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Vermont Climate Council Membership

Vermont Climate Council

Cabinet Members

Julie Moore is the Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources (ANR), the state agency with primary responsibility for protecting and sustaining Vermont’s environment, natural resources, wildlife and forests, and for maintaining Vermont’s beloved state parks. Moore was named to that position by Governor Phil Scott in January 2017. As ANR Secretary, Moore shapes Vermont’s environmental agenda, focusing on water quality, the forest economy, and the importance of conservation. She currently serves on the boards of the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board, Vermont Council on Rural Development, as well as ECHO Lake Aquarium and Science Center.

Before her appointment, Moore worked as the Water Resources Group Leader at Stone Environmental, an environmental consulting firm headquartered in Montpelier, Vermont. She led a variety of watershed planning and assessment projects and has a deep understanding of water quality concerns associated with runoff from developed land and agricultural areas, as well as stream channel processes and flooding. Moore has diverse experience engaging the public in watershed management programs and activities.

Prior to joining Stone in 2011, Moore spent seven years at ANR where she led the state’s efforts to reduce phosphorus pollution in Lake Champlain. In that role, she coordinated a multi-million-dollar budget and grant allocations and served as the primary Agency liaison to related programs at the agencies of Agriculture, Food & Markets and Transportation.

During her years outside of State service, Moore volunteered her expertise for several organizations dedicated to improving Vermont’s water resources, including: Friends of Northern Lake Champlain Advisory Council (Chair); Friends of the Winooski River and Watersheds United (Board of Directors); Winooski Natural Resources Conservation District (Associate Supervisor); Rumney Memorial School Board (Chair). She also served two three-year terms on the Citizens Advisory Committee on the Future of Lake Champlain, including two years as Chair.

Moore earned a B.S. in civil engineering, cum laude, from the University at Buffalo and an M.S. in environmental science and policy from the Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering at the Johns Hopkins University. She is a registered professional engineer in Vermont and New Hampshire.

Moore currently resides in Middlesex, Vermont with her husband, Aaron, and their two children.

Kristin L. Clouser was appointed Secretary of Administration on December 8, 2021 by Governor Philip B. Scott, one month after her appointment as Interim Secretary and just over a year after he appointed her as Deputy Secretary of Administration on November 1, 2020. Prior to her appointment, Kristin served as Chief of the Human Services Division of the Vermont Attorney General’s Office and General Counsel to the Agency of Human Services. Born and raised in New York, Kristin moved to Vermont with her family in 2012, joining the Vermont Attorney General’s Office that same year as an Assistant Attorney General primarily serving the Department for Children and Families Economic Services Division. Before moving to Vermont, Kristin was a litigation associate at a private law firm in New Hampshire for eight years. She graduated summa cum laude from Susquehanna University in 2001 and earned her Juris Doctorate degree from Villanova School of Law cum laude in 2004. Kristin currently resides in Jericho with her husband and two children. 

Anson Tebbetts was appointed Vermont’s Secretary of Agriculture, Food, and Markets by Governor Phil Scott in January of 2017.

Dr. Mark Levine was appointed commissioner of health by Governor Phil Scott and began service on March 6, 2017. Prior to his appointment he was a Professor of Medicine at the University of Vermont, and most recently the Associate Dean for Graduate Medical Education and Designated Institutional Official at the College of Medicine and the UVM Medical Center. He also served as the Vice Chair for Education in the Department of Medicine. Dr. Levine obtained his B.A. in Biology from the University of Connecticut and received his M.D. degree from the University of Rochester. He completed his Internal Medicine Residency and a Chief Resident year at the University of Vermont and a fellowship in general internal medicine at the University of North Carolina, which emphasized clinical epidemiology, research training, teaching, and administration of educational programs.

Dr. Levine has gained a reputation as an outstanding teacher and educational program innovator, receiving teaching awards from the medical school and the Department of Medicine. He maintains his faculty appointment and continues to actively teach.

Prior to becoming Commissioner, he actively practiced general internal medicine with special interests in solving complex diagnostic dilemmas, health promotion/ disease prevention, screening and clinical nutrition. This provided him with personal perspective on the challenges our healthcare system holds for physicians as well as patients. At the nexus of Dr. Levine’s clinical, education, public health and advocacy efforts is his heightened interest in improving health at the population level through health policy directed at fostering a culture of health. As Health Commissioner, Dr. Levine takes great pride in leading the Department of Health’s efforts to fulfill its mission – To protect and promote the best health for all Vermonters and is honored to represent its vision of Healthy Vermonters living in healthy communities.

