leadership

Lisa Jones is a Liberty Fellow and a Riley Institute Diversity Leadership Initiative Fellow who focuses on environmental responsibility. She provides consulting services to local governments, businesses, non-profits, and individuals to accomplish complex sustainability and conservation goals through simple approaches to communication, strategy, organizing, and advocacy. Since establishing her business in South Carolina, Lisa has been responsible for launching multiple land and water conservation funding programs; diverse advocacy coalitions; and new models for conserving landscapes through innovative solutions, such as carbon offsets and conservation burials. 

Prior to her work as a consultant, Lisa served in executive positions at the Coastal Conservation League in Charleston, S.C. — first as the chief conservation officer and most recently as the chief strategy officer where she was a key member of the executive leadership team that led a successful $20 million comprehensive fundraising campaign. 

As the director of the Coastal Conservation League's Food and Agriculture Program, Lisa helped launch GrowFood Carolina, South Carolina’s first local food hub in 2011. She also initiated the strategy and fundraising effort that led to the state's strategic plan for small farms — Making Small Farms Big Business in South Carolina.

Lisa began her career in conservation after graduating from the University of the South with a B.S. in Natural Resources in 1999. She  served for more than two years as an agroforestry Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon, Africa, where she partnered with the government to expand agroforestry practices. In 2002, she joined the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in the Office of Policy, Economics and Innovation in Washington, D.C. where she worked on regulatory issues pertaining to air quality, consultations with tribal governments, and environmental justice.

In the time she is not working with partners to protect nature, she is reading about or playing in it with her two daughters and dogs. She lives in Mount Pleasant, S.C. and enjoys gardening, biking, backpacking, and traveling.