Jerome Ringo
Chair, Board of Directors National Wildlife Federation
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Biography
Since being elected chair of the board of the National Wildlife Federation in April 2005, Jerome Ringo has been cited as "the most interesting environmental leader in the United States right now,” by The Nation, and among Ebony magazine’s most influential African-Americans in 2006. "I’m proud that the National Wildlife Federation is meeting the big challenges head on,” Jerome says. "We’re building a movement to combat global warming that threatens the very survival of wildlife as we know it. We’re connecting kids and families with nature to restore America’s conservation ethic.”
Jerome and his wife Mary volunteered to assist evacuees from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina hit in August 2005, and then as residents of Lake Charles, Louisiana, became evacuees themselves when Hurricane Rita swept through the Gulf several weeks later. Those experiences thrust Jerome forward as a national conservation spokesman on an array of issues including global warming’s influence in making hurricanes more intense, reforming national water policies and projects to put the public interest first, and restoring the degraded wetlands of coastal Louisiana and other habitats vital to wildlife. His leadership on these and other issues, including keeping the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge free of oil development, led to Jerome’s being named president of the Apollo Alliance in December 2005. The Apollo Alliance is a coalition including business, labor, faith and conservation groups, farmers and others united in the effort to forge a new energy future that will both create jobs and reduce America’s dependence on fossil fuels and foreign oil. As an avid hunter and angler, Jerome is an ambassador to America for the wildlife and habitat concerns of the nation’s 40 million sportsmen and women.
One of his first memories is that of his grandfather taking him fishing in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, where he was raised. That coastline is a cultural melting pot, with many indigenous people living off the land. This gave Jerome a connection to the land and water that runs deep. Louisiana has a history as a sportsman's paradise -- wild landscapes where Jerome would fish, catch crabs, and hunt for duck, goose and deer. He is distraught to see those local resources diminishing and is fighting to halt the environmental destruction of Louisiana's coastlines along with the country's other places of natural beauty including the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Everglades.
At 16, Jerome was one of the first-ever African-American staff members at the Philmont Scout Ranch, the world's largest scouting ranch in Cimarron, New Mexico. Teaching and connecting younger scouts to the natural world gave Jerome an appreciation and respect for nature, and he understood the need to protect these precious natural resources for generations to come. Both as a former Board member of the Louisiana Wildlife Federation and now at the National Wildlife Federation, Jerome seeks to reach out to those communities he loves. After a 20 plus-year career in the petrochemical industry (the largest employer in Louisiana), Jerome has a clear understanding of the impacts of poor environmental practices on the communities that surround those petrochemical plants. He believes more attention needs to be given to those communities so adversely affected. Jerome's company, Progressive Resources, Inc., provides those communities with expert technical assistance, legal counsel, and scientific advisors to improve their quality of life. Jerome and his wife, Mary Guidry Ringo, live in Lake Charles, Louisiana with their four children.