A message from Jon Panek and the Mass Audubon Board of Directors:

We are pleased to announce that the Board of Directors voted unanimously on Thursday, October 11, 2012, to elect Henry George Tepper as the next President of Mass Audubon. Henry is an internationally recognized conservationist with significant experience in land protection and advocacy, and we are confident that he has the experience, vision, and passion to lead Mass Audubon into its very promising future.

Henry has an impressive list of accomplishments in the NGO, nonprofit, and governmental arenas, and he is currently the Chief Conservation Officer and a Partner at Patagonia Sur, LLC, a company that invests in, protects, and enhances large tracts of ecologically significant properties in Chilean Patagonia.  At Patagonia Sur, Henry has led a team that has created a practical template for a conservation easement under Chilean Law, and has established one of Chile’s first independent land trusts, the Tierra Austral Land Trust.  He also launched and continues to serve as the senior U.S. advisor to the Chilean Private Lands Conservation Initiative, which has introduced breakthrough conservation easement enabling legislation in the Chilean Congress.

Prior to working at Patagonia Sur, Henry served for two-and-a-half years as Vice President of State Programs for the National Audubon Society, where he oversaw nine state programs in the eastern United States as well as the organization’s Atlantic Flyway Conservation Initiative.

Prior to working at the National Audubon Society, Henry spent thirteen years at The Nature Conservancy (TNC), serving for one year as Director of International Programs, Eastern US Region;  eight years as State Director for New York;  and four years as State Director for New Hampshire. During his time at TNC, Henry launched and successfully led numerous multi-million dollar campaigns to protect habitats.  He also initiated a series of increasingly large, landscape-scale forest conservation projects that successfully protected 350,000 acres in both states.

Henry’s career also includes serving as Deputy Commissioner for Natural Resources for the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation and as Executive Director of the Columbia Land Conservancy in the Hudson River Valley, where he is currently a member of the Board of Directors. Throughout his career, Henry has worked to advance the professional capacities of land trust organizations, and most recently served for four years as a member of the Land Trust Accreditation Commission, an independent program of the Land Trust Alliance.

Henry holds a B.A. from the University of Michigan and an M.A. and Admission to Doctoral Candidacy from Cornell University.  Henry and his wife Jane Henoch, a nurse practitioner, have two children, Katherine, 19, and Miles, 16.  He comes from a family of birders and in part credits his lifelong commitment to conservation to his childhood visits to Mass Audubon sanctuaries and excursions on Monomoy and South Beach with Mass Audubon staff.

Henry is excited and honored about the prospect of working with the incredible team at Mass Audubon. He will start on Tuesday, January 15, 2013.

Please join us in welcoming Henry to Mass Audubon!

Sincerely and on behalf of the Board of Directors,
Jon Panek

Jared Chase, Chair, Search Committee
Jon Panek, Chair of the Board
Nora Huvelle, Vice-Chair of the Board
Jim Sperling, Board Member
Cathy Campbell, Board Member
Andy Falender, Council Member and Former President, Appalachian Mountain Club