The group Citizen Climate Lobby met Tuesday at Ritter Park to try and start a chapter in Huntington, West Virginia’s 3rd Congressional District. The group’s goal is to start a chapter in each of the state’s Congressional Districts.

According to its website, Citizen Climate Lobby is a non-profit, non-partisan, grassroots advocacy organization focused on national policies to address climate change.

Jim Probst, West Virginia State Coordinator of Citizen Climate Lobby and group leader of the Charleston chapter, said the turnout at the first Huntington chapter meeting met his expectations, and he added everyone in attendance was interested in the mission of the group.

The overall goal of the group is to rally support for its Carbon Fee and Dividend proposal, which is a policy proposal to internalize the costs of burning carbon-based fuels. The policy would place a steadily rising fee on the CO2 content of fossil fuels and give all of the revenue from the carbon fee back to households.

The other goal of the Huntington chapter is to spread the word, get community members involved and speak out with their concerns about climate change.

The group has another event coming up July 19, a Group Start Workshop where a national representative from the group will teach training to approach lobbying, methods for lobbying and methods for talking to legislatures. The event will be held at 2 p.m.

Probst said that he is interested in engaging the Marshall University community in the group. The group had a table at Earth Day and had several students sign up. He said “Students tend to be transitory, but I hope to bring some into the group in the fall. Also, some professors have expressed an interest,” he said.

Jocelyn Gibson can be contacted at [email protected].