The Young Greens Steering Committee is comprised of 9 positions. For more information about the roles and responsibilities of Steering Committee members, please see the YGUS By-laws.
Co-Chair, Preston Thacker
Preston is a Savannah, GA based activist who became involved in the Green Party after a political awakening following the 2016 primary elections.
Aside from being a YES Co-Chair, they are a founding member of the Green Party of Chatham County, Georgia, where they served as Co-Chair from 2017-2018, and an Alternate Delegate to the GPUS National Committee for the Georgia Green Party since 2017.
Preston identifies as Non-Binary (they/them pronouns please), and politically as a Marxist/Eco-Socialist.
In addition to politics, Preston enjoys working on cars and bikes, as well as petting their 6 cats.
Co-Chair, Scott Cove
Scott is a working class american living in San Marcos, Texas. He's an operator for his city's recycling facility and manages the household hazardous waste drop off center for his county. Protecting water and standing up for right to migration are pivotal points for activating in Texas. Working in waste management for low wages and long days it's apparent every day that capitalist social order is the cause of an abundance of our world's failings and injustices. In order to trigger solutionary transformative social change, we need to agitate for revolutionary confrontations with power structures on many different fronts, simultaneously, while living in an economy of normalized opression, exploitation, and usndermined/overlooked consent. Grateful to the Green Party for attempting to form the grassroots vehicle for organizing to meet our demands for a more just world.
Education Chair, Jacob Falzone
Jacob is an adult student at Guilford College pursuing the following degrees: History B.A. and German Language and Culture B.A. with a minor in Philosophy. He intends to attend law school after graduation and practice environmental law. Jacob is most passionate about social justice and environmental wisdom. As a Young Green, Jacob has been rigorously involved with the national party, his local party, and the YGUS. In 2016 Jacob volunteered to be a regional volunteer coordinator for the Stein/Baraka campaign working directly with the state volunteer coordinator. On behalf of the YGUS, Jacob worked closely with the founding members of the International Indigenous Youth Council to co-organize a student and youth assembly on 19 January 2017 in Washing D.C. Also in 2017 he helped co-found the Triad North Carolina Greens. As co-chair he looks forward to working with his fellow committee members to address the issues facing young Americans.
Outreach Chair, Shannel Pittman
Shannel is a Los Angeles based activist whom before coming into the Green Party after the 2016 primary, she was an organizer for Wolf-PAC in California, preparing other volunteers to speak to their representatives and prepare for meetings and working with others to ensure that California Prop 59 was approved in 2016, the resolution said California was down to amend the constitution to get rid of Citizen's United, if you follow the campaign finance reform things. Since becoming a Green, Shannel has volunteered in many-a campaign team in almost every complicity possible thriving where there were people to interact with directly. Of course she was drawn to Outreach, with her main goal here being to ensure that every member of this caucus finds their perfect place to thrive. Aside from her role as a Outreach Co-Chair here, in her state Shannel is a member of California's Green Issues, Campaign and Candidates, and Grassroots Organizing Working Groups, and mostly recently appointed to her state's Co-Ordinating committee, Shannel is a writer of poems, prose, and plays, a lover of theater and Disney as most millennials born in 90 tend to be. Cartoons, obscure music, and novels are how she finds balance so as not lose functionality in this fight.
Media Chair, Erik Rydberg
Finance Chair, Brendan Phillips
Brendan is currently a stay-at-home dad of two young boys, part time AV tech, and full time political activist. He has been involved with the Green Party since 2016 he when oversaw the petition to get Jill Stein on the ballot in Utah. Since then he has served in a number of roles within the party including Co-chair and National Delegate of the Green Party of Utah, Outreach/Accreditation Chair of the Young Ecosocialists, Northwest Regional Coordinator to the GPUS Ballot Access Committee, and YES representative to the GPUS Accreditation Committee. He also currently serves as Secretary of the Tooele County Historic Preservation Commssion, and on the board of the Long Memory Project. Brendan ran for Tooele County Commission in 2018, and received almost 10% of the vote in a deep-red rural county. He has been an all-vinyl DJ for 17 years, and is a fanatical record collector. He enjoys playing his records, spending time with his family, and watching the Utah Jazz.
National Alternate Delegate, Jay Walker
Bio Coming Soon
National Alternate Delegate, Austin Bashore
Austin Bashore is a senior teaching English as a second language major at Kent State University and the co-Leader of the Kent State Greens. Austin Bashore is a lifelong leftist. He has, since his high school days, stood up for people at risk by society. From August 2017 until June 2018, he studied, worked, and volunteered in Asan, Republic of Korea. During his time in the Republic of Korea, he got to work with the Green Party Korea in local activism and electoral politics, even helping to create the Cheonan Green Party, a local branch of the Green Party Korea. There, he learned about Korean Unification, sexual minorities in Korea, the dangers of unregulated economies, anti-war activism, and international solidarity. He helped as the Green Party Korea went from a party disbanded by the government in 2012 for failing to get enough votes to coming 4th (of 10) in Seoul for the 2018 Mayor Election.
After returning to Ohio, Austin ran as the Green Party candidate for House District 75. Although he did not win, the Green Party showed a growing force in Portage County, ranking the third highest in gross percentage of Green Party votes for governor in 2018.
He also serves as deputy social media manager for the Ohio Greens and a member of the International Committee of both Green Party US and Green Party Korea.