Mayor Bill de Blasio appointed Nilda Mesa as director of New York City's new office of sustainability. She will oversee the administration's environmental and sustainability initiatives, de Blasio said in a Dec. 4 statement. She is now the director at the mayor's office of environmental coordination.
Mesa brings with her extensive experience at the local, state, and federal levels of government, and in both the public and private sector. She helped lead implementation of an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and One City, Built to Last¸ the mayor's sweeping green buildings plan. De Blasio later in the day was expected to sign legislation to formally commit to the so-called 80x50. That would make New York the largest city in the world to do so, said the mayor.
Previously, Mesa served at Columbia University as the assistant vice president of environmental stewardship from 2006 to 2012, and as the chief administrative officer and associate dean of administrative affairs at its graduate school of journalism from 2012 to 2013.
