As the Director of the Prince George’s County Department of the Environment, Adam leads a Department that is responsible for taking innovative and sustainable approaches to our environmental challenges and oversees a new organics composting program; a zero waste, resource recovery approach to our waste stream; cost saving public-private partnerships (P3) for clean water creating green infrastructure and jobs; increased partnerships to boost animal adoptions, pet foster families and low cost vet services and major investments in renewable energy generation like solar farms and electric charging stations.

Previously Adam launched and managed the “CountyStat” office for the County Executive Rushern L. Baker, III. He also served as Deputy Chief of Staff to Lieutenant Governor Anthony Brown and as a three-term Mayor of Edmonston, Maryland.

Jeff Hughes is a faculty member at the School of Government and the Director of the Environmental Finance Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Jeff has more than 25 years of experience as a water researcher, policy analyst, educator, consultant, and practitioner. Jeff is a member of the American Water Works Association and the Council of Infrastructure Financing Authorities. He serves on the Finance Committee for the Water Research Foundation and the EPA Environmental Financial Advisory Board. He received a master’s degree from the University of North Carolina and a bachelor’s degree from Duke.

Erik Michelsen is currently the Administrator of Anne Arundel County’s Watershed Protection and Restoration Program and is charged with managing its restoration effort to clean up the County’s waterways and satisfy its Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4) and Chesapeake Bay TMDL requirements.

Paul J. Carroll, the Director of Civic Engagement for the City of Newport, RI, has 30 years of local, regional, national and global strategic private/public entrepreneurial leadership experience. He develops, implements and manages innovative public/private sustainable economic development initiatives; entrepreneur empowerment/community regeneration/capacity building efforts; streamlining the public sector point of contact for planning/approval processes; foreign market access programs (investments, strategic alliances and market penetration); and organizational/business creation/change management efforts. He gained this background and a strong network of global public, private and non-profit/academic sector professional associates by working with governments, organizations, locales, small-medium sized enterprises (SMEs), multinational enterprises and universities in the United States, United Kingdom, China, Ireland, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and India.