Karen Jewett is excited to join Sustainable Tompkins as the new Director of Operations. In May she relocated to the Ithaca area (Dryden) after 20 plus years in San Francisco where she happily lived in the Haight Ashbury district. She has a broad and deep experience in community building, non-profit management and fundraising including running a touring circus in California; coordinating neighborhood performing arts events and community celebrations in Pittsburgh, PA; organizing citizens in New York City in support of their neighborhood parks; and training and supporting peace activists to help soldiers during the first war with Iraq. From 1999 to 2007 Karen worked for Cornell’s Western Regional Office: connecting Cornell alumni in the seven western states to each other and to the University. The position made it possible for her to renew friendships, travel, and visit Ithaca to see the four seasons. For the last few years she has been honing her horticultural skills at the San Francisco Botanical Garden, and as a residential gardener in 25 San Francisco gardens. Karen grew up in Ithaca in the Northeast neighborhood and left after graduating from Cornell’s College of Human Ecology in 1979. She is delighted to return to the area to pursue a blossoming relationship with her old flame from Jr. high, Hal Bennett. Karen and Hal live in Dryden. On most weekends they can be found on Cayuga Lake’s West Shore practicing catch and release.