Karen Argenti is an advocate for clean water, social equality and a transparent public participation process. She has a background in administration, municipal governance, politics, environment, and community participation. In addition to her Masters of Public Administration from John Jay College of Criminal Justice, she has a BA from Lehman College. She was employed by Council President Carol Bellamy in the Office of the Ombudsman, the Bronx Democratic County Committee, New York State Senator Jeffrey Korman, and New York City Council Member Lucy Cruz. Later. She consulted on political and environmental campaigns, including as consultant for the Gaia Institute, building Green Roofs and Enhanced Tree Pits.

As a community leader, she was Chairperson of her local Community Board for ten years. She founded and served on the board of the Fort Independence Park Neighborhood Association, the Friends of Jerome Park Reservoir, and the Jerome Park Conservancy. She was the Democratic candidate in 1992 for New York State Senate; and was the first woman to serve on the Bronx Democratic Party at the high-ranking office of Secretary.

As a civic leader she saved her neighborhood and the Jerome Park Reservoir from becoming the site for the Croton Water Treatment Plant. In that effort, she organized community and upstate watershed stakeholders to demand the New York City Department of Environmental Protection look at other alternatives.

In the drinking water watershed, she advocated for extra protection as a member of the Stormwater Pollution Prevention Plan (SWPPP) Advisory Committee, which was set up as a result of negotiations with the NYS Department of Transportation’s Route 120 Environmental Impact Statement Project to establish a state-of-the-art stormwater practice plan to protect the Kensico Reservoir drinking water.

Currently retired, she serves on the not-for-profit Bronx Council for Environmental Quality (BCEQ) Board of Directors as Secretary. She is also a community member on Bronx Community Board 8’s Environment and Sanitation Committee, where she chairs the Water Working Group focusing on using Green Infrastructure to mitigate the impacts of severe stormwater flooding in the Bronx part of the Tibbetts Brook Watershed.

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