Preparing communities to heal and sustain urban ecosystems.

Organization: TreePeople/Functioning Community Forests
Field of Work: Environment
Location: Beverly Hills, California
Year Elected: 2008
Fellow Type: Fellow

Andy Lipkis started TreePeople at the age of fifteen after a life-changing summer camp experience replenishing a forest that was dying from pollution. He brought his environmental passion home to Los Angeles, galvanizing teens and neighborhood groups to not only plant trees, but to become citizen foresters, taking responsibility for the forests they plant and helping them to thrive. The TreePeople movement has spread worldwide, and now Andy is focused on Functioning Community Forests (FCF). By taking a holistic approach to managing urban ecosystems, FCF is helping to retrofit cities for sustainability. Citizens, policymakers, public agencies and community organizations all play a role in transforming cities into generators of health, resiliency and abundance. By integrating urban forestry and watershed management, and treating cities as forests that work in concert with nature’s cycles, FCF focuses on healing the environment in practical ways. Andy’s mission is to help individuals, families and institutions see that how we deal with water, waste, energy and spending have consequences on our economy, the crime rate, social development and our quality of life. FCF is helping to create livable green communities, as well as thousands of skilled green-collar jobs for the under-employed that will have lasting economic impact.