Foundation News

SCF Board Discusses Priorities, Movement Building, and More in Atlanta

By Steven Berkenfeld, Chair, Board of Directors, Sierra Club Foundation 

In February, the Sierra Club Foundation Board of Directors convened in Atlanta, Georgia for our quarterly Board meeting. At this first meeting of 2017, we kicked off the day with a discussion about organizational priorities for the year. Having joined us at the end of last year, our new Executive Director Dan Chu offered a new perspective on organizational goal-setting. We talked about strategic impact, fundraising, and leadership development and reached a consensus on our most important priorities.

After covering a number of financial and governance matters, Sierra Club staff from the Beyond Dirty Fuels Campaign, Military Outdoors Program, and Organizing Team joined us for a timely discussion about innovations in movement building. There are a number of imminent opportunities to stop dirty infrastructure projects that harm people and the environment, as well as opportunities to promote an inclusive, growing environmental movement. We learned how the Military Outdoors Program is engaging military personnel, veterans, and their families on outings to increase their appreciation for the land they defend and to show them how important activism is to continue to protect it. Our conversation affirmed the slogan of the People’s Climate Movement that in order “to change everything, we need everyone.”

Part of building a powerful movement is an authentic commitment to equity, inclusion, and justice principles. Director Allison Chin and Sierra Club’s Director of Equity, Inclusion, and Justice Nellis Kennedy-Howard gave an overview of the restructured Department of Equity, Inclusion, and Justice. The department will work to make the Sierra Club, both internally and in its partnerships, more equitable to ensure everyone has the same access to opportunities, more inclusive to ensure everyone feels welcome, and more just to lift up the voices of those who have been historically excluded. We are fully supportive of the work of the Department of Equity, Inclusion and Justice and look forward to more engagement with this team in the coming months.

The next day, we were eager to meet with the Sierra Club Board for a joint session. In a time of uncertainty about the federal government, we know we not only have to continue to defend existing environmental protections, but also must continue to pursue opportunities to advance our goals. Sierra Club leaders have developed a four-pronged approach to harness the power of many thousands of staff and volunteers to resist, recruit, train, and sustain in the current political landscape.

At this meeting, we were sad to say goodbye to Director Marni McKinney, who has served on the Board for the past seven years. We deeply thank her for her incredible leadership and dedication.

Our next meeting will take place in May in Oakland, California and I look forward to getting together with the Foundation Board then to continue to evaluate where we are and where we need to go on our path toward a fair, just, and clean future.

Category: News and Updates