Our Team
Managing Director
Aside from managing the Co-operative, Zoe Wangler was recently made a trustee of Lewes Community Land Trust. Before joining the Co-operative, Zoe worked as a freelance environmental researcher. Her clients included the International Institute of Environment and Development, Friends of the Earth and the Food Commission. She also managed projects and ran stakeholder consultations, high-level workshops and project evaluations for clients including the National Consumer Council and Green Globe Network. For 3 years Zoe was part of the management team at the Tenderloin Neighbourhood Development Corporation, a non-for-profit property development and management company serving the low-income Tenderloin community in San Francisco. Zoe interned at the Centre for Alternative Technology and lived at John Seymour’s Centre for Living.
Committee of Management
Dr. Larch Maxey's involvement with ELC began in 2007 through his work with Lammas Low Impact Initiatives Ltd., which he co-founded in 2005, and his work on a two-year Leverhulme Trust funded project on the UK Back-to-the-Land Movement (2007-9). He has over 20 years’ experience of teaching, researching and practicing sustainability, with over 40 academic and popular publications, including a co-edited book on Low Impact Development. He is currently a Research Fellow at Plymouth University.
Leonard Beighton is a retired civil servant. He worked at the head office of the Inland Revenue and the Treasury as a policy advisor and a senior manager. He was an independent, non-party, member of the Conservative Party’s Tax Reform Commission and a Specialist Adviser to the House of Lords Committee on the Finance Bill.
Leonard has throughout his life been committed to working for vulnerable members of society and has worked for dozens of charities. Amongst those that he has supported, he served as a Board member and chairman of World Vision UK. Leonard is currently a member of the Low Incomes Tax Reform Group which is concerned with the tax issues of the least well off, and a consultant on tax and benefits to CARE (Christian Action, Research and Education). He is a trustee of Livability, a Christian disability charity for both children and adults and on the audit committee of the Council for World Mission. He is director of African Revival and treasurer of the Elmbridge Multifaith Forum, the Elmbridge Fairtrade Network, and of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions UK. He was a founder member, and is now an internal auditor, of the Elmbridge Credit Union.
Alex Lawrie is a founder member of Stepping Stones and Cornerstone Housing Co-ops, Footprint Workers Co-operative and Chapeltown Credit Union. He studied politics at Leeds University, worked for Yeovil College as a lecturer in IT, has received training in Fundraising and Training Skills from the DSC, and in Planning for Real from the Neighbourhood Initiatives Foundation (he is NIF training associate). He is the author of ‘Empowering the Earth’ (Green Books, 2000). His role in UpStart includes advising new social enterprises, IT management and co-ordinating co-operative development projects.
Oliver Rodker is a founder member of Equinox Housing Co-operative in Manchester and lives at Landmatters co-operative, a 42 acre permaculture community in Devon. He is a director of Knott Wood Coppicers , a workers co-operative specialising in woodland management and tree planting. Oli is a professional furniture maker and has worked on a variety of environmental projects over the last fifteen years.
Sandra Aldworth is a Chartered Accountant, and a member of the Tax and Finance and Management Faculties of the Institute of Chartered Accountants. She has been a member of Somerset Cooperative Services since 2006, with responsibility for yearend accounts, payroll and management accounts for fifteen co-operatives and social enterprises. Previous to this, Sandra worked until as the financial controller of, or consultant for a number of businesses.
Zoe Wangler is also part of the Committee.
