Biography
Seaford, NY
Program Coordinator,
Citizen’s Campaign for the Environment
Tara Bono has a Master’s Degree in Public Affairs from Baruch College in New York and is Program Coordinator at Citizen’s Campaign for the Environment (CCE). Her responsibilities include representing CCE at public hearings, community events, lobbying, coalition meetings; researching and drafting material for legislative memoranda, white papers, fact sheets, testimony, petitions and training materials; analysis of environmental impact statements and legislation; participation in development of campaigns with the Executive Director and CCE program team; and monitoring local media and developing media coverage of CCE’s. Climate Change &Energy Policy one of CCE’s main programs, works to advance renewable energy, energy efficiency, and climate change legislation at all levels.
She also worked on CCE’s “Fix LIPA” campaign to push the Long Island utility company to pursue a cleaner, safer, energy future that included solar energy, offshore wind, and energy efficiency. Getting the NYS Solar Jobs Act enacted is part of the focus of her job and she recently met state Senators and Assembly members to push for its approval. The legislation has failed in past years, but thanks to CCE’s campaign and her continued efforts the bill is moving through various committees and she is committed to continue to work tirelessly to ensure that it passes through the committees, is adopted, and signed by the Governor.
She would like to be part of the Climate Change Professional Fellow project because she feels it would be invaluable to learn how other professionals with similar challenges have dealt with them and their ideas on how to overcome opposition. She also wants to learn how to meet the challenge of advancing renewable energy projects in the face of opposition from oil and gas industries.
She believes one of the most important areas of climate change is decreasing consumption; electricity, home heating oil and gasoline and also consumer products. We are known as a “throw away” society, and it important to change our consumer culture and advance reduce, reuse, and recycling efforts. She has personally faced the extreme opposition in passing legislation to decrease our consumption of plastic, and in mandating corporate responsibility for e-waste recycling and recognizes that her region (Northeast) of the U.S. lags behind other states in its use of renewable energy.