Donnel Baird
Donnel Baird
Overview
Donnel Baird is the founder of BlocPower, a startup that markets and finances the installation of energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies in churches, small businesses, and non-profits in underserved communities. Donnel spent three years as a community organizer in Brooklyn and one year as a voter contact director for Obama For America. Donnel managed a national Change to Win/LIUNA campaign to leverage Dept. of Energy energy efficiency financing to create green construction jobs for out of work populations. He partnered with the Washington Interfaith Network to generate a $100m government investment in undeserved communities in the District of Columbia, and managed a team that negotiated agreements in Portland, Milwaukee, and New York. Donnel is an Open Society Foundation/ Echoing Green Fellow and a recent graduate of Columbia Business School, where he was a Board of Overseers Fellow, a member of the Sanford Bernstein Board for Leadership and Ethics, and a recipient of investment from the Eugene F. Lang Fund for Entrepreneurial Initiative. In 2012, Donnel became the first Entrepreneur in Residence at Jalia Ventures, a firm that deploys growth capital to early-stage for-profit social enterprises.
