The role of NJPACE is to accelerate the market adoption of C-PACE as a community development tool. We assist municipalities in leveraging the program’s strengths to upgrade their building stock to today’s resilient and climate-savvy standards. We also assist property owners and developers in sourcing the best financing for their needs.
NJPACE (New Jersey PACE) is a nonprofit arm of Possible Planet, a NJ 501(c)(3) originally registered as the Center for Regenerative Community Solutions.
We have advocated for PACE in New Jersey since 2012 and have helped the law pass three times in the NJ legislature, with overwhelming bipartisan majorities. Governor Phil Murphy finally signed it into law in 2021.
Serial entrepreneur and nonprofit executive, designer/builder, conservation, and renewable energy expert.
Jonathan has been helping catalyze action toward sustainable development in municipalities, communities, and businesses since the early 1970s. He consults to corporations of all sizes, nonprofits, municipal, state, and national governments, and colleges and universities.
His expertise and interests include energy and environmental technologies, community financing mechanisms, local food systems, and renewable energy systems, along with sustainable innovation, entrepreneurship, community engagement, and transformational leadership for social change.
Jonathan has been an entrepreneur, consultant, educator, community organizer, policy analyst, journalist, and researcher in several fields of environmental and social change. He worked for the Federal Government of Canada in policy, research, program management, and evaluation of energy and environmental issues. Jonathan ran a solar design and construction firm pioneering green building techniques, urban agriculture, and other areas of sustainability, in both Canada and the U.S.
Business development consultant, former Deloitte Sustainability Practice Business Development leader, Yale MBA
Victoria is the Co-Founder of Possible Planet, aka the Center for Regenerative Community Solutions (CRCS) and Director of Development for Regenerative Financing and New Jersey PACE (NJPACE). She speaks publicly and has been published on the subject of sustainability (“Who Will Be the Rock Stars of Corporate Sustainability?” Science, Wisdom, and the Future: Humanity’s Quest for a Flourishing Earth, Collins Foundation Press, 2012).
Victoria Zelin, also known as “the PACE lady,” has championed the passage of C-PACE (Commercial Property Assessed Clean Energy) legislation in NJ since 2012. NJPACE is now one of several projects of the larger nonprofit, Possible Planet, where Victoria is Director of Development. Possible Planet’s mission is to regenerate communities using financing and other Sustainable Local Economic Development tools. To accelerate carbon reduction in areas where C-PACE is not available or appropriate, Possible Planet makes available other financing structures as well as alternatives developed within its Regenerative Financing division.
Business and program development professional with experience as an Investment banker, licensed NJ land use planner, and former NJ local elected official.
Gus is also the principal of First Enterprise Consulting, LLC, a project finance advisory firm in central New Jersey. The firm specializes in Alternative and Renewable Energy Facilities. He consults on projects from concept to development management, financial structuring/proformas, team coordination, and equity and debt execution.
Gus’s recent positions include Business Development Manager at a leading Commercial Solar Design/Build company and as a Project Manager for a prominent non-profit corporation in Trenton, NJ.
Prior to these, he served in leadership positions at Citicorp Securities, PNC Capital Markets, RBC Capital Markets, and BB&T Capital Markets—all specializing in project development and finance.
Gus has held licenses issued by the SEC/FINRA in all 50 states, with Series 7, Series 63, and Series 79 designations.
He holds a BA from Princeton University, and a Master of Architecture and Urban Planning, also from Princeton University.
Peter Burgess has formal training in engineering, economics, and accountancy which has given him the background to understand problems from many perspectives and introduce effective practical solutions.
The same skills that were effective in the corporate environment were also very effective in planning and evaluation in the field of international socio-economic development. Peter did many assignments for the World Bank, the UN (mainly UNDP) as well as private commercial clients. Worked in more than 50 countries over a period of more than 20 years.
Matt Polsky is a sustainability change agent and Senior Fellow for Sustainability Innovation and Multidisciplinary Thought at Fairleigh Dickinson University’s Institute for Sustainable Enterprise.
He has unique cross-sector experience working in business, government, environmental groups, and as an adjunct professor. He was the Sustainability Team Leader at the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. He has taught sustainability and energy courses at six New Jersey colleges. He was a marketing manager at AT&T Microelectronics’ Energy Division, a market researcher at Lane Bryant, and a marketing coordinator at BBD&O. Matt was co-chair of one town’s Green Team, advised another town’s Green Team, is on two Sustainable Jersey Working Groups, and is advising Sustainable Jersey in their development of “Gold” level certification for municipalities. He has also worked with a number of municipalities to preserve open space.