Objective- Citizen Science Enhancing the Local Governance Mechanism to Expedite Coal Exit: A Challenge Faced by the Indigenous Changki Community in Northeast India The Changki community are Ao-Naga indigenous people, located in the State of Nagaland, northeast India, The Community sits in the Indo-Burma ecological hotspot and enjoys a rich environment and natural resources, which ranks among the world's top 10 biodiversity-rich areas. Two major rivers with dozens of tributaries flow through the area, providing the Community with a rich environment and natural resources, such as water, forests, and land, on which the community members' livelihoods depend. Belonging to the Sino-Tibetan language family, the Changki community has long been isolated physically, socio-culturally, and politico-economically. Recently, however, externally motivated "development" such as natural resource exploitation, is occurring to the Community. Most concerning is coal mining, which is taking place in many pockets, especially in forest areas, of the Community, leading to, for instance,water and soil quality degradation and risking the health of the community members and mine workers. While many owners of the mines are members of the Community and do benefit from mining, they are dominated by outside middlemen, as they provide the owners with machinery and other tools and equipment needed for mining. The mine owners are heavily indebted and have little bargaining power over the coal price. Economic disparities have emerged in the traditionally egalitarian Changki community. In sum, mining activities do not benefit the Community as a whole. Rather, they make them increasingly rely on the unsustainable resource extraction and external actors. These situations led the Changki community council to declare in 2018 that coal mining must be banned by the end of August 2021. Mining has continued to date, however. Some community members strongly oppose mining and may resort to confrontational approaches to shut down the mines, which may result in resentment and internal conflicts. This research project attempts to fill in the information gaps in the Community, as laid out above, so that they can reach more informed solutions to end exploitive mining activities in non-confrontational manners, thereby protecting the Community's natural and social environment. [Sep. 2021]