Peggy Shepard

Peggy Shepard is co-founder and executive director of the not-for-profit WE ACT for Environmental Justice in New York in the USA. She has been involved with organizing environmental protection campaigns in and around New York since the 1980s, and also works on many social action committees.

Shepard holds a National Order of Merit from France and gave a TED talk in 2022.

Career Initially a journalist at the Indianapolis News, and their first African-American reporter, she moved to New York in 1971 to work in publishing. Following an editorial role at Black Enterprise magazine, she changed jobs to speechwriting for the New York state government. She became involved in activism about environmental protection and health policy for those with a low income and people of color at a grassroots level and subsequently nationally. In 2021 she was appointed a member of the White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council.

Publications Shepard has been involved in studies of urban environmental quality and public awareness, particularly using community-based participatory research methods and is co-author of several scientific publications.

Awards She has been awarded the Jane Jacobs Medal from the Rockefeller Foundation for Lifetime Achievement in 2008, the 10th Annual Heinz Award For the Environment in 2004, the Dean's Distinguished Service Award from the Columbia Mailman School of Public Health, and Honorary Doctorates from Smith College in 2010 and Appleton, Wisconsin's Lawrence University.

In 2021, she was made a Knight of the French National Order of Merit.

Personal life She gained a BA degree from Howard University.