Leadership Spotlight: Mark Conway, Baltimore City Councilmember and Executive VP at Chesapeake Conservancy

This interview is part of a series of blog posts highlighting prominent members of the Smart Surfaces Coalition team. Over the coming months, we will publish interviews with new Coalition Steering Committee members as they talk about their work, our environment and the Smart Surfaces mission.

Mark Conway is the Baltimore City District 4 City Councilmember as well as the Executive Vice-President of the Chesapeake Conservancy. He oversees the Conservancy’s high quality mapping data used for conservation efforts in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Prior to running for Baltimore City Council, Mark worked in the Baltimore Mayor’s office and the EPA while pursuing his Master’s. Mark grew up in the Bronx, NY and has a masters in Public Policy and a Bachelor’s Degree in Government and Politics and Philosophy from the University of Maryland. Mark lives with his family in Baltimore and is a proud father to his two daughters.

This interview was conducted by Amanda Wager (AW) and Sophie Nichols (SN), Research Analyst Interns with Smart Surfaces Coalition.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

AW: When did you first learn about climate change, and what inspired you to take action?

MC: I first learned about climate change freshman year of college. So, I went to the University of Maryland. Our first year book was a book called The Ravaging Tide by Mike Tidwell. I am a huge reader and a nerd. So I read the book which most people don’t do. I was taken by the perspective and the insight Mike had put into it. It was something I wanted to learn more about. I started to get really involved with issues surrounding change and I joined Clean Energy for UMD and joined their board, and started working to do what I could as a student on campus around climate change, specifically around clean energy. I ended up getting an internship with the Chesapeake Climate Action Network which Mike Tidwell started and ran so I had an opportunity to work with Mike Tidwell and see some of the work they were doing trying to push change at the local and federal level.

AW: So you are currently the Executive Vice-President of the Chesapeake Conservancy, a non-profit organization in Maryland that works to conserve wildlife in the Chesapeake Bay. Can you tell us a bit more about the Chesapeake’s work?

MC: We are a conservation organization and we do conservation work within the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Our scope goes as far as New York, as far west as West Virginia, and as far south as Virginia. We work to preserve the natural beauty and the benefits of the Bay. Even more, we try to connect people to the Bay by creating opportunities for folks to get out into the wild, into the water, and experience the Chesapeake Bay and the watershed from their own perspective. I came on coming up on a year ago and the work I’ve been doing is around helping us think strategically about the impact we want to have as an organization. We do a lot of conservation work, but a lot of our work very specifically is informed and approved by the CIC. So the CIC uses data analytics and mapping to be precise about the conservation impacts we want to have and conservation practices and find ways to be smart about conservation work in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. We are lucky to be on the cutting edge and are really excited to work with this team. We as an organization do a really good job about being thoughtful of the limited resources, the limited time, and the impact we can have on only so much land. We work very closely with the National Parks Service to create access to the Chesapeake Bay and to tell the story of the Bay.

SN: How does the Chesapeake Conservancy’s mission and mapping technology compliment SSC’s mission of replacing dark impervious surfaces with smarter and greener technology like Solar PV, green roofs, and urban trees?

MC: I am always amazed by the capability of our team. We use high quality mapping data to get a sense of landscape, the flow of water, and as a result, the likely impact of nutrient and sediment loads into the Chesapeake Bay. We can do it at a microlevel, at the 1-meter level, which is incredibly precise. We are able to take that information and get an understanding of water flow and how land use practices have an impact on water quality. It has been a game- changer already for the conservation movement as we see our federal partners and partners in the conservation space begin to use that data to be more thoughtful and precise on where they want to spend their next dollar and how. But when we look further at the impact of climate change we realize that these are water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and climate change on the global level are issues that are intersecting. We are having more frequent storms, more turbulent storms, more water rushing into the Bay which means more nutrients. As this is happening we should be thinking about where we spend that next dollar, where we plant that next tree, what roof we paint white, what roof we decide to put solar panels on. Mixing those two perspectives can go a long way in our fight to improve the water quality in the Bay, and reduce the heat island and climate change effects in our urban areas.

SN: Why did you decide to become a civil servant and what role did climate change and environmental justice play in your decision to run for Baltimore City Council?

MC: I came out of college and went to grad school. While in grad school I worked for the EPA and did a cost-benefit analysis of cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay. I am a kid that grew up in the Bronx and understood some of the social issues that I saw. I always had this social pull. I eventually left the EPA and started working here in the Mayor’s office in Baltimore City and I got a wealth of perspective and knowledge on what it takes to make a city tick. All this happens at the local level. It’s easy to think about the President of the United States, but the person who impacts you the most everyday is your County Executive, your Mayor, or your Councilperson. That’s when I began thinking about running for office in Baltimore and eventually I took that leap. As a father of two, now is the time if we are going to do anything. I feel a huge responsibility that we do everything we can on the conservation side and the city side to make sure our city is prepared and we do what we can to mitigate the impacts and be resilient to what we know will come.

AW: What lessons have you learned as a Baltimore City Councilor that have shaped your perspective on Smart Surfaces?

MC: Being on city council and working in city government has made me take my head out of the clouds sometimes and look at the real everyday issues and realize if we can address everyday issues while addressing the issue of climate change we really hit the jackpot. The Smart Surfaces approach is really important to that endeavor because we found ways that are low-cost, or no-cost, or even profit-bearing if done correctly to address climate change. We have so many priorities that it is hard to advocate for solar panels, but if we can say that solar panels will reduce some of the public health impacts, or provide carbon neutral energy to communities that don’t have AC during the summer, those things address people’s everyday problems and still help us address climate change. We can begin to look at this as not just a global problem, but as my problem or your problem.

AW: From your perspective, what do you view as the number one challenge associated with implementing Smart Surfaces at an equitable and large scale?

MC: Money, funding is always the barrier with tight budgets. It’s tough. So, to find ways to fund initiatives is going to be I believe the key. The approach that Smart Surfaces brings is that over time the implementation will either reduce expenses or possibly fully account for and begin to bring in money... but I think that start-up capital is going to be really important, so we need to be creative about bringing capital into the picture. We always rely on government funding to tackle these issues and certainly the government is responsible and willing to step up, but I don’t think the government has quite the capacity to step up to meet the overwhelming need we have at the city, state, national or even global level. We need to find ways that create incentives to bring in private capital that will blow the door wide open for scaling Smart Surfaces. Much like the family trying to feed their family and needs a job and we can create jobs by installing solar panels on roofs, painting roofs white, or installing green roofs, whatever you like to call it, I think we can find that win-win there and also find it on the private capital side, we just need to be thoughtful on how to do it.

SN: When you close your eyes and imagine the City of Baltimore in 2050, what do you see?

MC: I imagine it will be a robust, clean city that is now attracting folks because of the innovative ways we have tackled problems. A safe city that has really pushed the ball whether it’s tree planting and green jobs. I see Baltimore being the next frontier. We have some of the best universities in the world and certainly some of the greatest opportunities for folks to grow and learn here. By 2050 I hope and I expect we will be a very different looking city. If we can take the mantle and run with it on some of these larger issues we can really show the way for other cities across the country.

SN: What is your proudest accomplishment?

MC: Becoming a father, easily hands down, the best thing ever.