About us

Meet our team

We are a small team of people passionate about changing Aotearoa New Zealand’s homes and neighbourhoods for the better.

Our Board

Beacon Pathway is governed by a Board elected by members. Current Board members are all independent:

  • Brenda Steele (Chairperson)
  • Lesley Jenkins, Local Area Manager – Upper Harbour, Rodney and Hibiscus-Bays local boards, Auckland Council
  • Godfrey Hall, Director, InZone Industries
  • Nina Campbell, Independent
  • John Chapman, Director, Kaea Group

Our team

We operate using a co-management model. Sally, Glenda and Vicki share responsibility for Beacon’s day-to-day operation as well as managing Beacon’s projects. If you would like to get in touch, please contact us.

Vicki Cowan (Co-manager)

Vicki is passionate about getting New Zealanders moving towards better home performance. She has been with us from the beginning when she began her housing research journey as the Knowledge Manager. This saw her busy facilitating experts from many disciplines to deliver evidence-based projects designed to improve residential outcomes in Aotearoa. She has continued her great mahi with us as a housing researcher and communicator and can be seen actively collaborating with many groups to improve housing outcomes.

Vicki’s talents don’t stop there. In addition to leading and contributing to Beacon research projects, she used her project management skills to manage three national housing surveys for BRANZ (2015 House Condition survey, 2018/19 Pilot National Housing Survey, 2022 HEEP2).

Glenda Lock (Co-manager)

Glenda joined our team in 2011 and brought her extensive experience of policy and programme management in the local government sector with her.

Along with co-managing Beacon Pathway, Glenda has a particular passion in helping people live in warmer, drier and healthier homes. She gained considerable insight into housing issues ‘on the ground’ during her time as part of a co-design team supporting the Ministry of Health’s Healthy Housing Initiative.

Sally Blackwell (Co-manager)

Sally brings a wealth of healthy homes and environmental policy skills to Beacon Pathway. With 20 years’ experience as a policy and research professional, in central government and not for profit sector, her knowledge is invaluable. Sally has a reputation for building strong and trusted relationships and bringing parties together around a common purpose or problem.

Sally has a number of firsts under her belt. She project-managed EECA’s Energywise home grants scheme between 2004 and 2008. This was the first large-scale government subsidy scheme for insulation retrofits so Sally understands the reality and challenges of designing and delivering effective and equitable programmes that enable people to improve their homes. She became the first Executive Officer of the newly established Community Energy Network and she was also part of the team that saw the need for the Home Performance Advisor training programme, and helped set this up. She has a Masters in Environmental studies from Victoria University of Wellington and is well-versed in the theory and practice of enabling people to live in a better-performing home.

Sally lives on the Kāpiti Coast with her husband and son. They are walking the talk by building a super-efficient home with the lowest carbon impact they possibly can. In their spare time, they can be found on a variety of bikes and other wheels.

Bill Smith

Bill’s vast knowledge of sustainable behaviour change, neighbourhood design and community resilience has seen him play a crucial role in a number of Beacon projects. Beacon Pathways’ Medium Density Housing assessment tools are Bill’s speciality and he brings his knowledge of sustainable behaviour, sustainable housing and neighbourhood design to our other projects.

Ian Mayes

Ian’s an encyclopaedia of home performance knowledge and has an almost uncontrollable passion for educating Kiwis about home performance. Beacon is fortunate to be able to draw on Ian’s skills and knowledge in its projects. Ian has on-the-ground knowledge of buildings and the building code and understands the challenges of achieving better home performance. He is comfortable working in a range of settings from working with group home builders and building specifiers, to school children and whānau in their homes.

In his other life, Ian is a trainer for the Home Performance Advisor training programme and continues to champion environmental projects in his local community Whaingaroa. For the last 20 years, Ian and his family have enjoyed the benefits of the high-performance home they built.

Andrea Blackmore

Andrea has been with Beacon since 2005 and is our powerhouse behind the scenes providing invaluable communications and research support for Beacon Pathway projects. She works in projects, particularly on data analysis and reporting, and disseminates Beacon’s research via our newsletter and website.