Valerie Meadows Homeowners

Session: Mr. Smith goes to City Hall

Council Member, City of Modesto

Session: Mr. Smith goes to City Hall

Capay Valley Grown Growers and Partners

Session: Planting your own Grassroots

Web Content Editor, Norcalblogs.com (Chico Enterprise Record

Session: Ink, Pixels and the Remote

Executive Director, Planning & Conservation League

Session: Luncheon Speaker

Big Chico Creek Watershed Alliance

Susan Strachan holds a B.A. in Economics from the University of Virginia and an M.A. in Geography: Environmental Planning and Resource Management from San Francisco State University. She has worked in land use planning and environmental management for 20 years. For the California Coastal Commission, she served in both technical and policy capacities, including enforcement, geotechnical review, land use planning and permitting, and nonpoint source pollution planning. She has worked for a land trust and a watershed group as executive director and an environmental consulting firm doing stormwater planning, grant administration and grant proposal writing. A trained facilitator, she co-facilitated a technical advisory committee for wetlands and riparian habitat management for the State Water Resources Control Board and has facilitated strategic planning efforts. In her current position with the CSU, Chico College of Engineering, she manages externally funded environmental projects. A graduate of the Great Valley Center Institute for the Development of Emerging Area Leaders, she sits on the Board of Directors of the Big Chico Creek Watershed Alliance. A resident of Chico, she enjoys downhill skiing, biking and riding horses in Bidwell Park with her two sons and husband.

Session: Planting your own Grassroots

Butte County Sustainable Communities Coalition

Co-organizer of the South Butte Smart Growth and Sustainable Communities, Farms & Businesses Coalition, Eileen Burke-Trent is also a board member and Executive Director of several not-for-profit and non-profit civic and charitable organizations, and an annual speaker at the CSUC Sustainability Conferences. In her professional and civic endeavors, Ms. Burke-Trent encourages individuals, businesses, and municipalities to plan and invest in ways that enrich the lives of citizens, employees, and business owners; increases employee retention and quality of life; and promotes practices that help improve the quality of life, health, and economies of local communities and towns.  She speaks regularly to develop citizen interest, awareness, and involvement in the creation and implementation of general plans that incorporate sustainable and smart-growth planning principles; protects agricultural lands and open spaces; and works to develop community activism and oversight.  Eileen Burke-Trent is a 25 year veteran in real property investment; a licensed stockbroker, business and individual lines insurance agent; and financial counselor with A.G. Edwards & Sons, Inc. ~ Wachovia Securities.  She also researches and promotes socially responsible and green investments in portfolio and retirement planning for individuals, businesses, and for non-profit organization investment and fund management. Eileen and her husband of 35 years Dr. Roger Trent (along with their five rescued mutts, 20 heritage hens, two swans and three goats), own an organic farm in Gridley, CA and have three college age children, two of whom are U.S. ARMY veterans. 

Session: Planting your own Grassroot

CEO, Sacramento News and Review

Jeff vonKaenel is the president and chief executive officer of the News & Review.  He has worked with alternative newspapers for over 30 years.

Jeff went to college in Santa Barbara from 1969-1973 at UC Santa Barbara.  He was involved in one of the first alternative papers in the country in the fall of 1973, The Santa Barbara News & Review, working as a reporter and advertising manager until 1979.

In 1980, Jeff took over the Chico News & Review as publisher and over the next eight years, grew the paper from the initial circulation of 9,000 to a circulation of 40,000.  The Chico paper was selected as the best weekly newspaper in California by CNPA, California Newspaper Publishers Association.  In 1989, Jeff came to Sacramento and started the Sacramento News & Review and then in 1995, took over the Reno weekly newspaper and created the Reno News & Review.

In addition to working on his own papers, Jeff also served as the president for the AAN, Association of Alternative Weeklies, for two years and has been on the board of directors for IMI, the Independent Media Institute, since 1995.

The News & Review newsweeklies have been recognized for journalistic accomplishments in their field since 1987 and have won over 150 awards, including multiple awards for general excellence, outstanding community service and editorial coverage.

Since September 11, 2001, Jeff has spent time getting to know the many religious organizations throughout the Sacramento area while putting together the annual A Call for Unity events, an evening of interfaith music, a celebration of community. Through his efforts, Jeff has attended over 80 different faith services in the Sacramento area and his fourteen year old daughter, Natasha, has attended many of these services with him.

The faith groups participating in A Call for Unity have been inspired to build upon Sacramento’s long tradition of interfaith cooperation by creating an interfaith service endeavor—Building Unity. Jeff serves on the executive board of Building Unity, a coalition of diverse religious organizations, neighborhood groups and Sacramento-area nonprofits working to repair seniors’ homes, build new homes and work with landlords and the city of Sacramento to create better, safer neighborhoods.

Jeff has been married to Deborah Redmond for 24 years and has two children with Deborah. Nick, who is now studying at UC Santa Cruz and Natasha, who is currently in high school.

Session: Ink, Pixels and the Remote