Energy Justice Panel: Communities Leading the Transition
Join Young Professionals in Energy SF Bay Area for an evening of conversation with local organizers, advocates, and community leaders advancing energy justice for local communities. For decades, low-income communities and communities of color across the Bay Area have disproportionately faced the harms of pollution, environmental degradation, and inequitable energy infrastructure.
Our panelists will share firsthand experiences from their work and communities, highlighting both the challenges and the progress being made toward a more just and sustainable future. Attendees will leave with a deeper understanding of the intersection of energy, equity, and climate justice — and with tangible ways to support the movement for clean, healthy, and affordable environments for all.
Our panelists
Jessica Tovar, Local Clean Energy Alliance
Marisa Villarreal, GRID Alternatives
Yolanda Sanchez, Focus Forward EnviroHealth LLC. ex-EPA
Emi Yoko-Young, Reclaim Our Power Utility Justice Campaign
Moderator
Igor Tregub, Berkeley City Council/Reimagine Power
Schedule
6:00 - 6:30 Mingling + Introductions
6:30 - 7:30 Panel
7:30 - 8:30 Networking + Refreshments
Thank you to our sponsors!
This event is hosted by GRID Alternatives and co-sponsored by the United Nations Association East Bay Chapter.
Transportation
Public Transit: The GRID Alternatives office is accessible from MacArthur BART via AC Transit. From MacArthur Station, attendees can take the 72 or 72M bus toward Jack London Square and exit near San Pablo Ave. The office is also accessible via the Emery Go-Round Hollis Line, which connects to MacArthur BART and stops nearby in West Oakland/Emeryville.
Driving: Street parking is available in the surrounding neighborhood.
Attendees consent to the use and distribution of the attendee’s image in future Young Professionals in Energy promotional emails and materials.
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Panelist bios:
Jessica Guadalupe Tovar is the Executive Director of the Local Clean Energy Alliance, based in the San Francisco Bay Area. She grew up in housing projects near an industrial pollution corridor in East Los Angeles. The experience of cancer in her family led her to focus on preventing and reducing local industrial pollution and to advocate for policies to protect vulnerable communities. Jessica has worked for over 20 years as an environmental justice and climate organizer in a variety of urban, rural, and indigenous communities throughout California and Arizona. Her focus is mentoring young organizers and building new leadership for energy democracy to fight for a just transition and bring, “Clean Power to the People!”
Jessica started as a youth with the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative in 2003, working with organizations across the U.S. on issues of climate justice. Since then she has battled various polluting corporations; PG&E’s gas fired power plant in Bayview Hunterspoint, the Richmond Chevron Oil Refinery and many others.
She currently promotes equity in clean energy as the coordinator of the East Bay Clean Power Alliance, which has advanced local clean energy solutions by establishing a Community Choice program; Ava Community Energy, formerly known as East Bay Community Energy, a public energy services provider agency that is providing electricity for ~2.1 million people in Alameda County and San Joaquin county cities; Tracy and soon Stockton and Lathrop, CA. This keeps electricity revenues local, by replacing PG&E in providing electricity. Since June 2019, we have advocated for Ava Community Energy to provide millions in funding and resources towards advancing clean energy programs like energy efficiency, electrification, community innovation grant funding and other equitable priorities for environmental justice communities. We advanced a policy in collaboration with labor for Ava Community Energy to jumpstart a just transition to true clean energy solutions with a Local Development Business Plan--A roadmap for a Green New Deal for communities throughout Alameda and San Joaquin county cities.
Marisa Villarreal (she/her) was born into a large, multicultural Mexican American family in Los Angeles, shaped by matriarchs who nurtured community through family, spirituality, and food — an upbringing that made her the nurturer, connector, and cross-pollinator she is today. For over 15 years, she has built and managed programs at the intersection of climate resilience, equity, and social justice. She currently serves as a Program Director at GRID Alternatives, advancing economic and environmental justice through renewable energy jobs and technology. Marisa also co-facilitates with the organization YES!, bringing environmental changemakers together through immersive retreats — called "jams" — at the intersection of inner/personal work, relational/interpersonal healing, and systemic change. Marisa holds a Master's from the Bren School of Environmental Science & Management and a Bachelor's in Biology from Wellesley College. She’s called Oakland home for over a decade, where she finds joy in cooking big meals for friends, surfing, and dance parties.
Yolanda Anita Sanchez, MS, MPA is an environmental health scientist and public participation practitioner who specializes in environmental cleanup communications and community engagement. Yolanda spent over 15 years in public service at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as a Community Involvement Specialist with the Superfund (hazardous waste cleanup) program and as a Senior Advisor on Community Engagement at the Office of Environmental Justice. She strived for EPA’s decisions to be inclusive of community concerns and expectations within challenging constraints of the federal government. In addition, she focused on building knowledge, skills, and abilities in foundational principles of public participation.
After being DOGE ’ed in 2025, Yolanda pivoted herself to opening an independent consulting practice and founded Focus Forward EnviroHealth LLC.
A steadfast advocate for environmental justice, Yolanda is dedicated to building healthy, just communities through community-driven solutions, shared decision-making, and courageous leadership. She is interested in opening STEM pathways, focusing on the next generation of women of color leaders in the environmental sector.
Emi currently serves as the Policy Organizer for the Reclaim Our Power: Utility Justice Campaign, leveraging over a decade of experience working at the intersection of policy and people in movement organizing spaces. Emi sees her role as bridging the divide between the needs that communities have expressed and the technical resources and policy practitioners in the environmental, health equity, and racial justice space. In her work at Reclaim Our Power, Emi co-facilitates the campaign’s People’s Policy Workshops, which aim to center frontline community members in the ideation, creation, passage, implementation, and evaluation of the policy process, creating a bottom-up planning process that centers resident voices at every step. She believes that movement building will bring us closer to the world we envision, and that by elevating everybody’s strengths we can build the solutions that lead to a safe, affordable, and reliable energy future. Emi is committed to fighting for our collective liberation through multiracial solidarity, a regenerative economy, and organizing for the abolition of harmful institutions and a future of self-determination.
Moderator
Igor Tregub serves on the Berkeley City Council, proudly representing the Downtown, Central, and North Shattuck Berkeley communities, following a 20+ year career of public service at all levels of government, including eight years on the Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board, twelve local commission appointments, and oversight of a multimillion-dollar budget at the U.S. Department of Energy. He also chairs the Ava Community Energy Board’s Marketing, Regulatory, and Legislation Committee and serves on the California League of Cities Environmental Quality Committee.
Outside of his public service roles, Igor is the Strategic Partnerships Director/Senior Policy Advisor at Reimagine Power, a women-owned boutique consultancy providing legislative and regulatory advocacy for renewable energy solutions benefitting renters, schools, and disadvantaged communities and serves on the Sierra Club National Board.
Igor holds an M.A. in Public Leadership from the University of San Francisco, M.S in Engineering Management from Duke University, and a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering/B.A. in Political Science from UC Berkeley.