"Eddie has been a trusted advisor and successful liaison between the Mayor's Office and the City Council, working closely with legislators and policy advocates on issues that will have a profound influence on the lives of all New Yorkers. He spearheaded efforts to pass several landmark pieces of legislation through the City Council, including the City's innovative 20-year Solid Waste Management Plan, which relies for the first time on principles of environmental justice and borough equity; the creation of the first municipal brownfields remediation office in the nation; the required retrofit of all diesel-powered school buses to reduce air pollution in bus cabins; the consolidation of the Environmental Control Board with the Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings; and the Greater Greener Buildings Plan, the nation's first comprehensive package of legislation aimed at improving energy efficiency for large scale buildings.

"Beyond traditional legislative negotiations with the Council, Eddie helped expand the work of the Office of City Legislative Affairs by facilitating meetings for policy advocates with Administration officials on a range of legislative and regulatory initiatives. He worked with the Mayor's Office of Long Term Planning and Sustainability to reach out to and strategize with a broad range of advocate stakeholders to help shape PlaNYC, our long-term sustainability plan. And he facilitated a strategic dialogue on language access between the Mayor's Offices of Operations, Immigrant Affairs and immigrant rights advocates, which culminated in Executive Order 120 of 2008, which for the first time called for all City agencies to make services and documents available to immigrant New Yorkers in the top six languages spoken in the City.

"I know he will excel in his new role as Executive Director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, and I wish him all the best."