Going Green had the opportunity to meet with Karina Mandell, CEO of Green Smart Cities. First off, tell us about you. Where do you work?
I am the Founder and CEO of Green Smart Cities.
Tell us a little bit about you and your background:
I graduated from St. Mary’s College of Maryland, and after several years shifted from social work to social entrepreneurship in order to focus on macro urban challenges and impact projects. Green Smart Cities, prioritizes sustainability with 21st Century technology solutions to create an EcoDistrict within Baltimore. In addition, she also leads Sync The City, a tech startup that will offer a marketplace for companies looking to share resources and partner on mutually aligned initiatives.
What is a fun fact about you?
I’ve been skydiving twice and I was adopted at 13
What was your motivation to get into this industry?
I saw that Sustainability fulfills the social enterprise buckets for me of “doing good by doing well”. To do something where you care for other people and the planet can only surely lead to positives outcomes for our humanity worldwide.
Why do you think climate change and sustainability is such an important topic today?
It’s bipartical, if we can stop debating science, it’s the one thing that we don’t have to morally debate. There is no religious dogma that says women should do xyz because that’s how they’re supposed to be or men should be xyz because of those other cultural norms. Sustainability is to some degree the new frontier, something everyone can get behind.
What do you envision your industry looking like 10 years from now?
Hopefully sustainability will be woven through every fabric of life and we’ll be a more conscientious people. I’d like to see us adopt the Green New Deal and become committed as global leader towards addressing the Sustainable Development Goals.
What can the average person do to make a difference?
The average person can team up with someone else to fill either a gap that they have have or they fill a gap that you have, this would be TRULY a circular economy. If that happened, then we wouldn’t all be begging for money from the Rockafellers, we can realize we have everything we need among us.
What positive changes are you seeing?
There’s a global conversation that wasn’t happening before and it’s raising people’s awareness even if they’re not read to act yet, it’s moving them through the different stages of motivation.
Where can we follow you and find more information to support your vision?
You can find me on Karina Mandell across Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.