Sierra Club (USA)
Self-Description July 2008
The Sierra Club is an American environmental organization founded on May 28, 1992 in San Francisco, California by the well-known preservationist John Muir, who became its first president. The Sierra Club has hundreds of thousands of members in chapters located throughout the United States, and is affiliated with Sierra Club of/du Canada.
Mission statement
To explore, enjoy, and protect the wild places of the Earth; To practice and promote the responsible use of the Earth’s ecosystems and resources; To educate and enlist humanity to protect and restore the quality of the natural and human environment; and to use all lawful means to carry out these objectives.
Organization
The Sierra Club is governed by a fifteen-member volunteer Board of Directors. Each year, five directors are elected to three-year terms, with all Club members eligible to vote. A president is elected annually by the Board from among its members and receives a small stipend. The Executive Director runs the day-to-day operations of the group, and is a paid staff member. The current Executive Director is Carl Pope.
All Club members also belong to chapters (usually state-wide), and to local groups. National and local special interest sections, committees, and task forces address particular issues. Policies are set at the appropriate level, but on any issue the Club has only one policy.
In addition to the members who are active as volunteers, the Club has approximately 500 paid staff members. Most of them work at the national headquarters in San Francisco, California, but there are others in the lobbying office in Washington, D.C. and in numerous state and regional offices.
All members receive Sierra magazine, a bimonthly glossy magazine describing the Club’s activities and spotlighting various environmental issues. All chapters publish a newsletter and/or schedule of activities, and many groups also publish a newsletter.
http://www.sierraclub.org/