Justin Elicker FES ’10 SOM ’10, former Ward 10 Alder and candidate for mayor, was named Thursday the part-time Executive Director of the New Haven Land Trust.

“I am thrilled to take on this challenge…” Elicker said in a statement issued by the Land Trust, a land conservation and environmental education nonprofit. “I look forward to building upon the Land Trust’s strong relationships with communities throughout the city to increase access to healthy food, foster environmental stewardship and facilitate strengthening connections within and across all of New Haven’s neighborhoods.”

Elicker, first elected to the Board of Alders in 2009, served constituents in East Rock, Cedar Hill, and slices of Newhallville and Fair Haven for four years before making a bid for the mayor’s office last fall. He was the first candidate to declare his intentions to run and the only one to do so before former Mayor John DeStefano Jr. announced his plans to step down. Elicker ended up capturing 9,416 votes — or 45.34 percent — falling in a two-way contest to Mayor Toni Harp.

Elicker has also worked as an environmental consultant and has racked up a list of community and environmental activism roles that include reinvigorating the Friends of East Rock Park and co-founding New Haven Green Drinks. As an alder, he led the charge on numerous environmental initiatives, including a 2011 ban on bottled water that was ultimately quashed by Connecticut’s labor relations board.

ISAAC STANLEY-BECKER