Former California Senate Majority Leader and Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg is championing the proposed Middle-Class Homeownership and Family Home Construction Act, a 2026 ballot initiative aimed at expanding housing opportunities for middle-income Californians.

Alycia Gilde, newly appointed to lead Los Angeles County’s Internal Services Department (ISD) climate initiatives, shares her vision for advancing clean energy deployment at the local level. Drawing on her federal experience shaping zero-emission vehicle strategy at the White House, leadership at CALSTART, and decades of collaboration from New York City to Los Angeles, including her Peace Corps experience in Ghana, West Africa, Gilde brings both national and international expertise to the role. 

At VerdeXchange Conference 2025, Tamotsu Saito, Chairman of Japan’s New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO), underscored the critical role of international innovation partnerships in navigating an era of climate and geopolitical uncertainty.

After nearly a quarter century at the helm, John Boesel is stepping down as CEO of CALSTART, the nonprofit that turns clean transportation from an environmental experiment into an industrial movement. Under Boesel’s leadership, CALSTART helped push zero-emission trucks and buses from lab prototypes to commercial mainstays, shaping markets that now define the future of mobility.

At the Los Angeles Business Council’s Sustainability Summit, former LA Times climate columnist Sammy Roth led a wide-ranging discussion with CAISO CEO Elliot Mainzer, SCE’s Mike Backstrom, and developers from AES, EDF, Southwestern Power Group, and Vineyard Offshore on how California will build the grid a clean economy requires.

Recently reappointed by Governor Gavin Newsom and confirmed by the California Senate, David Nahai is serving a fifth term as Chair of the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board. In conversation with VX News, Nahai outlines the Board’s top priorities amid recent and converging climate threats, including wastewater recycling, stormwater capture, aquifer remediation, and a more integrated embrace of the One Water framework.

VX News presents an excerpted webinar hosted by Wade Crowfoot, Secretary of the California Natural Resources Agency (CRNA), where he discusses the implementation of Proposition 4 and specific programs it will support with a variety of key agency leaders, including Lauren Sanchez, the recently appointed Chair of the California Air Resources Board (CARB).