Become a Waterkeeper
Do you lead or want to lead an environmental nonprofit organization to focus advocacy work on protecting your local watershed?
Do you have excellent leadership, communications, and fundraising skills?
If yes, we want to hear from you! Scroll down to learn more about how to start a Waterkeeper group and submit your information.
United as one powerful force, Waterkeeper Alliance fights for every community’s right to clean water.
From the Great Lakes to the Himalayas, Alaska to Australia, local Waterkeeper groups defend the fundamental human right to drinkable, fishable, and swimmable waters, and combine firsthand knowledge of waterways with an unwavering commitment to the rights of local communities.
Whether on the water tracking down polluters, in courtrooms enforcing environmental laws, advocating in town meetings, or teaching in classrooms, the Waterkeeper movement speaks for the waters it defends with the backing of local communities.
Do you know if there is already a Waterkeeper group protecting your watershed? Find Your local Waterkeeper and reach out to them to get involved!
Types of Waterkeeper Groups
Organizations
Licensed Waterkeeper Organizations are financially sustainable. They are voting members of Waterkeeper Alliance, each representing a specific waterway. Waterkeeper Alliance offers a variety of training, organizing, communications, and advocacy benefits to strengthen their programs so that the local fight for clean water becomes a powerful, coordinated, global movement.
Affiliates
Provisionally licensed Waterkeeper Affiliates are sustainable nonprofit organizations but may have limited capacity, and/or they may be Affiliates of a fully-licensed Waterkeeper Organization, representing a specific waterway. Affiliates are non-voting members of Waterkeeper Alliance but can utilize Waterkeeper Alliance’s benefits to strengthen their programs and develop the capacity to become, if applicable, fully licensed, voting Waterkeeper Member Organizations.
How We Support Waterkeeper Groups
Communications & Marketing
Waterkeeper Alliance provides a collective voice on national and global issues affecting our waterways ...
Training
Waterkeeper Alliance provides trainings and networking opportunities, hosts webinars, creates partnerships ...
Regional Organizing
Waterkeeper Alliance provides the opportunity to participate in in-person and virtual gatherings to foster ...
Advocacy
Waterkeeper Alliance engages with lawmakers, regulatory officials, and courts to advocate ...
Conference & Regional Meetings
Every other year, Waterkeeper Alliance hosts a global conference for Waterkeeper Organizations and Affiliates from around ...
Conference and Regional Meetings
Every other year, Waterkeeper Alliance hosts a global conference for Waterkeeper Organizations and Affiliates from around the world to attend trainings, share strategies, and strengthen bonds that empower Waterkeeper groups to be the most effective clean water advocates in the world (registration fee required). On years when the global conference is not held, Waterkeeper Organizations and Affiliates have the opportunity to meet in-person or virtually at regional summits around the world.
Become a Waterkeeper
Using the form, please briefly tell us about yourself and your work to protect your local watershed. Please include the following relevant experience:
- Leadership
- Communications
- Fundraising
Strengthening and growing Waterkeeper groups in the Amazon Basin
Through Project Osiris, Waterkeeper Alliance has prioritized the Amazon Basin as one of the world’s most iconic and endangered water bodies in critical need of protection. With an initial focus in Peru, Brazil, and Ecuador, we will recruit local and Indigenous-led groups to amplify their voices—and Indigenous knowledge—for the protection of the Amazon Basin and Rainforest.
Waterkeeper Magazine
Reporting from the front lines of the planetary environmental crisis. These are the stories you won’t find anywhere else covered in such depth and uncompromising force.
Waterkeeper Alliance provides a collective voice on national and global issues affecting our waterways. We bring the Waterkeeper movement’s stories to a worldwide audience through collaborative media campaigns, public relations, digital media, Waterkeeper Magazine, and other marketing and communications tools.
Please see more on Member and Affiliate Benefits.