Maryland Sierra Club Zero Waste Committee
May 7, 2020, 7 pm
Susan V. Collins, President, Container Recycling Institute
Ms. Collins became the President of the Container Recycling Institute in 2009. She leads the Institute’s research projects and works with environmental organizations, businesses, and state and federal governments throughout the United States and around the world to educate the public on the benefits of packaging recycling. Prior to 2009, she was a consultant for 20 years and assisted over 80 public agencies with their solid waste and recycling programs. Ms. Collins served on four CalRecycle advisory groups, including the subject of waste accounting. She served on the Board of the California Resource Recovery Association for nine years, and has been on the board of the National Recycling Coalition since 2010. She holds degrees in Manufacturing Engineering from Boston University and Business Administration (MBA) from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA).
Founded in 1991, CRI has become recognized as the expert source for information on container recycling and container deposit systems, and plays a vital role in educating policymakers, government officials, and the general public regarding the social and environmental impacts of the production and disposal of one-way beverage containers. CRI also works to debunk myths about container recycling promoted by the beverage, retail, and container manufacturing industries.
Ms. Collins has testified before the legislatures of California, Nevada, Vermont, Minnesota, Maryland, Tennessee, and Massachusetts. She has been quoted in news stories on National Public Radio, PRI’s The World, BBC radio, KNX radio, KCET’s SoCal Connected (TV), Maryland Public Radio, KQED radio, the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Minneapolis Star Tribune, Boston Globe, Resource Recycling, Waste 360, Plastics News, and Beverage World, among others.
Judith Enck, President, Beyond Plastics
Judith Enck is a Senior Fellow and Visiting Faculty member at Bennington College, where she teaches classes on plastic pollution and is the President of Beyond Plastics. Beyond Plastics works with community leaders on issues related to plastic pollution and trains college students to become informed and active on environmental issues. She recently was a Visiting Scholar at Pace Law School.
She served from 2009-17 as Regional Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency overseeing environmental protection in New York, New Jersey, 8 Indian Nations, Puerto Rico and US Virgin Islands. Working with a staff of 800 and managing a $700 million budget, Judith secured a number of environmental accomplishments during her tenure at EPA. She has worked on environmental and energy issues related to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico and the U S Virgin Islands, serving on the Governor’s Hurricane Recovery and Resiliency Advisory Committee in the US Virgin Islands.
Judith previously served as Deputy Secretary for the Environment in the New York Governor’s Office and served as a Policy Advisor to the New York State Attorney General. Prior to that, she was Senior Environmental Associate with the New York Public Interest Research Group. She worked with the New York State Legislature to pass a number of the state’s most far reaching environmental laws, including those addressing acid rain, toxics, pesticides, recycling, energy conservation and environmental funding. Ms. Enck is credited for helping to establish New York State’s bottle law and shutting down the Albany ANSWERS garbage incinerator in a low-income community. She also served as the Executive Director of Environmental Advocates of New York. She is a past President of Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, former Executive Director of the Non-Profit Resource Center and a designer of her rural town’s recycling program.
Judith serves on the Advisory Board of Climate Action Now, The Institute for Health and the Environment at the Albany School of Public Health and Sustainable Westchester. She is active with the Hoosick Falls Support Network, working to bring clean drinking water to a region impacted by toxic contamination.
Brooke Lierman, Delegate (District 46), Maryland House of Delegates
Brooke Lierman is currently in her second term in the Maryland House of Delegates, representing Maryland’s 46th Legislative District in the City of Baltimore. She currently serves on the House Environment and Transportation Committee, where she is Chair of the Land Use and Ethics Subcommittee. She successfully sponsored Maryland’s statewide ban on expanded polystyrene foam food containers – the first in the nation – passed in 2019 and due to go into effect in July 2020. During the 2020 legislative session, she led the campaign in the House of Delegates for passage of the Plastics and Packaging Reduction Act (HB109), which would ban plastic carryout bags, require retailers to charge for other carryout bags, and establish a work group on single-use packaging.
From 2015-2019 she served on the House Appropriations Committee, where she played a major role in managing Maryland’s more than $42 billion budget, prioritizing funds for education, services for people with disabilities, and public transit, and holding state agencies accountable for fiscal responsibility and program performance. She has carried and won passage of statewide legislative initiatives to: improve public transportation; stem the school-to-prison pipeline by prohibiting suspensions and expulsions of pre-K to 2nd graders in public schools; eliminate sex trafficking and aid its victims; and fund evidence-based gun violence prevention programs at the state level. She has championed legislation related to child care access and the rights of low-wage workers.
Brooke also practices as a civil rights attorney. She represents blind and/or deaf students, individuals in civil rights claims, and low-wage workers suing for their wages. She successfully represented a wrongfully-convicted man who served 25 years in jail in a civil suit against the Baltimore Police Department. Her pro bono activities include assistance with expungements and representation of young undocumented immigrants.
Brooke graduated from Dartmouth College, and attended the University of Texas School of Law. Prior to law school, she served as an AmeriCorps VISTA member at The DREAM Program in Burlington, Vermont, and worked as Special Assistant at the Center for American Progress. In 2017, she was named Legislator of the Year by Maryland Hunger Solutions for her work on hunger issues, and a Green Legislative Champion by the Maryland League of Conservation Workers. The Maryland Public Health Association named her the Legislator of the Year in 2018. She has been listed in The Daily Record’s Top 100 Women in Maryland, the Baltimore Sun Magazine’s 50 Women to Watch, The Daily Record’s Leading Women list, Baltimore Magazine’s 40 Under 40, and as a Maryland Rising Star since 2013 in Super Lawyers.
Melanie Duchin, Greenpeace Plastics Campaigner
Melanie Duchin is a Greenpeace Plastics Campaigner who is based in the San Francisco Bay Area. She started working for Greenpeace in the early 1990s, and has campaigned on a broad range of issues ranging from ozone depletion and climate change to toxics, oceans, and forests. For several years she was based in Anchorage, Alaska, where she focused on the impacts of climate change in the Arctic and worked to stop oil companies from drilling in what they viewed as the "new frontier" for oil exploration. Melanie recently moved to Berkeley, California, to focus on the issue of plastic pollution, bringing years of effective campaign experience to this critical issue. In addition to her issue-based efforts, Melanie has logged many miles on Greenpeace ships, including expeditions to the Arctic, Antarctica, and the Marshall Islands.
John Hite, Policy Analyst, Conservation Law Foundation Zero Waste Project
John Hite is a policy analyst with the Zero Waste Project at the Conservation Law Foundation. CLF is a nonprofit, member-supported, regional environmental organization working to conserve natural resources, protect public health, and promote thriving communities in the New England region with an office. CLF’s Zero Waste Project aims to protect the regions’ communities from the dangers posed by landfills and incinerators, support the development of a circular economy, and reduce unsafe and unsustainable plastic use and waste disposal.
Based out of Boston, John acts as a regional Zero Waste resource for municipalities and citizen groups in New England, while collaborating on the development and implementation of innovative waste management programs. He is also an advocate for the Zero Waste Project’s legislative priorities in Maine and Massachusetts, including statewide bans on single use plastics.
Over the past two years, John has collaborated with legislators, advocates, and municipal leaders in both states to develop and advance extended producer responsibility (EPR) laws for packaging. His research and expertise have placed CLF at the forefront of the growing movement to require corporate accountability for waste and move New England towards a circular economy. In coalition with partners like the Natural Resources Council of Maine, CLF aided Maine legislators, the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, local municipalities, and industry representatives in crafting a first-of-its kind EPR proposal, which drew national attention as the furthest advanced EPR for packaging legislation in the country.