The Illinois Environmental Council has announced the winners of its 2008 Environmental Leadership Awards, which will be presented at IEC's annual Environmental Leadership Dinner Sept. 25. The recipients are:

- Chicago Recycling Coalition, which has persevered in its 15-year fight to create a better recycling program for the City of Chicago;

- Dan Rosenthal and Ina Pinkney, founders of the Chicago Green Restaurant Co-op, which links businesses with local sources of sustainable products; and

- Strachan Donnelley, a posthumous award to this conservationist and philanthropist who was founder of the Center for Humans and Nature.

Cathy Zoi, the chief executive officer of the Alliance for Climate Protection, is the keynote speaker for the dinner, which is IEC's primary fall fundraiser. Zoi leads the nonprofit, nonpartisan effort to halt global warming recently founded by former Vice President Al Gore. She is the former Chief of Staff in the White House Office on Environmental Policy in the Clinton-Gore Administration, where she managed the staff working on environmental and energy issues.

The selection of Zoi as IEC’s annual dinner speaker reflects the organization’s growing emphasis and work on the issue of global warming as it impacts Illinois. In 2007, IEC facilitated the formation of the Illinois Climate Action Network (Illinois CAN), a coalition of environmental, faith and health organizations that advocates for policies necessary to reduce global warming pollution to 1990 levels by 2020 and 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. This summer, IEC is hosting a series of town hall meetings around the state to build support for climate change legislation introduced in the last session that included the omnibus Global Warming Response Act(SB2220/HB5254).

Zoi's selection also continues a tradition of timely, provocative keynote speakers for IEC’s annual dinner. In the early years, IEC and its sister organization, the IEC Education Fund, co-hosted annual conferences to bring together environmentalists to hear nationally known speakers. In 2003, the tradition was reinvented as the Environmental Leadership Dinner with Attorney General Lisa Madigan as the keynote speaker and attracted more than 300 attendees. In the years since, the event has maintained its popularity, thanks to a diverse roster of speakers, including then-U.S. Senate Candidate Barack Obama in 2004 and Fran Pavley, a leading advocate of a landmark California state law regulating greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks who headlined last year’s dinner.

The 2008 Environmental Leadership Dinner takes place Thursday, Sept. 25, at the Hotel InterContinental in Downtown Chicago. Festivities start at 5:30 with a reception followed by dinner at 7 p.m. Tickets are $150 per person. Table sponsors are $1,500, and corporate sponsors are $2,500.

To register online or for more information, please click here and if you have questions, call Mary Pemberton at 217-544-5954 or email her at mpemberton@ilenviro.org.