Our Team

Monica Sanders - Founder + Advocate in Chief

Monica Sanders is the founder of “The Undivide Project”, an organization dedicated to addressing the legal and policy changes needed to address the intersections between digital and climate equity. She also teaches Law, Policy and Practice in Disasters and Complex Emergencies at the Georgetown Law Center. Professor Sanders is a Senior Fellow at Tulane University’s Disaster Resilience Leadership Academy where she designed first in the nation programs on disaster equity and the “Climate X JEDI” Spring Institute. Previously, she held an Associate Professor appointment at the University of Delaware and was faculty at the Washington and Lee University School of Law. Read More

Dustin Loup – Advisor, Community Access

Under Dustin Loup’s guidance, the National Broadband Mapping Coalition brings together technology and policy experts to shape network analytics and advocate for best practices. Read More

Anthony Duan – GIS, Storytelling

Fellows and Interns

Nouran Alim – Environmental Justice Research Fellow

Maya Walker – 2022 Intern

Valentina Akpan, MBA – Executive Assistant

Valentina has over 5 years of experience as an administrator, alongside a strong aptitude for technology. She has successfully built and maintained TUP website, showcasing her tech-savvy skills.

The Advisory Board

Shari C. Suero, MBA

Shari has over 15 years of experience in end-to-end Technology, Data, and Operations, with a high specialty in platform transformation, data democratization, and insights. She has a proven track record of turning around underperforming technology ecosystems at companies such as Wells Fargo, MetLife, and MassMutual, to name a few. Shari enjoys giving back to her community serving as an HOA Board Member for over 10 years as well as volunteering with the YMCA, YWCA, and Habitat for Humanity.

Venkat Mahalingam

Venkat Mahalingam spent the last 20 years at Microsoft, SAP, and Ciena in leadership roles across business development, and product development, leading up to the current role in Google as Director of Business Development. At Google, Venkat leads business development engagements with a focus on Google Cloud Platform through strategy development, partnerships and M&A.

Venkat holds an MBA from NYU Stern School of Business, a Masters in Computer Science from Stevens Institute of Technology and a Bachelors in Computer Engineering from India.

Venkat is married with two kids and a 20-month old Labrador puppy. In his free time, Venkat enjoys cooking with his wife, playing tennis with his daughter, airplane modeling with his son and playing fetch with his puppy. He is based in the greater Seattle area.

Tiffany Watson

As Senior Manager of Climate Policy at Salesforce, Tiffany leads Salesforce’s U.S. climate policy program, advocating for policies that set the world on a path to a just transition to a 1.5-degree future. Tiffany also serves as a subject matter expert on the company’s climate justice strategy.

Before joining Salesforce, Tiffany worked at Van Ness Feldman LLP, a boutique Energy & Environment law firm as an experienced public policy professional providing strategic advice and representation on local, state & federal legislative and regulatory issues. Her portfolio includes matters relating to federal energy, environmental justice and climate change policy. She also worked at the Georgetown Climate Center as an Institute Associate, providing legal and policy analysis on adaptation projects at the federal, state, and local levels and leading the center’s work on equitable climate adaptation and environmental justice issues. She holds a Juris Doctor degree from Howard University School of Law and a Bachelor of Arts degree from George Mason University in Government and International Politics with a focus on American Government.

Dillon Taylor

Dillon is a passionate public sector executive with a servant leadership mindset. He has government experience at the local, state, and federal levels in the executive and legislative branches. He also has previous federal attorney and current adjunct law professor, focused on public interest law and ethics.

Patrick Pannett

Patrick Pannett leverages a diverse background managing political campaigns, crisis, and public affairs issues for some of the world’s best-known brands to address contemporary challenges. With a passion for resilience, he is director of industry communications for the Consumer Technology Association, the home of CES. He joined CTA from Ogilvy and Resilience Action Partners as Special Projects Director. As a volunteer public and government affairs team member for the American Red Cross, he led responses and contingency planning for natural disasters and events of national significance across the U.S. and within the National Capital & Greater Chesapeake Region.