 

Joe Flynn was named Secretary of Transportation in December 2016, prior to that he served as Deputy Commissioner of the Department of Public Safety where he was also Director of Emergency Management and Homeland Security. His career in state government began in 2009 at the Agency of Transportation as Rail Program Director. In 2011 he left that position and moved, along with many others from headquarters in Montpelier, to live and work in southeastern Vermont in the aftermath of Tropical Storm Irene. That was followed by time in the Irene Recovery Office at the Agency of Administration, before going to Public Safety in 2012.

Prior to State service, Joe was employed for thirty-years in the private sector spanning building, construction supplies and services, transportation, and over twenty-years in manufacturing-distribution- sales.

Flynn has extensive experience in public safety and emergency services. He has served as Fire Chief of South Hero Volunteer Fire Department, Deputy Sheriff with the Grand Isle County Sheriff’s Department, Vermont State Firefighters’ Association representative to the Vermont Fire Service Training Council, among several other key emergency services roles. He is a former member of the South Hero Select Board and former trustee of Lyndon Institute. Flynn graduated from Saint Michael’s College and lives in South Hero, Vermont.

June E. Tierney was sworn in as the Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Public Service by Governor Phil Scott on January 5, 2017. Prior to her appointment, Commissioner Tierney served as general counsel to the Vermont Public Utility Commission (PUC) (2012-2016). Before then, she was a PUC hearing officer (2008-2012), as well as a staff attorney at the Vermont Department of Public Service (2001-2008). A 1986 graduate of Boston University and a 1993 graduate of Vermont Law School, Commissioner Tierney began her legal career with a clerkship at the Vermont Supreme Court, followed by three years as an associate at Davis Polk & Wardwell in New York City, where she specialized in securities fraud litigation, white collar crime defense and corporate internal compliance investigations. Before her admission to the bar, Commissioner Tierney enjoyed the privilege of serving on active duty (1986-1990) as a commissioned officer in the United States Army.

Lindsay Kurrle was appointed Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Commerce and Community Development by Governor Phil Scott, effective on September 2, 2019. ACCD encompasses the Departments of Economic Development, Housing and Community Development, and Tourism and Marketing. These departments include many programs that serve the Vermont public by enhancing the Vermont business climate, marketing Vermont to tourists and others, and strengthening Vermont communities in a wide variety of ways.

From January 2017 to September 2019, Lindsay served as Commissioner for the Vermont Department of Labor where she led over 300 employees, and administered Vermont’s workforce development, unemployment insurance, workers’ compensation, employment services programs, and Vermont’s occupational safety and health program.

Prior to becoming the state’s Labor Commissioner, Lindsay was a business owner for 15 years, and an Auditor for the international accounting firm KPMG. Lindsay brings a balance of knowledge and understanding of both the labor and business community to her role.

Kurrle is an outspoken and strong advocate for matching job seekers with skills, training, and career opportunities while ensuring that Vermont’s employers have access to a skilled and competent workforce that matches their needs now and in the future.

Secretary Kurrle lives in Middlesex, Vermont with her husband and three children.

 

Members Appointed by the Senate Committee on Committees

Jared Duval serves as Executive Director of Energy Action Network (EAN), a nonprofit organization that supports a network of over 200 members and public partners across Vermont. The shared mission of EAN members is to achieve Vermont’s 90% renewable by 2050 total energy commitment and to significantly reduce Vermont’s greenhouse gas emissions in ways that create a more just, thriving, and sustainable future for Vermonters.

EAN, the nonprofit organization, serves its network and the State of Vermont by acting as a neutral, trusted convener of diverse stakeholders, including hosting an Annual Network Summit. EAN also collects and analyzes data for its members and the State of Vermont to enable evidence-based and data- informed policy making and program design, most prominently with its Annual Progress Report for Vermont on Energy, Emissions, the Economy, and Equity.

Jared has led EAN since 2017. Previously, from 2014 to 2017, he served as Economic Development Director at the Vermont Agency of Commerce and Community Development, where he was responsible for providing business support to working lands and green economy businesses and helped to guide millions of dollars of state and federal investments in sustainable economic development via the Northern Border Regional Commission, the Working Lands Enterprise Initiative, and the Clean Energy Development Fund. Part of the ninth generation of his family to call Vermont home, Jared grew up in the Upper Connecticut River Valley and now lives with his family in Montpelier.

Jared also currently serves as Co-Chair of the Clean Energy Development Fund and is a member of the Board of the Public Assets Institute. He holds degrees from Princeton University (Master in Public Affairs – Domestic Policy, 2014), University of Cambridge (MPhil, Modern Society and Global Transformations, 2012), and Wheaton College, Massachusetts (Bachelor of Arts, Summa Cum Laude – Economics and Political Science, 2005).

