Right leadership, right time: CLF's new board chair ready for challenges, opportunities ahead.

PositionCOVER STORY - Conservation Law Foundation of New England's Sara Molyneaux

On the night of November 13, 2012, CLF celebrated its new board chair. In a ballroom in a downtown Boston hotel, filled with CLF staff and board members, Michael Moskow, who had served expertly as CLFs Board Chair for 12 years, officially handed the reins over to Sara Molyneaux. John Kassel, CLF President, addressed the crowd by saying, "In order to succeed, CLF needs a strong movement behind it, and a strong board chair leading it. I am confident that we have that leader in Sara, and I know that our staff and board share that confidence."

CLF has been immensely fortunate in this respect: we have always found the right board chair at the right time. This was certainly true in the beginning: our first chairmen-Hunnewell, Waldron, Ells, and Conors-were dedicated leaders with a vision, long before our movement became the movement it is today. They laid the strong roots from which CLF has flourished in the decades since.

Fourteen years after our first board chair came Frank Sargent, former Governor of Massachusetts, who opened many doors for CLF (see sidebar). Then came Francis W. Hatch, former MA State Representative and environmental advocate, after whom the Wetland Protections Act is named, and who served CLF passionately for a decade. He was followed by Charlie Cabot Jr., an immensely warm and dedicated board chair. Most recently, Michael Moskow put CLF on stable footing. In 1992, with the real estate market in decline, and with CLF's old office space growing both worn and small, Michael located and recommended CLF purchase 62 Summer St and an adjoining property. The stability this has lent to CLF over the decades cannot be overstated. And yet he remains concerned about our environment, our region, and our globe. "My greatest concern for the future is global warming," Michael says. As a gardener, he has seen the changes. "Small changes when seen in my garden," he says, "but changes nonetheless."

Michael is right to be worried: the challenges we face as a region, and as a people, are immense. So too are the challenges that we face as a movement significant. "We need to think differently, to work with new partners, and to forge a creative, evidence-based path forward," says CLF President John Kassel. "In CLFs pick of Sara Molyneaux as our next board chair, we are confident that we have yet again found the right leader, at...

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