently presiding as Board President and Executive Director, plus serving as the NEC’s forest advisor. Larry was elected to the Eureka City Council and served four years (2006-2010). His knowledge of local environmental issues and experience as a community leader proves a vital component of the NEC. Larry sits on the NEC’s Conservation, Personnel, Tech, Finance, Board Development and EcoNews Committees. Larry is also President and Executive Director of Safe Alternatives for our Forest Environment (S.A.F.E.), Trinity County’s environmental voice since 1979. Larry is a resident of both Trinity and Humboldt County, giving him a unique perspective for both groups.
Email: larryglass71@gmail.com (he/him)
Carlrey Arroyo, Xicanx with Yoeme roots, has been a guest on Wiyot land since 2013. They received their B.A. in Environmental Studies from Humboldt State University with an emphasis on community organizing in 2017. As a community member, they have organized for land defense and water protection, racial justice, food equity, and mutual-aid networks. Carlrey is a farmer, an artist, and an active believer in the power of community. Email: admin@yournec.org (they/them)
Coastal Programs Coordinator
Sable Odry graduated from Cal Poly Humboldt in 2017 with a degree in Environmental Management and Protection Planning. In the thirteen years that they’ve lived in the area, they’ve appreciated getting to connect with the environment and community in different ways. From local government, to farming, to volunteering, now they’re excited to be a part of NEC’S work in advocating for environmental and social justice. Outside of the NEC, they enjoy adventuring with their pup Griffin, helping put on drag shows, and running their seasonal florist business.
Email: coastalprograms@yournec.org (they/them)
EcoNews Journalist
Elena Bilheimer graduated in winter of 2021 with a degree in environmental studies and a minor in journalism from Cal Poly Humboldt. She has written over 50 articles for EcoNews about a wide variety of environmental topics ranging from the implications of climate anxiety, the complexities of renewable energy, and the detrimental effects of capitalism and colonialism on the environment. Her passions include being outside, camping, natural dyeing, reading, design, and cooking. Elena loves being part of an organization that is actively working to address issues of environmental justice in Humboldt County and beyond.
Email: econewsjournalist@gmail.com (she/her)
Programs & Advancement
A descendent of the Visayas and Mindanao and growing up on the California coast, Tali Trillo has been alongside the Pacific for generations. They have been a guest in Wiyot territory since 2016. Majority of the time, you’d catch them in their community garden, planting flowers or harvesting herbs for medicine-making. At the NEC, Tali wants to primarily uplift local Indigenous and grassroots environmental protection efforts, collaborations with houseless and other marginalized community members, and connections between social injustices and environmental harms.
Email: tali@yournec.org (they/them)
Communications Coordinator
Moxie Alvarnaz is a Queer Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) and a guest in Wiyot Homelands since their youth. Mox holds a bachelor’s degree in Sociology and focuses their scholarship on liberatory movements and the relationships between industrial extraction and state violence. They have been involved in a variety of environmental and social movements, mutual aid organizing, and direct action. Mox firmly believes in the possibility of crafting revolutionary anti-colonial coalitions which reject green capitalist rationales. You can usually catch Mox in the NEC office scrambling to finish an EcoNews piece on environmental movements or working on an event flier. In their spare time, Mox nourishes soil at a local queer farming commune.
communications@yournec.org (they/them)
EcoNews Archive
My name is Griselda Valdez. I am a first-generation student at Cal-Poly Humboldt. I am getting my degree in Environmental Science and Management with a concentration in Education and Interpretation, as well as pursuing a minor in Parks Administration. This summer, I am working with EcoNews as an archiving intern. I am excited to learn and grow. I love living in Humboldt and enjoy taking nature walks, biking, and baking and recently started looking for agates.
EcoNews Intern
Emma Wilson is a new EcoNews journalism intern this spring 2024. Wilson is a fourth year journalism student with a public relations concentration, and is minoring in environmental ethics at Cal Poly Humboldt. She aims toward a scientific and environmental storytelling focus that connects people with the natural world. She was science editor for The Lumberjack in fall 2023 and started pursuing journalism after realizing how much there is to know about the natural world and how that can connect people through writing and storytelling. After growing up in different places ranging from Seattle WA, Laurinburg and Asheville NC, and moving across the country to Oakland CA during the 2020 pandemic, everything seemed possible as there is so much to see and understand about the world. Wilson loves to swim in rivers, lakes, and the ocean. She wants to connect people with water through public relations to understand the ways water impacts everything around us. One day, Wilson strives to lm a documentary on how water connects and flows throughout the world, and with the environment. She aims to connect people so we as a community can understand how the world works to make the world a better place to live and understand in. After graduating college, Wilson hopes to connect with people to understand the complex ways life brings while working with environmental nonprofits and using public outreach to connect one another.