It's a brand new year! We at GRID Alternatives Central Coast are happy to welcome 2014, which marks our fourth year of operations in a region which covers Santa Barbara County, San Luis Obispo County, Monterey County, San Benito County and Santa Cruz County. Just as we closed 2013, we bid farewell to Steven Fernandez, our first regional director, and welcomed Anna Lisa Lukes, who succeeded him in late November. While Steven has made a change in coordinates, he remains with GRID Alternatives, helping to launch our Tri-State Area office which spans the states of New York-New Jersey-Connecticut.
Anna Lisa comes to us from Southern California, where she most recently worked as Vice President of Organizational Advancement of an affordable housing and community development organization that is part of the national NeighborWorks America network. While she is new to the Central Coast region, collaborating through public-nonprofit-private partnerships is familiar to Anna Lisa, having previously secured financing for and created programs that added value and made a positive impact on the lives of low- and moderate-income people. Anna Lisa holds a Masters degree in Business Administration with an emphasis in Entrepreneurship, a Juris Doctor and a Certificate in Nonprofit Management.
In December, Justin Hitchcock joined us as our bilingual English/Spanish Outreach Coordinator. Although Justin is new to our Central Coast office, he comes to us from our Greater Los Angeles office, where he worked for 2 years. Justin gained extensive outreach experience as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Dominican Republic, where he worked on several community projects focusing on environmental initiatives and youth development. Justin studied Civil Engineering at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.
As GRID Alternatives Central Coast ramps up for the new year, our staff members reflect on our first three years, during which we installed 400 solar arrays, saved families $9 million, prevented 30,000 tons of greenhouse gases, and trained thousands of people for jobs in the solar industry. Our impact has been made possible by so many supporters corporate sponsors, individual and in-kind donors, affordable housing partners, local governments, job training partners, volunteers and of course, our staff.
We started 2014 excited about continuing to help those who need it the most; people like Enrique Martinez of Salinas. In early January, Enrique got on his roof to help our construction staff and volunteers install his 9 panel system. We look forward to hearing about all the great things hell do with the over $8,000 in savings the system will provide over its lifetime.
We also began the year eager to continue and strengthen relationships with existing supporters and creating new ones. We launched a new partnership with the San Luis Obispo Regional Transit Authority, which donated significant advertising space on buses that will run throughout SLO County during the first two months of the year. This partnership will help us raise even more awareness about our mission, as well as invite people to volunteer with us and support our work.
Thank you for your interest in GRID Alternatives Central Coast and we invite you help us continue our work. Join us as we build upon what we have done learn more about us, attend an event, help out at a solar installation, spread the word and give to GRID Alternatives today.