The Climate of Action MC is Barry Martin, writer, producer, director, and actor, and is Co-Founder of Lucky Penny Productions. He has worked in radio for 24 years and is currently the producer and host of Wine Country Live on KVON 1440 AM. He’s also a part-time wine educator, an avid soccer fan, and lover of travel. He has made Napa his home since 1986 and raised two children here.
Speakers: (alphabetical order)
Dr. Aurora Dawn Benton designs, implements, and scales sustainability programs in hospitality, events, and travel. She founded Astrapto to provide practical, business-oriented solutions to social and environmental issues. In addition to her work with clients to transform their operations and organizations through sustainability, she is involved in thought leadership initiatives, such as the Events Industry Council Sustainable Events Standards task force and the Global Business Travel Association’s Sustainability Committee.
Aurora holds a Bachelor in Business Administration in Information Systems from Georgia State University, a Master in International Business with Latin America specialization from University of South Carolina, and a Doctorate in Business Administration in Social Impact Management from Walden University. She is a Certified Sustainability Associate from International Society of Sustainability Professionals, has a Certificate in Sustainable Tourism from the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC), and a Sustainable Event Professional Certificate from the Events Industry Council. She serves on the sustainability committee of the Global Business Travel Association.
Giulianna di Lauro Velez is an intersectional feminist organizer based in Orlando, Florida. She recently worked as a strategic researcher with the think tank known as New Consensus, which was tasked with the job of compiling the scope, the scale, and the goals of the Green New Deal.
From 2012 through 2015, she conducted policy research and provided programmatic support to the U.S. Departments of Labor, Education, and Health and Human Services. In 2016, she joined the Bernie Sanders campaign, acting as a National Strategist and the Puerto Rico Field Director, and subsequently served as the Electoral Manager of the Sanders campaign’s legacy organization, Our Revolution. Over the past 7 years, she’s managed electoral campaigns and advocates for equity, economic, racial, and environmental justice. Giulianna has a B.A. in Social Sciences with a concentration in Politics and a minor in Rhetoric from Utrecht University.
Tim Dewey-Mattia is the Recycling & Public Education Manager for Napa Recycling & Waste Services, the local franchise hauling company in the City of Napa and southern Napa County, as well as the operator of Napa’s Recycling & Composting Facility. He got his start in the recycling field over 20 years ago and has been at Napa Recycling since 2005, where he works on recycling and composting program development, implementation, and outreach. Tim also serves on the board of the Northern California Recycling Association.
Dr. Daniel M. Kammen is a Distinguished Professor of Energy in the Energy and Resources Group, University of California, Berkeley, with parallel appointments in the Energy and Resources Group, the Goldman School of Public Policy, and the Department of Nuclear Engineering. He was appointed the first Environment and Climate Partnership for the Americas (ECPA) Fellow by Secretary of State Hilary R. Clinton in April 2010.
Kammen is the founding director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory (RAEL), Co-Director of the Berkeley Institute of the Environment, and Director of the Transportation Sustainability Research Center. He has founded or is on the board of over 10 companies, and has served the State of California and US Federal Government in expert and advisory capacities.
Dr. Kammen was educated in physics at Cornell and Harvard and held postdoctoral positions at the California Institute of Technology and Harvard. He was Assistant Professor and Chair of the Science, Technology and Environmental Policy Program at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University before moving to University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Kammen has served as a contributing or coordinating lead author on various aspects of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change since 1999, which shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.
He has authored or co-authored 12 books, written more than 300 peer-reviewed journal publications, and is a frequent contributor to or commentator in international news media. Kammen has appeared on 60 Minutes, Nova Frontline, and hosted the six-part Discovery Channel series Ecopolis. Dr. Kammen is a Permanent Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the American Physical Society. In the U.S., he serves on two National Academy of Sciences boards and panels.
Chloe King is a recent graduate of the George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where she studied international environmental studies. She has worked with the World Wildlife Fund for over two years on food waste initiatives in K-12 schools in DC and co-founded Last Call in 2017 to address restaurant food waste by providing discounted meals to customers at the close of business. She has also worked in Southeast Asia as a PADI Divemaster, and researched and studied the effects of tourism on coastal communities across Indonesia for seven months as a Boren Scholar.
Jenny Lester Moffitt is a 5th generation California farmer and Undersecretary at the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA), where she was Deputy Secretary from January 2015 – February 2018. Appointed to these positions by Governor Jerry Brown, Jenny works to engage stakeholders on issues that affect ranchers and farmers, including climate change, land use, water policy, and food security. As a farmer and policymaker, Jenny believes that agriculture is critically important to sustaining our environment and economy.
