Inside Climate News tells the incredible story of Diane Wilson, a fourth-generation fisherwoman from Texas, who with a group of citizen scientists took on petrochemical giant Formosa Plastics and won a $50 million settlement for Lavaca Bay.
Now, five years later, their win is transforming a struggling Gulf Coast fishing community with $20 million directed toward the Matagorda Bay Fishing Cooperative. Local fishermen are reclaiming their heritage by launching Texas’s largest oyster farm, buying out a seafood buyer, and creating sustainable futures for themselves.
Wilson’s triumph also is also funding environmental projects like a marine science camp and a study on mercury pollution — evidence of how grassroots activism and sheer determination can revive a community’s spirit and its connection to the water.