Nancy Skinner

Nancy Skinner (born August 12, 1954) is an American politician who is member of the California State Senate.

A Democrat, she represents California's 9th State Senatorial district, encompassing parts of the East Bay.

Skinner was a member of the Berkeley City Council from 1984 to 1992; she remains the only student ever elected to the Berkeley City Council.

She had previously founded and worked for several non-profit groups on global warming and other issues related to environmental policy.

Skinner attended the University of California, Berkeley, earning a B.S. from the U.C. Berkeley College of Natural Resources and a Masters in Education from the U.C. Berkeley School of Education.

As a student, she was a leader in the Anti-Apartheid Movement, served as the Academic Affairs Vice President of the ASUC, the student government, and was a founder of ASGE, the Union of Graduate Student Employees.

Skinner later taught courses in native California plants and interned at the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.

Skinner was elected to the Berkeley City Council while still a student and served from 1984 to 1992.

She remains the only student ever elected to the City Council.

After serving on the City Council, she co-founded ICLEI — Local Governments for Sustainability, a coalition of 800 global cities, and Cities for Climate Protection with 500 U.S. member cities, to assist urban regions with environmental and global warming policy, respectively.

She was the U.S. director of The Climate Group, an international organization that works with businesses to address global warming.

She also coauthored the best selling book series, Fifty Things You Can Do to Save the Earth and has written a pair of articles concerning global warming for the San Francisco Chronicle.

Skinner coordinated Loni Hancock's 2002 State Assembly campaign and was a Field Manager for Barbara Lee's 2002 Congressional campaign.

She also served as a member of the East Bay Regional Park Board, representing Ward 1 from 2006 to 2008.

Skinner was appointed to the East Bay Regional Park District board of directors in March 2006 to fill a vacancy due to the death of incumbent Jean Siri.

She was appointed by a 6–0 vote.

Skinner was then elected to the board in 2006 with 84% of the vote.

The district includes parts of Albany, Berkeley, El Cerrito, El Sobrante, Emeryville, Kensington, Richmond, San Pablo, Pinole & Oakland.

Skinner was considered a likely candidate for the California state Assembly as early as 2006 and had previously considered a run in 2002.

She ultimately announced her candidacy in late January 2008 and was elected to the State Assembly later that year.

She was re-elected in 2010 and 2012.

Prior to her election to the State Senate in 2016, Skinner was a member of the California State Assembly representing California's 15th State Assembly district from 2008 to 2014.

In 2016, Skinner ran for the California State Senate to replace Senator Loni Hancock, who was termed-out of office in 2016.

She was elected to office on November 8, 2016 and sworn in on December 5, 2016.

In the 2017–2018 and 2019–2020 legislative sessions, she served as the Majority Whip of the state Senate.

In the 2019 legislative session, she chaired the state Senate's Public Safety committee.

In November 2020, Skinner won reelection to the Senate for another four-year term.