Prior to joining CDFA, Jenny spent 10 years as Managing Director at Dixon Ridge Farms, her family’s organic walnut farm and processing operation. Jenny also served on the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board. She has been a board member for CA Certified Organic Farmers and served on the California Organic Products Advisory Committee, the Food Safety Committee of the Walnut Marketing Board and the Farmers Advisory Council for the Organic Trade Association. Previously, Jenny worked for American Farmland Trust.
She is a graduate of Brown University with a degree in Economics, and a graduate of the California Ag Leadership program.
Michelle Novi is the Associate Director of Industry Relations for the Napa Valley Vintners (NVV) where she oversees the organization’s local and state advocacy efforts, sustainability initiatives and community outreach endeavors. Michelle has worked extensively with regional and state land use and water quality regulations where she has assisted both private applicants and now NVV member wineries in navigating the complex regulatory landscape. Michelle received an undergraduate degree from UC Davis, along with a recently completed Juris Doctorate from Empire College of Law.
Supervisor Alfredo Pedroza, Napa County, is a lifelong Napa resident and current District 4 Supervisor. He was recently elected to serve a two-year term as Vice Chair of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission — a public, governmental agency responsible for planning, financing and coordinating transportation for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area. He was appointed to represent the 4th District on the Board of Supervisors by Governor Jerry Brown on December 29, 2014. In 2016, Alfredo won election to the Board. Prior to joining the Board of Supervisors, Alfredo was elected to the Napa City Council in 2012, becoming the youngest and first Latino Council member ever elected.
Carl Pope is a veteran leader in the environmental movement, and the former Executive Director and Chairman of the Sierra Club. He serves as the Sr. Climate Advisor for Michael Bloomberg and recently co-authored a book: Climate of Hope with Mr. Bloomberg. He is now the principal advisor at Inside Straight Strategies, focusing on the links between sustainability and economic development. He was a founder of the Blue-Green Alliance and America Votes and has served on the board of the California League of Conservation Voters and the National Clean Air Coalition. The author of three books, he writes regularly for Bloomberg View and The Huffington Post.
Daniel A. Rodríguez, Ph.D. is Chancellor’s Professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning and Associate Director of the Institute for Transportation Studies at The University of California, Berkeley. His research focuses on the reciprocal relationship between the built environment and transportation, and its effects on the environment and health. He is currently involved in studies examining the built environment and health outcomes in several countries.
Dr. Rodríguez’s research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Wellcome Trust, the US Department of Transportation, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, among others. He has a distinguished publication record, including co-authoring the book Urban Land Use Planning (University of Illinois Press). He has been named one of the 25 most impactful planning scholars in North America.
Aaron Schreiber-Stainthorp is the Sustainability Manager at Jackson Family Wines (JFW). In his role at JFW, Aaron focuses on implementing systems that drive transformational change with an emphasis on carbon emissions, energy efficiency, renewable energy, water conservation, zero waste, and employee engagement. Using a data-driven approach to identifying opportunities and guide decision making, Aaron has worked to make sustainability synonymous with innovation and continuous improvement.
In addition to his work at JFW, Aaron is a board member with the Center for Climate Protection focused on speed and scale GHG policy solutions in California and
runs a small consulting firm Sustainability Squared, which focuses on embedding sustainability in the food and beverage industry.
Aaron has spent 5 years working in the wine industry and previously led sustainability efforts at Francis Ford Coppola winery resulting in their 2017 Sustainable Winemaking Leadership Award from the California Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance. Prior to working in wine, Aaron managed energy efficiency education programs at the Alliance to Save Energy. Working with schools nationwide he developed energy efficiency programs that trained 30,000 students, resulting in measurable energy savings of over $3.4 million at participating schools.
Aaron has an MS in Sustainability Management from the Kogod School of Business at American University, a BS from Northland College and is a former EDF Climate Corps Fellow. When not looking for ways to reduce water and energy use, you can find Aaron riding his bike around Sonoma County, or backpacking around Northern California.
Dr. Paul Ullrich is an associate professor of regional and global climate modeling in the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources at the University of California, Davis, and a faculty scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. His research is focused on the development, analysis, and evaluation of stakeholder-relevant climate data, particularly data relevant to water availability and weather extremes in California in light of a changing climate.