Kelly Klein is the founder and CEO of Groennfell Meadery and Havoc Mead, a certified B Corp located in St. Albans, Vermont. Kelly has worked since the company's founding to use the business as a force for good and to create a healthy, supportive environment for their growing team of employees.

Jaiel Pulskamp is the founder and owner of Kettle Song Farm, a small-scale organic vegetable farm. Jaiel established her farm in 2008 after gaining experience working on several farms throughout Vermont. From 2017 until 2022, she served as an organizer and co-director for 350Vermont, and she currently holds a position with the White River Natural Resources Conservation District.

Jaiel has a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology from Long Island University's Friends World Program. During her academic tenure, Jaiel focused on indigenous agricultural practices and conducted fieldwork with the Embera tribe in the Darien Gap, where she studied their farming techniques. Jaiel has served on the Washington Central Unified Union School District School Board and the Worcester Planning Commission. She is an active board member of the Vermont Healthy Soils Coalition and resides in Central Vermont with her husband and two children.

Peter Sterling is the Executive Director of Renewable Energy Vermont a 501(c)(6) trade association representing Vermont’s renewable energy sector which includes businesses, non-profits, utilities, individuals and others who believe 100% total renewable energy is not only possible, but necessary.

Prior to working at REV, Peter served as the Chief of Staff to the Senate Pro Tem Tim Ashe from 2016-2020. Peter spent the previous decade working as an advocate for expanding public health care programs and for a universal, publicly funded health care system in Vermont.

Peter has a B.A. in Political Science from the State University of New York at Albany and did graduate work in forestry and forest policy at UVM’s Natural Resources Planning Program. Peter has served on both the Doty Memorial and Montpelier-Roxbury School Boards, the Executive Committee of the Vermont Chapter of the Sierra Club and on the board of directors of Vermont Conservation Voters and the Vermont Natural Resources Council. Peter lives in Montpelier with his wife, and two children.

 

Members Appointed by the House of Representatives

Bram Kleppner is CEO of Danforth Pewter, with manufacturing in Middlebury and retail stores in Vermont, Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Virginia. Danforth has committed to getting to zero fossil fuel use, and to that end has built a solar farm, installed heat pumps, and put in an electric car charging station at the flagship store in Middlebury. 

In addition to the Vermont Climate Council, Bram served for five years as Co-Chair of Vermont’s Medicaid Exchange Advisory Board, served as a Commissioner on the Vermont Tax Structure Commission, and served on the Governor’s Business Advisory Council on Health Care Financing.

Previously, Bram spent 10 years at Ben & Jerry’s, where he co-led their first campaign against global warming and led the creation of their first non-GMO ice cream.

He also spent seven years as chair of the Board of the Population Media Center, which advances the rights of women and girls in the developing world and protects the planet by stabilizing global population at a sustainable level. PMC’s programs have been seen by over 500 million people.

Burlington Electric believes Bram’s family’s project was the first 100% conversion of a historic home in Burlington to zero emissions.

Bram earned an MBA from the (now) Grossman School of Business at the University of Vermont, and a BA from Middlebury College.

Liz Miller is VP of Sustainable Supply & Resilient Systems at Green Mountain Power and lives in Burlington. Previously, she worked as a lawyer and advisor specializing in executive and organizational management and corporate governance. Liz served as Chief of Staff to former Governor Shumlin and as Commissioner of the Vermont Public Service Department, where she led the State’s energy and telecommunications policy. Earlier in her career, she founded and ran a small law firm. Liz has served on many nonprofit boards and advisory groups including ECHO Leahy Center for Lake Champlain, Boy & Girls Club of Burlington, Vermont Law School, and Conservation Law Foundation. She is a member of the Vermont Professional Responsibility Board and chairs the Vermont Supreme Court’s Advisory Committee on the Rules of Evidence. Spending time on Vermont’s mountain trails and Lake Champlain is her passion.

David Deen, Westminster served as the River Steward for the Connecticut River Conservancy (nee Connecticut River Watershed Council) responsible for public education and advocacy on issues in the VT/NH reach of the river since 1998, including regulatory affairs, river cleanup, barrier removal, hydro relicensing, and published articles and made presentations to citizens about the river. He now serves as an honorary trustee for the Conservancy.

David owned and operated Strictly Trout a flyfishing guide service that was Orvis Endorsed in VT and licensed in NH for 25 years, at the time the oldest guide service in Vermont.

 David served in the Vermont Legislature for 30 years (28 in the House; 2 in the Senate) either on or as chair of the Natural Resources, Water Resources, and/or the Fish and Wildlife Committees among other assignments including a decade as ranking member of the House Rules Committee.

