Every year, Sustainable San Mateo County ‒SSMC‒ honors sustainability leaders who have made significant progress in protecting our people and planet through their work with local organizations, businesses, and governments, and Thursday night, several awards were presented to men, women, and young people who have made a difference in this locality.
SSMC has presented 166 local sustainability champion awards since 1999, seeking to inspire and honour those working to make the region truly sustainable.
With the theme “A Hopeful Future for Our Youth,” this Thursday, March 30, at 5:30 p.m., Colegio de San Mateo, located at 1700 W. Hillsdale Blvd., dressed up to celebrate these individuals, have dinner, and be part of a silent auction.
In this 24th edition of the Sustainable San Mateo County Awards, the winners were:
Sustainability Award: Diane Bailey, Tom Kabat, Redwood High School and SEI.
Green Building Award: Burlingame Community Center.
Green Building Honorable Mentions: Atherton Library and Gilead Sciences' Wellbeing Center.
Praise Youth for Sustainability: Alex Wagonfeld, Colin Chu, and Ethan Hua.
Diane Bailey has led sustainability efforts in Menlo Park since 2015 through the nonprofit Menlo Spark. Under her leadership, with much support from fellow awardee Tom Kabat, Menlo Spark helped mobilize city residents to address climate change, persuading the City Council to adopt a goal of being carbon neutral by 2030, the most aggressive goal for the city in San Mateo County.
Last year, Menlo Spark helped forge a public-private partnership between BlocPower and Menlo Park for a citywide electrification and job training program, which included securing $4.5 million in state funding to help low-income households transition off natural gas in Menlo Park.
Tom Kabat, Chairman of the Menlo Park Environmental Quality Commission, is an environmental and mechanical engineer with four decades of experience in energy efficiency, utility programs, utility delivery planning, and public policy areas.
Tom has leveraged his extensive experience providing assistance and analysis to a variety of electrification efforts, including developing ways to electrify without increasing the size of electrical panels. Tom assisted with a recent San Mateo County study on new methods for electrifying homes.
Together, Diane and Tom founded the Fossil-Free Buildings Campaign in Silicon Valley (FFBSV) in 2019, which now has 40 member organizations and has helped persuade 30 cities in San Mateo County and Santa Clara County to limit or ban fossil fuels in new construction.
SEI is a San Rafael-based environmental nonprofit that trains young leaders across the Bay Area to drive sustainability solutions and develops leadership pathways from elementary school through early career.
Sequoia High School has a strong commitment to students’ futures with a focus on post-secondary options and environmental sustainability. Its new sustainable, climate-resilient campus opened in 2018 and features energy-efficient heating and cooling, solar power, and biofiltration.
The school features a large outdoor educational space with an organic garden, greenhouse, composting system, chicken coop, rainwater harvesting systems, riparian corridor, and outdoor classroom. Students participate in environmentally infused curricula that include maintaining the school garden, using produce harvested from the garden in culinary arts classes, and analyzing food systems through hands-on aquaponics labs.
The young people who are committed to sustainability and have been recognized have volunteered their time to make the county more sustainable.
Alex Wagonfeld of Hillsborough received an SSMC Youth Sustainability Citation for his work in mobilizing peers at The Nueva School and other local high schools to get involved in environmental projects, and his involvement in urging private high schools across the U.S. to divest from fossil fuels.
Colin Chu of Portola Valley, who also attends The Nueva School, runs the Homeless Heroes organization that educates the public about homelessness and has delivered over a thousand meals each year from local schools to homeless shelters in the county.
Meanwhile, Ethan Hua of San Mateo attends Aragon High School and founded the Help Our Planet Earth Uniform Program (HOPE), which serves the community by accepting and reusing school uniforms, thereby reducing contributions to landfills.
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