Chantelle Mendonsa

Chantelle serves as the Strong Prosperous and Resilient Communities Challenge (SPARCC) Learning Community Coordinator at the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC). She leads the SPARCC Community of Practice, a platform for shared learning and relationship building around health, climate, and racial equity. She works directly with community-based organizations to deliver an intersectional curriculum on climate, health, and equity through specialized technical assistance, skill-building webinars and uplift innovative and salient community-focused models. She serves on the American Public Health Association (APHA) Center for Climate, Health and Equity Advisory Board. Before joining the NRDC, Chantelle worked at the White House Council on Environmental Quality within the Obama Administration. She is deeply passionate about understanding the climate impacts on public health, specifically for low-income communities and communities of color.

The Strong, Prosperous, And Resilient Communities Challenge (SPARCC) is a multiyear initiative investing in and amplifying local efforts underway in six regions to ensure that new investments reduce racial disparities, build a culture of health, and prepare for a changing climate. The initiative’s long-term goal is to change the way metropolitan regions grow, invest, and build through integrated, cross-sector approaches that benefit low-income people and communities of color. SPARCC offers flexible grant funding, technical assistance, and a community of practice to support innovative solutions that advance racial equity, health, and climate resilience. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 3 million members and online activists. Since 1970, NRDC lawyers, scientists, and other environmental specialists have worked to protect the world's natural resources, public health, and the environment. The organization works to ensure the rights of all people to clean air, clean water, and healthy communities through science, advocacy, and litigation.