By the sea, Rob Moir shares the ORI mission
Our Mission
The Ocean River Institute, an environmental education nonprofit, connects advocates and small groups with specific community-based opportunities to practice stewardship, save wildlife, and protect ecosystems with environmental education, science, and conservation.
Our Philosophy
The Ocean River Institute operates based on the belief that many environmental issues can be best addressed by people acting within their communities and regions, rather than by national or international entities. In this respect, ORI’s work is grounded in the principle of subsidiarity. Subsidiarity is “an organizing principle that matters ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest, or least centralized competent authority. The Oxford English Dictionary defines subsidiarity as the idea that a central authority should have a subsidiary function, performing only those tasks that cannot be performed effectively at a more immediate or local level. [1] ORI supports the efforts of small-scale, localized environmental organizations by providing the expertise, services, resources, and information they need but are not readily available at the small or local scale. We call this approach environmental subsidiarity.
Our Partners
Small, local, regional, and/or newly formed environmental groups often find they can benefit from outside help in achieving their goals. That’s where the Ocean River Institute comes in. We maintain a network of ORI Partners, connecting these organizations with resources and services to help them maximize their impact, expand their capacity, and weather unanticipated setbacks. For example, ORI’s role might be to quickly raise money to replace broken monitoring equipment for a river or coastal group. Or, for a group that lacks a website, we can set up a web page with information about an upcoming event. If your organization is interested in Partnering with ORI, please contact us.
Examples of ORI services
- ORI acts as the fiscal agent for the (British) Virgin Islands Environmental Council and Green V.I., enabling them to obtain and manage funding. ORI also helped the Council engage thousands of people worldwide in an educational effort to protect salt ponds, mangroves, and a bay where locals caught fish in the British Virgin Islands.
- From January to June 2008, ORI responded quickly with the equipment and materials the Coastal Bird Program needed to monitor and protect nesting piper plovers and coastal birds on Cape Cod during a transition of directors.
- In 2007, working with the Massachusetts Audubon Society, Conservation Law Foundation, and Ocean Conservancy, ORI raised public awareness of the need for comprehensive ocean management in Massachusetts, leading to the passage of the Massachusetts Ocean Act.
- In 2007, ORI helped Alternatives for Community and Environment (ACE) youth organizers in Boston plan and carry out a Diesel DeTox campaign to clean the air in their neighborhoods.
