Sierra Club staff says boss's ouster is ‘a relief'

E&E News

a day ago

Ben Jealous is officially out as the Sierra Club's boss after two turbulent years marked by infighting and drama inside the green group.
Employees inside the nonprofit welcomed the board of directors' decision to fire Jealous on Monday as staffers said they hope the organization will refocus on its mission to protect the environment as the group gears up for several more years of fighting the Trump administration's policies.
'It's a relief to be able to move on from a pretty awful chapter in the organization's history,' said one Sierra Club employee granted anonymity to discuss internal dynamics.
Advertisement
Sierra Club's board of directors on Monday 'unanimously voted to terminate Ben Jealous' employment for cause,' Patrick Murphy, president of the Sierra Club board of directors, told staff Monday evening in an email. 'This was not a decision we took lightly.'
'It is disheartening, unfortunate, but perhaps not surprising that the board has chosen an adversarial course that the facts so clearly cannot support,' Jealous said Tuesday in a statement. 'I have begun the process under my contract to fight this decision. I am confident that we will prevail.'
Jealous has retained the Los Angeles-based civil rights and employment firm Hadsell Stormer Renick & Dai, LLP to represent him, one of the firm's lawyers said Tuesday in an email.
'The Board of Directors voted unanimously to remove Mr. Jealous from the Sierra Club upon learning that he engaged in conduct that constitutes cause under his employment agreement,' Sierra Club spokesperson Jonathon Berman said Tuesday in a statement responding to Jealous. 'The decision was not taken lightly, and the entire Board determined that it had no other option than to separate from him in order to protect the organization, its employees, its values, and its mission.'
Jealous, Berman added, 'had an opportunity for a dignified exit and we are disheartened to see he has instead unfortunately chosen an adversarial course. Mr. Jealous' challenge to the Board's unanimous cause determination has no merit. We are confident that Mr. Jealous will not prevail in any forum, whether public or private.'
Sierra Club did not elaborate on the reason for firing its executive director.
The board's vote followed an 'extensive evaluation' of Jealous' conduct, Berman said in a statement Monday. 'The Sierra Club will continue to look into concerns raised regarding misconduct irrespective of who they are raised against in furtherance of our policies, the law, and our mission.'
'Lack of leadership'
Sierra Club employees have been openly critical of Jealous' leadership since his early days on the job.
Many staffers at first praised the hire of the group's first Black executive director, who came with nonprofit experience as the former leader of the NAACP and People for the American Way. He replaced Michael Brune, who resigned in 2021 amid what Brune at the time referred to as a 'cultural transformation and fight for justice inside the Sierra Club.'
But staff criticism mounted soon after Jealous started.
Jealous announced layoffs across the organization as one of his early moves, including getting rid of the group's entire equity team. Jealous said he had inherited a budget deficit and a mandate to improve the group's finances.
Staffers complained about how Jealous handled those and subsequent layoffs and about how he openly criticized the group's staff union. Employees also accused Jealous of surrounding himself with an insular senior team and failing to promote open communication with staff.
'The biggest problem was his lack of leadership,' said another Sierra Club employee. 'He did not communicate a vision. The strategies and tactics and visions would change constantly and feel incredibly out of touch with the organization we were.'
Under Jealous, that person said, there was a 'constant turnover of executive staff.' Employees 'never knew who was running the organization.'
That employee thinks the 133-year-old group will rebound quickly after years of drama. 'I'm just hoping to get back in the game,' that person said. 'It would have been nice to be at our peak at this moment of a threat.'
There's a general atmosphere among employees of 'cautious optimism,' said the first Sierra Club employee. 'Folks are really eager to have some stability with leadership.'
'Governing something like this is difficult'
The sprawling green group, with a San Francisco-based national office and chapters in all 50 states, has long been tough to manage effectively, said one former Sierra Club employee who was granted anonymity to discuss internal dynamics.
'There's a lot of policy tension between the national office and the state chapters,' that person said. 'Governing something like this is difficult.'
But, said the former employee, that structure also makes the group effective. The group is also organized as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit rather than a 501(c)(3) charity under the tax code, which gives it more leeway than other groups to get involved in politics.
Angelle Bradford Rosenberg, chair and manager of the Sierra Club Delta Chapter, praised Jealous' leadership of the group and his engagement with her chapter.
'I found Ben's leadership and personality to be bold, dynamic, and to meet the moment we were in, which I believe came with a lot of surprises for him,' she said Tuesday in an email.
'Ben had big decisions to make and intra-Club dynamics to navigate and contend with on day one,' she added. 'Ben was focused on chapters, on people, on expanding the 'uncomfortable coalition,' on justice, and returning to our conservation and outings roots, the roots that brought people together. But he was also super honest and real, and I admired that.'
Jealous said Tuesday that he remains 'proud of all that we have accomplished in my time leading the Sierra Club, an organization that helped shape me as a young outdoorsman and environmental activist. The board and I were able to create the most diverse leadership team in the club's history, strengthen a weak financial base, craft a progressive union contract, dramatically increase chapter directors in red states, and increase our advocacy capacity by building a stronger field department.'
He hopes, he said, that the organization 'will continue this vital work and lead the fight we began on Election Night to stand up to the Trump administration's dismantling of historic climate and environmental protections and attacks on our wild places.'
Murphy, president of the group's board, told staff that 'this is a critical moment' for the Sierra Club.
'This is not the first time we have been tested over our 133 year history,' Murphy wrote. 'We will once again rise to overcome the challenges the country faces, and carry our mission forward with even greater strength and clearer sense of purpose than ever before.'