Governor Names Mahwah 22-Year-Old 'Environmentalist of the Year'

A 22-year-old Mahwah environmental activist Eric J. Fuchs-Stengel, who founded the Mahwah Environmental Volunteers Organization, or MEVO, has hit another milestone. At a ceremony in Trenton last week, Fuchs-Stengel won the 2013 Governor’s Environmental Excellence Awards’ Environmentalist of the Year award.

The ‘Environmentalist of the Year’ distinction was one of a group of Governor’s awards given out to environmentally-conscious businesses, organizations, and projects throughout the state.

“Getting recognition like this from the state shows that the work we are doing is important in New Jersey,” Fuchs-Stengel said of what he felt when receiving the award.

“The term ‘environmentalist’ that they dubbed me with is a loaded term, it’s a powerful one. It’s a person who is an activist, who is part of an important movement.”

The senior at NYU first formed MEVO while a 16-year-old student at Mahwah High School. What started as an after school club that conducted clean-ups throughout the township has grown into a volunteer environmental and organic farming organization that coordinates and works on environmental projects throughout Northern New Jersey. Over the past few years, MEVO and Fuchs-Stengel have been the recipients of many accolades and honors, including being named the Mahwah Regional Chamber of Commerce 2012 Organization of the Year, receiving a $2500 grant from the North Face, and being named one of the $5,000 Russ Berrie Foundation Award For Making a Difference winners.

“So far, this is the most far-reaching recognition we’ve gotten,” Fuchs-Stengel said.

“Every time we win an award or get a grant, I just look at it as a springboard to another award or grant. It connects us with other people or resources, generates interest or concern in the work we do and the issues we deal with.”

According to a representative from the Christie Administration, Fuchs-Stengel was chosen for the award partly because he, "has engaged some 1,500 volunteers who have volunteered more than 20,000 hours to community projects." 

The award, Fuchs-Stengel said, is not the culmination of a project, but rather one of the things that will launch MEVO into its “extremely busy” 2014.

The group is currently working on two big, new projects.

The first is a larger effort to clean up debris that has been dumped on Stag Hill, and investigate and prevent illegal dumping the group says is still happening on the Mahwah mountain.

“It’s super illegal, and it has a huge impact on the community up there,” he said. “We’ve done lots of clean-ups there, but that’s really going to be one of our focuses this year.”

The other big project is developing a community organic farm in conjunction with the Bergen County Parks Department.

“We’ve already received approval from the county, and now we are in the process of finding a one to two acre piece of land to build the farm on,” Fuchs-Stengel said of the project.

“It’s going to be a community-based farm that serves all residents of the county. We are going to be focused on educational opportunities there about organic farming and sustainable living for all different groups of people.”

After his graduation this spring, Fuchs-Stengel said he plans to take a year off before going to grad school to work for MEVO full-time in order to get the farm project up and running.

“We’ve got this opportunity and ability to make a real change, and we’re not going to pass that up,” he said.

“We want to continue to make a bigger difference.

Get more information about getting involved with or supporting MEVO on the group’s website, or by contacting Eric Fuchs-Stengel at ericjfs@mevoearth.org, or 201-316-4888.