EPA Names Director for Its Chesapeake Bay Program – Maryland Matters

A veteran authorities scientist and meteorologist is poised to turn out to be director of the U.S. Environmental Safety Company’s Chesapeake Bay Program, which oversees federal and regional Bay environmental monitoring and cleanup efforts.

The EPA introduced Thursday that Dr. Kandis Boyd will take over as director of this system on Monday. She’ll be the primary particular person of coloration to carry a management place on authorities Chesapeake Bay coverage — and the primary everlasting head of that EPA workplace in over a yr.

“I’m thrilled to have Kandis be a part of our management crew as we’re stepping up restoration efforts for the Bay within the face of rising challenges,” stated EPA Mid-Atlantic Regional Administrator Adam Ortiz — a former state and native environmental official in Maryland. “Her expertise as a strategic chief within the sciences and success partaking various communities and youth will assist take the Bay effort to a brand new stage as we give attention to local weather change and weak communities.”

In response to the EPA, Boyd has practically 30 years of expertise main, instructing, advising and mentoring college students and early profession fanatics in environmental and atmospheric science. The primary African-American lady to obtain an undergraduate diploma in Meteorology from Iowa State College, Boyd served most lately as strategic advisor for the Workplace of Fairness and Civil Rights on the Nationwide Science Basis (NSF). That place included serving as the primary deputy division director of the NSF Division of Grants and Agreements, the place she offered oversight and route for 35 staffers, a $5 billion price range, and greater than 12,000 new grants a yr.

Dr. Kandis Boyd, the brand new director of EPA’s Chesapeake Bay Program.

Boyd spent most of her profession on the Nationwide Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Throughout Hurricane Katrina, she delivered around-the-clock on-site meteorological forecasts in the course of the 2005 landfall of that hurricane. She served because the designated federal officer for the third Nationwide Local weather Evaluation Improvement Advisory Committee, co-chaired the primary NOAA Environmental Modeling Strategic Plan, served as an adviser for NOAA’s $2 billion satellite tv for pc portfolio, and was each appearing director and deputy director of the NOAA Climate Program Workplace.

EPA’s Chesapeake Bay Program coordinates actions and implements methods for assembly the restoration objectives of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, which covers 64,000 sq. miles throughout New York, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia.

“I’m extraordinarily humbled and excited to work with a forward-focused crew of specialists and consultants to advance the continued work of EPA and the Chesapeake Bay companions,” Boyd stated. “I’m able to dive in and get to work on essentially the most urgent issues earlier than us.”

The final everlasting head of the Chesapeake Bay program was Dana Aunkst, who served from December 2018 to March 2021. Aunkst was a longtime official with the Pennsylvania Division of Environmental Safety earlier than taking the EPA job. He served at a time when the Trump administration was often attempting to chop Bay cleanup packages and was sued by states like Maryland for not doing sufficient to carry different states accountable for his or her air pollution discount commitments.

Hillary Falk, president of the Chesapeake Bay Basis, which has been a plaintiff in a few of these lawsuits, praised Boyd’s choice.

“Many challenges stay, time is working brief, and local weather change threatens to reverse the progress we’ve made,” she stated. “The excellent news is we even have unprecedented new funding for the Chesapeake Bay Program and federal farm conservation packages that may assist us make up floor shortly. Dr. Boyd has the management abilities to assist coordinate the efforts of the a number of federal companies that play a big position in Bay restoration, the data to make sure we’re guided by the very best science, and the non-public dedication to make sure that weak communities aren’t left behind.”