Melissa Kops, a New Haven native, is passionate about healthy, sustainable, and equitable design. Growing up in a single-parent household and relying on financial aid and scholarships to access a high-quality education, she developed a deep sense of responsibility to give back and serve her community. Her time studying abroad fostered an appreciation for different cultures as well as diverse ways of thinking and living.
An architect by profession, Melissa transitioned to public service after 17 years in the private sector, becoming an architect for the City of New Haven in 2021. In her current role, she designs and manages municipal building projects, advises on sustainable city policies and initiatives, and serves as the municipal representative to the Connecticut State Energy Efficiency Board.
Melissa also teaches a course on green buildings at the Yale School of the Environment and serves as a board member of BuildGreenCT (formerly the Connecticut Green Building Council and CT Passive House), where she volunteers to educate and advocate for sustainable design.
Melissa applies her sustainable design expertise to every municipal building project, specifying the healthiest products and materials while maximizing energy-efficiency within the constraints of limited project budgets and complex procurement policies. The City of New Haven has committed to electrifying its own buildings and fleet by 2030, and every project moves the city closer to achieving this goal. For example, the new Health Department building is an energy-efficient retrofit of an existing structure, featuring PVC-free flooring and base, all-electric heat pump mechanical systems, and energy-recovery ventilation for outside air using MERV 13 filtration for optimal indoor air quality.
Additionally, Melissa organizes the biennial Northeast Summit for a Sustainable Built Environment (NESSBE). The most recent event focused on Environmental Justice, bringing together a diverse community of building industry professionals, advocates, and policymakers to explore how the design of the built environment can improve the quality of life for vulnerable communities most affected by climate change.
At both state and municipal levels, Melissa advocates for energy transparency (requiring the disclosure of building energy efficiency, especially for homes before sale or rental), energy stretch codes for new construction and major renovations that can be voluntarily adopted by municipalities, and funding for energy efficiency programs to retrofit and electrify homes in environmental justice communities.