He serves as chair of the Connecticut River Chapter of Trout Unlimited and is a founding incorporator of the Vermont Community Foundation. He has recently been appointed to the Connecticut River Atlantic Salmon Commission.

He tries to fish whenever he can and is an appointed Vermont Fish and Wildlife Board member.

David holds a MS in Environmental Science from Antioch New England Graduate School.

Dr. Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux is a Professor of Climatology in the Department of Geography at the University of Vermont. She uses a variety of mixed methods from remotely sensed data to statistics and historical content analysis, to explore the influence of atmospheric processes on fluvial processes and vegetated landscapes. Her work spans a number of climate hazards and severe weather, with a special focus on flooding and droughts. As the State Climatologist for Vermont, she engages directly with community groups, K-12 schools, State legislators, Federal and State agencies, and national climate organizations. She is the President of the American Association of State Climatologists and was inducted as a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society in January 2020.

She is the lead editor of ‘Historical climate variability and impacts in North America’, the first monograph to deal with the use of documentary and other ancillary records for analyzing climate variability and change.

Nationally, she is the lead author for the Northeast Chapter of the Fourth National Climate Assessment of the US Global Change Research Program. She has served on the NOAA Science Advisory Board Climate Working Group helping to guide climate research across the US. Statewide, she is the Co-Chair of the State’s Drought Task Force and worked closely with the Vermont Department of Emergency Management and Homeland Security on the climatology related sections of the FEMA-mandated Vermont State Hazard Mitigation Plan. In 2014, she was a Scholar-in-Residence for the Sustainability Graduate Institute at Goddard College, and their Commencement Speaker in Spring 2015. Also, in 2015, Dr. Dupigny-Giroux was elected a Fellow of the Vermont Academy of Science and Engineering in recognition of her academic and outreach contributions to the state.

Additional Resources:

    Johanna Miller is the Energy & Climate Program Director at the Vermont Natural Resources Council. Johanna also serves as the coordinator of the Vermont Energy and Climate Action Network, the statewide network of over 120 all-volunteer town energy committees and the partners who support them. In these roles, Johanna works from the grassroots to the Legislature to help advance clean energy and climate action programs and policies. Johanna was appointed to serve as a member of Governor Phil Scott’s Climate Action Commission and also serves on the Clean Energy Development Fund board, the Vermont Energy Education Program board, and the Vermont System Planning Committee. Prior to joining VNRC in 2005, Johanna spent five years working as a researcher, writer and policy expert for a statewide environmental policy and advocacy organization in Michigan, where she helped to coordinate a statewide transportation and land use coalition. Johanna is a graduate of the University of Vermont and lives in Montpelier; a home base from which she and her family love to ski, hike, camp, bike, garden and travel.

    Paula Melton is a Brattleboro Representative Town Meeting member and serves on that body's Finance Committee. As Editorial Director at BuildingGreen, she manages publications and develops content related to environmental justice; climate change mitigation and adaptation in the built environment; and green building certifications, standards, and public policy. She has an MFA in poetry writing from the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop and has been researching and writing about health, sustainability, and related topics for more than 25 years.

    Richard Cowart is a Principal at the Regulatory Assistance Project (RAP), a Vermont-based, global non- profit that advises governments on energy regulation, electricity markets, and climate policy (1999- present). Over the past decade he built and directed RAP’s European program in Brussels, Berlin, and Warsaw. He has advised governments across the US and Europe, in China, Brazil, and several other nations.

    Before joining RAP, Mr. Cowart served as Chair of the Vermont Public Service Board (now PUC) for 12 years. He was elected president of the New England Conference of Public Utility Commissioners, and Chair of the US regulators’ national Committee on Energy Resources and the Environment.

    In addition to his RAP position, Richard served for six years as Chair of the US DOE’s Electricity Advisory Committee, on the International Energy Agency’s Demand-Side Management program. and the Board of Directors of the Electric Power Research Institute. He now serves on the Environmental Advisory Committee of the New York ISO and chairs the Board of VEIC, which operates the “energy efficiency utilities” in Vermont, Washington DC, and several cities in Ohio.

    Richard also has experience in natural resources and land use management. He served as Executive Officer and general counsel of the Vermont Environmental Board for two years, and taught courses in environmental law, land use law and natural resource policy at the University of California and Vermont Law School for more than a decade. He and his wife manage a commercial Christmas tree farm and sugar maple/land conservation projects in Calais and Marshfield, Vermont.

     

    Note: The asterisk next to certain names indicates they are a member of the Steering Committee.

     

    Subcommittee co-chairs