Walter Andrews

Environmental Protection Agency Years

Walter retired from The US Environmental Protection EPA) Region 2 in January 2010 after serving forty(40) plus years. He is a charter member of EPA having joined the Agency in 1969. Mr. Andrews held many management positions over the years; however, his last position was that of Chief of the Drinking Water and Municipal Infrastructure Branch (DWMIB) in the Division of Environmental Planning and Protection (DEPP), Region 2. Region 2 is comprised of the States of New York and New Jersey; Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and the Territory of the US Virgins Islands.

During his tenure at EPA, Walter was involved in several noteworthy cases that help define EPA’s authority such as;

1) The Belmar Sludge Case where he led the team that inspected and sampled the off shore discharges form sewerage treatment plant along the Long Island and New Jersey shores. The resulting body of data was used by a Judge to determine that sewerage sludge was a solid and not a liquid. As this practice was a violation of the Rivers and Harbors Act, the determination led to the eventual cancellation of Ocean Dumping in the New York Bight.

2) The General Electric Fort Edwards PCB Case: Walter led the team that did the first comprehensive investigation and sampling of the General Electric Plant in Fort Edwards, New York. The report found extensive discharges of PCBs and other toxic agents into the Hudson River which was a violation of its discharge permit. Thirty years after that report, EPA began removal of PCBs from the Hudson River as part of the Superfund Program.

3) The Ken Buc Landfill Case: This was a case where chemical waste haulers illegally dumped tankers full of waste chemicals in a solid waste landfill in Edison New Jersey until there was a steady stream of waste liquid into the Raritan River. Walter’s team led this investigation and sampling that proved that these were toxic waste chemicals being dumped. This eventually became a Superfund site and was closed and cleaned up.

4) While Walter was Chief of the Rochester, NY Field Office, one of his staff engineers investigated the company plants in Niagara Falls, NY that had discharged hazardous waste into a pond that was later covered over. Homes were eventually built over the filled waste pond area. This area and case became to be known as Love Canal.

Community Service

For a five year period Walter served as the EPA Liaison to the North River Community Environmental Review Board (NRCERB) in West Harlem, NYC. He was chairman of the DEPP Environmental Justice Workgroup (DEJWG) in Region 2. Further, he is the chairman of the nonprofit, House of Hope Community Development Corporation (HOHCDC) in Metuchen, NJ. Walter is also chairman of the nonprofit, Sphinx Scholarship Fund, Inc. in Somerset, NJ.

Walter became a Board member of World Team Now in October 2009 where he currently serves as Director of Energy and the Environment. Education He earned his B.S. degree in Biology from Wilberforce University in Ohio and his Masters of Public Health Degree (MPH) in Water Quality from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, Michigan

Suzanne Maxx

The vision of a world team inspired Suzanne to use media to actually "tell-a-vision". She pioneered the positive non-scripted genre "Actuality Television" with the development of the World Team™ broadcast series. This development began after the production of her first multimedia international project sponsored by Coca-Cola that was part of the Asian Pacific World Exposition in Japan.

Her life commitment to environmental and social causes began long before being the Founder of the Non-profit organization; World Team Now, where she presently is the President /Chair and acting Executive Director. In 4th grade she wrote a letter to the then President of the USA about her concerns for the environment, and in 1992 she documented USA Presidential Candidate’s Journey to the Earth Summit/ Global Forum. That lead her to speak there in Rio, document, report, and participate in other UN conferences, most recently COP15. Suzanne has worked to support many global venues, events and productions including Ashes and Snow, The International Yoga Expo, The Earth Train for Peace, and in her early years Roxy, Studio54, and others.

She is a writer, producer, actress, athlete and international public speaker. In entrepreneurial spirit Suzanne started "Sports to the Maxx," where as a sponsored “pro,” she coached others to go beyond what they believed to be possible in extreme sports: in-line and roller skating, skiing, and horseback riding. As named in "Best of LA" and featured on "Eye on LA," she has mobilized masses of people in clinics and classes around the world. Locally in Malibu she started the skate program and camp, plus helped to build the skate park, a continuation of her native NYC roller skate roots. She has worked with children, pro athletes, the disabled, and celebrities. Suzanne's in front of the camera work includes a soap opera, episodic night time television, commercials and film. As a journalist, she wrote about film, sports and travel for a local Malibu paper, and globally, recently for Environment News Service. As a public speaker she has addressed many international audiences on media, extreme sports, the environment and the vision for World Team.

The business plan and architecture for the World Team Project as well as WTN's Challenge has continued to evolve through unique collaborations with students and faculty from Columbia University's Computational Learning Systems: CCLS; Pepperdine University's Graduate School of Public Policy, and the International University of Monaco's Business School. Her Bachelor of Arts degree from Sarah Lawrence College gives her the framework to acquire knowledge through global travel and an ongoing creative education. Suzanne's vision is contagious, as evidenced by the people who have dedicated their time and resources to the World Team project. "Life to the Maxx" is not only her creed, but also the working title of the book she has been asked to write on leadership.