Staff

Leslie G. Fields, Esq.National Director, Policy Advocacy and Legal

Leslie G. Fields, Esq. brings thirty years of federal, state, local and international environmental justice and environmental law and policy experience to the Sierra Club. She serves on the boards of the Children’s Environmental Health Network and Empower DC. She also serves on the board of Adeso African Solutions (an East African natural resources and development organization based in Nairobi, Kenya) and has been an adjunct law professor at Howard University School of Law.

Fields was appointed by President Obama to serve on the Board of Directors of the Mickey Leland Urban Air Toxics Research Center. In 2018, she received the American Bar Association SEER Dedication to Diversity and Justice Award and the Sierra Club Mike McCloskey Award. In 2021, Fields received the Gertrude R. Rush Award from the National Bar Association. Leslie Fields is a graduate of Cornell University, the Georgetown University Law Center and licensed in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the District of Columbia and the US Supreme Court.

 

Associate Director, Environmental Justice and Community Partnerships

Sharonda Williams-Tack, Esq. is the associate director for Environmental Justice and Community Partnerships at Sierra Club. Ms. Williams-Tack joined Sierra Club in 2015. She works with EJ community members and state government to ensure that environmental justice and economic justice are integrated into climate mitigation policies and clean energy initiatives. Prior to joining the Sierra Club Ms. Williams-Tack worked as environmental justice liaison at the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency.

Prior to her tenure at Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, Ms. Williams-Tack was Environmental Advocacy and Policy Coordinator at WEACT for Environmental Justice. Ms. Williams-Tack earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from University of Massachusetts and a Juris Doctorate from University of Pittsburgh School of Law.

 

Environmental Justice Organizer, Puerto Rico

Adriana Gonzalez is an environmental justice organizer with the Sierra Club in Puerto Rico. Her work includes halting the construction of a waste incinerator while promoting zero-waste solutions and the protection of the Northeast Ecological Corridor. She studied at the University of Puerto Rico Social Sciences school and majored in geography. As an activist, she has organized around the UN Climate Negotiations in Cancun, Durban, Qatar, and Paris. Locally in Puerto Rico, she has coordinated efforts to monitor leatherback turtles, to lobby for public policy such as a plastic bag ban, and to create community partnerships for sustainable development. Currently, as EJ organizer for Sierra Club, she works with a base of about 300 volunteers and 10,000 local supporters in Puerto Rico.

 

Environmental Justice Organizer, Louisiana

Darryl Malek-Wiley is a veteran environmental activist based in Louisiana. Malek-Wiley has focused his career as an environmental activist on understanding and educating the public on the threats posed by toxins and industrial pollutants in air and water. He has been employed by the Sierra Club Environmental Justice Program since 2004. In recent years, his work has centered on environmental rebuilding in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.

 

Environmental Justice Organizer, Michigan

Rhonda Anderson has been working in the Detroit area with the Sierra Club for more than 12 years, defending communities and fighting against industrial polluters in already overburdened areas. Her work has been recognized nationally, and she has received multiple Sierra Club awards including the Virginia Ferguson Award in 2013 and the Mike McClosky Award in 2015.

 

Neha Mathew-Shah International Representative for the Environmental Justice and Community Partnerships, Neha Mathew-Shah

Neha Mathew-Shah is the international representative for the Environmental Justice and Community Partnerships Program. She's currently working with grassroots groups in South Asia, as well as developing our coordination among various diasporas to connect and elevate movements and community-based efforts that are addressing issues of fossil fuel development, climate disruption, and energy justice around the world. Neha has worked at the Sierra Club since July 2012 and was previously with the International Climate and Energy Program. Neha is currently president of Progressive Workers Union (PWU), which represents over 200 professional workers across the United States and Puerto Rico.