Event Agenda: What You Can Expect

  • Networking Reception
  • Electric Vehicles Expo
  • Food truck (by The Vegan Hood Chefs)
  • Indigenous Flora of Cooley Landing Learning Station (by Grassroots Ecology)
  • Induction Cooking Demo (with Acterra’s Chef-in-Residence Kelvin Briggs)
  • Youth Curriculum Activity (by Acterra’s Youth Program Manager, Lily de la Espriella)
  • Keynote Speaker: Davina Hurt (Chair of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District)
  • Closing Ceremony: Dave Pine (, Supervisor of San Mateo County District 1)
  • Presentation of the 2024 Champions of Promise Awards
  • Overview of Acterra’s Community-Based Programs
  • Youth Poet

Master of Ceremony

Katie Rueff
Katie Rueff is a first-year at Cornell studying American and Africana Studies. A co-coordinator for Acterra's youth ASAP Program, Katie has been involved in Bay Area climate action for the past five years. In high school, she co-founded the Palo Alto Student Climate Coalition, where she collaborated with the city council and local nonprofits on critical electrification goals. Outside of that, she has co-organized many sustainability events, including the 2023 Menlo Atherton Earth Day Festival with over two thousand attendees. Now, as a 2022 Champion of Promise recipient, she is honored to be returning to emcee this year's rendition.

The Keynote Speakers

Davina Rayleen Hurt
Davina Hurt is an attorney, elected official, former mayor of the City of Belmont, board director on the California Air Resources Board, commissioner of Silicon Valley Clean Water and chair of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District as well as chair of the Cities Counties Association of Government of San Mateo County. She holds deep appreciation for non-profits as an advisory council member, past board president of Samaritan House, board member of the Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County and council member for Santa Clara University Government Ethics Council at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. Davina is an avid cook and AI enthusiast, who enjoys oil painting and travel.
Dave Pine
As a board member for the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC), the SF Bay Restoration Authority, and the San Francisquito Creek Joint Powers Authority, Supervisor Pine has worked extensively on the intersecting issues of flood control, sea level rise and tidal land restoration. He is also the founding chair of the Peninsula Clean Energy Authority, led efforts to establish the San Mateo County LGBTQ+ Commission (the first of its kind in the state) and has championed affordable and accessible childcare through his role as Co-Chair of the Child Care Partnership Council and Build Up San Mateo County, helping to secure more than $11 million in emergency funding to support childcare & early learning centers, summer enrichment programs and learning hubs.
Youth Poet: Serafina Mackintosh
Serafina is a freshman at Oakland School for the Arts. She absolutely adores poetry and the way that it lets her express herself. Serafina has been part of many protests and has volunteered with Friends of Sausal Creek and in Joaquin Miller park. She loves to use poetry to learn more about herself and explore the world around her. Serafina is very excited to see what happens throughout her writing journey as she learns more about how she experiences writing.

Champions of Promise 2024

Charlene C. Nijmeh
Charlene C. Nijmeh
Charlene C. Nijmeh chairs the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, advocating for the preservation of their ancestral lineage in the San Francisco Bay Region since childhood. In 2018, she became Chairwoman, inheriting a commitment to environmental stewardship from her mother. She founded 7th Generation Recycling in 2008 before transitioning to nonprofit work focused on recycling education. Through the Green Education Foundation, she has developed international partnerships diverting 60 million lbs. of textile waste annually. Now, she's expanding textile recycling efforts into Mexico. Under her leadership, the tribe is partnering on a solar panel manufacturing plant and innovative plastic recycling initiatives. Charlene also leads the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe Inc. and the Muwekma Ohlone Preservation Foundation, dedicated to land preservation and cultural heritage.
Finn Does
Finn Does
is a senior in high school and a youth climate justice, environ(mental) health, and queer eco-justice organizer focused on building youth inclusion in the climate space through designing accessible skillshares and reimagining climate communications through the principles of intersectional environmentalism. In addition to Co-Chairing the Bay Area Youth Climate Summit—a local entirely youth-led climate education, advocacy, and activism organization—he co-leads a research cohort at the University of California Riverside examining how intersectionality shapes youths' climate emotions and in turn their activism.
Plant-Based Advocates
Plant-Based Advocates
Plant-Based Advocates is accelerating the shift to a plant-based diet, lifestyle, and food system by empowering communities to take grassroots action. They work to educate people at the local level about the many benefits of a plant-based diet and lifestyle, including improving their health, repairing the environment, eliminating cruelty to animals, and working toward social justice.Some of their activities include hosting monthly speakers in collaboration with the Los Gatos Library; screening documentaries with discussion panels; tabling and community outreach; writing articles for local newspapers and publications; and working with schools to increase their plant-based offerings. They also had a successful program in the past creating healthful plant-based lunches for underserved people, serving over 500 meals to unhoused residents throughout the Bay Area.
Shanelle Scales-Preston
Shanelle Scales-Preston
Shanelle Scales-Preston was elected to the Pittsburg City Council in 2018 and served as Mayor 2023. Her priorities have been to strengthen youth programs and improve city services to create a strong and vibrant community. She is Chair of the Board for MCE, the local electricity provider, is Chair of TransPlan which coordinates regional transportation projects and transit services in East County and is President of the League of California Cities East Bay Division. Her community service started in the federal government more than twenty years ago where she learned to effectively advocate for residents and local governments navigating difficult bureaucracies and fix problems. Shanelle earned her degree from California State University East Bay. She and her husband are raising their two sons in Pittsburg.

Thank you to our Sponsors

Promise Level

Peter and Melanie Cross

Partner Level

Bay Area Air Quality Management District
Star One Credit Union

Benefactor Level

Peninsula Clean Energy

Community Level

Grassroots Ecology
Arthur Keller

Supporter Level

City of Hayward

Sponsorships Available

Sponsors of Promise to Our Planet, Acterra’s single biggest community-building event of the year, will enjoy a variety of benefits. Visit our Sponsorships Page and be a part of this one-of-a-kind climate action fundraiser. For questions, contact Michelle Kim at 408.412.9384 or development@acterra.org.

Become a Sponsor