Debbie Mans, Founding Board Chair, New Jersey LCV
Debbie Mans is the founding Board Chair of New Jersey League of Conservation Voters (New Jersey LCV). During her time on the Board, Debbie Mans also served as Baykeeper and Executive Director for the Matawan-based NY/NJ Baykeeper since April 2008. Prior to joining Baykeeper, she served as Environmental and Energy Policy Advisor to then-Governor Jon S. Corzine, assisting in the development of a State Energy Master Plan charting clean energy plans through 2020. She also served as the Governor’s appointment to the State Planning Commission as the Smart Growth Ombudsman. Before working for the Governor, Mans served as Baykeeper’s Policy Director from 2002 to 2006, where she developed policies and programs to promote Baykeeper’s mission.
From 2000 to 2002, Mans worked with the Stony Brook-Millstone Watershed Association as a Policy and Outreach Specialist. In that role, Mans directed activities for a program designed to build New Jersey’s community-based watershed organizations.
Mans graduated from the University of Michigan and Vermont Law School. She is also a current member of her Borough Council.
Senator Bob Smith, Chair, Senate Environment and Energy Committee
New Jersey State Senator Bob Smith proudly represents the rights and interests of the citizens of the 17th Legislative District, a dynamic and ever changing community, which includes parts of Middlesex and Somerset Counties. Having served in the New Jersey State Legislature since 1986, first as a State Assemblyman and in 2002 as State Senator, Bob Smith is considered one of the State’s leading environmental lawmakers. Currently, Senator Smith is the Chairman of the Senate Environment and Energy Committee, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, as well as a member of the State House Commission.
Senator Smith’s legislative accomplishments include the Highlands Preservation Act, Site Remediation Reform (LSRP), Barnegat Bay cleanup, including the most stringent fertilizer law in the United States, the Recycling Enhancement Act, Electronic Waste Management Act and a host of legislation stimulating solar and alternative energy in New Jersey. Senator Smith was also the driving force behind the recently approved ballot question to insure funding for open space preservation in the Garden State in perpetuity.
Senator Smith has a long record of public service having served as Mayor of Piscataway Township from 1981-1986 and was a member of the Township Council from 1977-1981, serving as Council President and Vice President. From 1991-1992 he served as the Chairman of the Middlesex County Democratic Organization. He also served as Chairman of the New Jersey Democratic Task Force on the Environment in 1987 and was counsel to the New Jersey State Democratic Platform in both 1987 and 1989. From 1995-1996 he served as Deputy Minority Leader in the General Assembly.
Senator Bob Smith is a uniquely qualified legislator. Prior to becoming an attorney in private practice, Senator Smith was a Professor of Chemistry and Environmental Science at Middlesex County College. He holds Master’s degrees in Chemistry from the University of Scranton and Environmental Science from Rutgers University, as well as a J.D. in law from Seton Hall University. He and his wife Ellen live and work in Piscataway Township. They are parents to two grown daughters and are proud grandparents of five grandchildren.
Edward Lloyd, Professor, Columbia Law School
Edward Lloyd is the Evan M. Frankel Clinical Professor of Environmental Law at Columbia Law School. Since 2000, he has directed the Environmental Law Clinic at the Law School that represents environmental and community organizations in complex civil suits that address the ecological challenges of our time.
Governor McGreevey appointed Professor Lloyd to the New Jersey Pinelands Commission in 2002 where he has served since that time. Professor Lloyd has served as a Trustee of the Fund for New Jersey since 2004. He was the founding director of the Rutgers University Law School Environmental Law Clinic from 1985 to 2000. He is co-founder and Director of the Eastern Environmental Law Center, the sole public interest environmental law firm in New Jersey, and served on the New Jersey Supreme Court Committee on Environmental Litigation.
He is an activist and scholar with expertise in environmental legal issues and citizen suit litigation. He earned a B.A. in chemistry from Princeton and a J.D. from the University of Wisconsin.
northjersey.com, The Record, Toxic Secrets: Pollution, Evasion and Fear in North Jersey
The Record and NorthJersey.com launched in February “Toxic Secrets” - a multi-part series documenting how one of the world's biggest companies polluted a New Jersey neighborhood and then worked for decades to keep secret the extent of contamination. Record reporters spent months gathering and analyzing more than four decades of government documents to answer one question: why did toxic groundwater remain under a Pompton Lakes neighborhood almost 30 years after the polluter - DuPont - signed an agreement with the state of New Jersey to clean it up?
The documents showed how DuPont worked since the late 1970s to downplay the severity of its pollution and then spent years refusing to test homes while residents were being exposed to toxic fumes. The Record’s 16,000-word series and half-hour video documentary showed the impact the pollution has had on the neighborhood and the health of its residents. The series won the Kevin Carmody Award for Outstanding Investigative Reporting this year from the Society of Environmental Journalists.