About

About Sustainable Bellingham

The Vision of Sustainable Bellingham is to promote and participate in the co-creation of sustainable community in Bellingham and the surrounding bioregion, in partnership with other groups and individuals.

Our Mission:

To reach the goal of Sustainability, we advocate for the strategies of Relocalization and Resilience – becoming self and community-reliant at the local level and rebuilding communities based on the production of food, energy, and goods as well as the relocalization of governance and culture. Relocalization and resilience includes a firm commitment to reducing consumption and improving environmental and social conditions. 

Our Projects: 

Community-building Events – We host and co-sponsor  events to enrich and enliven the community and increase networking among the many organizations and groups that contribute to the well-being of our community.

 

Sustainable Bellingham is a Registered Non- Profit 501c3 Corporation.
 

Meet the Board 

Celt Schira

Fairhaven

Celt Schira is a registered professional electrical engineer, tax preparer, licensed hypnotherapist, gardener, college instructor, Community Emergency Response Trainer. She spent many years living and working in other people’s countries, experience which has informed both her cooking and her gardening. Her interest in empowering individual wellness led her to study herbal medicine, first aid and hypnotherapy.

Jeffrey Westcott

Bellingham

Jeffrey Westcott joined Sustainable Bellingham upon moving to Bellingham in 2006. He helped manage and promote its many community activities over the years, including Seed Swaps, Roving Garden Parties, Community Bike Repair and Yoga-in the-Parks. He is the Chief Financial Officer of the Cloud Security Alliance, a global Bellingham-based 501(c)6 that promotes best cybersecurity practices in cloud adoption. He is originally from Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania, and his hobbies include traveling and studying Greek. 

My career spans thirty years. I worked the corporate world for ten of those years in banking and securities, then as an entrepreneur for another ten, and since 2010 have worked with established companies in the Bellingham area.

David MacLeod

Bellingham

David is a musician, a Quality professional, and a social permaculturist (exploring “invisible structures”); he has lived his whole life in Bellingham, WA.  He earned his Permaculture Design Certificate at Inspiration Farm in 2009, and is a certified PatternDynamics workshop facilitator. 

David was involved on the periphery when Sustainable Bellingham was founded in the early 2000’s, and joined the Vision Team in 2006, where he engaged in event planning, editing the SB and community events newsletter, and the Sustainable Bellingham Documentation Project.  He also initiated and served on a local city and county appointed Energy Resource Scarcity/Peak Oil Task Force. 
In 2009 David helped to co-initiate Transition Whatcom, an ally and close partnering organization with many of the same values as SB.  In 2023 David is now happy to rejoin the SB board, as Transition Whatcom becomes an official SB project. David blogs at Integral Permaculture, and his writing has been published by Resilience.org, Integral Leadership Review, and Integral Review. 

Brian Kerkvliet

Laurel

Brian is an artist, educator, entrepreneur and jack of all trades. He has run Gossamer Glass Studio since 1985. He and his wife, Alexandra Founded and have stewarded Inspiration Farm since 1994. 

Inspiration Farm is a model for permaculture in Whatcom County. It is  a productive example of what is possible to achieve with minimal input for maximum yields. The farm offers workshops and tours to inspire the community in ways to build resilience.

Trained in Permaculture Design science he does consultations to help regenerative agriculture projects get established in Whatcom and Skagit county. 

As one of the founding members of the Salish Seed Guild and the Seed Swap. Brian sees his role with Sustainable Bellingham as a way to build a stronger more resilient community through education, food, seeds and agricultural projects. At the same time working to protect the environment and cultural diversity that makes Whatcom County so special.

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