The Sierra Club has hired one of its longtime leaders to serve as executive director as the organization seeks stability after the tumultuous ouster of its former boss, Ben Jealous.
The group’s board unanimously voted Saturday to hire Loren Blackford, who has held a variety of senior roles at the Sierra Club, as the organization’s executive director, the nonprofit announced.
The move to install Blackford — who has served as interim executive director since the board fired Jealous in August — comes after years of internal turbulence and leadership drama at the iconic environmental group.
“This is a time of rejuvenation for the Sierra Club,” Blackford said Saturday in a statement. She has been a leader at the group for nearly two decades, including serving as deputy executive director, as president and as the Sierra Club Foundation board chair.
“The challenges in front of us are daunting, but I know the Sierra Club is uniquely positioned to lead,” Blackford added. “This is not the first time we have been tested in our 133-year history. And we will meet this moment by rising together to carry our mission forward with even greater strength and clearer sense of purpose than ever before.”
The Sierra Club’s board unanimously voted in August to terminate Jealous’ employment “for cause” following “extensive evaluation of his conduct,” the group announced last month. Jealous called the move “unfortunate” and said he would fight the decision.
Earlier this year, Jealous was the subject of a sexual harassment complaint, a person familiar with the details of the complaint told POLITICO’s E&E News. The Sierra Club has not publicly disclosed the details about the cause for firing Jealous.
Jealous, the former head of the NAACP and the Sierra Club’s first Black leader, said he faced discrimination and a campaign against him during his time leading the group.
Jealous took the helm of the group in early 2023 following the resignation of Michael Brune, who led the Sierra Club from 2010 until 2021. Brune’s resignation followed another rocky stretch for the green group that included calls for increased diversity and staff complaints about workplace problems.
Blackford, the group’s eighth executive director, is the first female to assume the job, the Sierra Club announced.
Ramón Cruz, former Sierra Club president, called Blackford a leader who can “bring stability to an organization” that’s faced “difficult moments in the last few years.”
With dozens of chapters around the country, millions of members and thousands of volunteer leaders, “it’s not an easy organization” to manage, Cruz said in an interview Monday. But Blackford has been there for a long time, has held a variety of top positions and is “very well known in the donor community,” he said.
Cruz has “a lot of respect for her and her leadership,” he said of Blackford. “She knows the difficult decisions that need to happen. At the same time, she tries to bring everybody together.”
Blackford “brings significant experience and a deep commitment to the movement as a leader on staff and as a volunteer,” Sierra Club President Patrick Murphy said in a statement.
“She knows our opportunities, our challenges, and our mission by heart. And we are all fortunate that she is working in partnership with our leadership team, which brings decades of experience and deep fidelity to our mission and to our organization,” Murphy said.
During Jealous’ tenure, he oversaw several rounds of staff layoffs and fought with the Sierra Club’s employee union.
“Progressive Workers Union is eager to continue to rebuild trust with Sierra Club management and the Board of Directors under Blackford’s leadership,” Dylan Plummer, representative with the Sierra Club unit of the Progressive Workers Union, said in a statement.
“It has never been more clear that if the Sierra Club is to be successful in standing up to the Trump Administration, protecting our environment and defending our democracy, a strong collaborative relationship between the Executive Director and the union is critical,” Plummer added. “While there is still a long way to go to repair the damage caused over the past few years, we are optimistic that the organization is heading in the right direction.”
