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Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
CHAIRMAN - Board of Directors
ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR.'s reputation as a resolute defender of the environment stems from a litany of successful legal actions: prosecuting governments and companies for polluting the Hudson River and Long Island Sound; winning settlements for the Hudson Riverkeeper; arguing cases to expand citizen access to the shoreline, and suing sewage treatment plants to force compliance with the Clean Water Act. "He's a pioneering environmental attorney who has established whole new standards for governmental and industrial compliance with environmental laws,"said former Hudson Riverkeeper John Cronin.
Mr. Kennedy serves as Senior Attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, Chief Prosecuting Attorney for the Hudson Riverkeeper and President of the Waterkeeper Alliance. He is also a Clinical Professor and Supervising Attorney at the Pace Environmental Litigation Clinic at Pace University School of Law in New York. Earlier in his career he served as Assistant District Attorney in New York City. He has worked on several political campaigns and was state coordinator for Edward M. Kennedy's 1980 Presidential Campaign. He has worked on environmental issues across the Americas and has assisted several indigenous tribes in Latin America and Canada in successfully negotiating treaties protecting traditional homelands. He is credited with leading the fight to protect New York City's water supply. The New York City watershed agreement, which he negotiated on behalf of environmentalists and New York City watershed consumers, is regarded as an international model in stakeholder consensus negotiations and sustainable development. He helped lead the fight to turn back the anti-environmental legislation during the 104th Congress.
Among Mr. Kennedy's published books are Crimes Against Nature (2004), The Riverkeepers (1997), New York State Apprentice Falconer's Manual, (1987), and Judge Frank M. Johnson, Jr: A Biography (1977).
His articles have appeared in the New York Times, Atlantic Monthly, The Wall Street Journal, Esquire, The Village Voice, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, Pace Environmental Law Review, Rolling Stone, and other publications.
Mr. Kennedy is a graduate of Harvard University. He studied at the London School of Economics and received his law degree from the University of Virginia Law School. Following graduation he attended Pace University School of Law, where he was awarded a Masters Degree in Environmental Law.
He is a licensed master falconer, and, as often as possible, he pursues a life-long enthusiasm for white-water paddling. He has organized and led several expeditions to Latin America, including first descents on three little known rivers in Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela.
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Alex Matthiessen
Board of Directors
Alex Matthiessen is the Hudson River’s most visible and aggressive advocate. With the help of a team of attorneys and the Pace Environmental Litigation Clinic, he investigates potential threats to the watershed and enforces environmental law in order to safeguard the Hudson River valley and the New York City drinking water supply. In his capacity as Executive Director, Alex oversees the fundraising and outreach operations of Riverkeeper, Inc., a rapidly growing organization currently comprised of 20 staff.
Alex came to Riverkeeper in 2000 from the U.S. Department of Interior, where he served as Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary on matters of special importance to Secretary Bruce Babbitt. Alex’s primary responsibility was overseeing a government-wide task force to reform the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s hydropower licensing process. While at the Department of the Interior, Alex also conceived and developed the Green Energy Parks initiative, a joint program of the National Parks Service and the Department of Energy, which promotes clean and sustainable energy use throughout the national park system. For his leadership on the project, Alex received a Presidential Award from the White House. Prior to joining the Department of the Interior, he spent a year in Indonesia as a Macroeconomic Policy Analyst for the Harvard Institute for International Development and a summer working at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. In a stint as an independent environmental consultant, Alex wrote foundation grants and authored papers on the potential social and environmental impacts of international trade liberalization. Earlier in his career, he served as the Grassroots Program Director for the Rainforest Action Network in San Francisco, organizing and managing an international network of affiliate activist groups.
Alex earned a Masters of Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University in 1995 and a Bachelor of Arts, with degrees in Biology and Environmental Studies, from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1988.
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Andrew J. Willner
Board of Directors
Formerly a sailing vessel captain, city planner, furniture designer and boat builder, Andy is presently writing two books: a history of environmental advocacy in the Hackensack Meadowlands titled, They Won’t Shop and They Won’t Work and a mystery novel tentatively titled, The Bayshore. As a teacher and speaker, he has run workshops and symposia in environmental advocacy and practice, and has spoken at, chaired and participated in panels at regional and national conferences on subjects such as: the Public Trust Doctrine, Port vs. Estuary, the State of the Harbor, Storm Water and Metal Recycling, Environmental Advocacy and Ecological Democracy. In the past decade, Andy has served as a member of many environmental organizations, including the NY/NJ Harbor Estuary Program’s Habitat Work Group, the Dredge Materials Management Work Group, the Hackensack Meadowlands Special Area Management Plan, the Hackensack Meadowlands Partnership, and the Keyport, NJ Planning Commission and Environmental Commission. Among his awards is a UNEP 500 Environmental Program Achiever from the U.S. Committee for the United Nations Environmental Program, the Stewardship Recognition Award from New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, and the “Hero of the Harbor” Award at the 1999 Waterfront Conference of the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance. Since 1989, Andy has served as Executive Director of the NY/NJ Baykeeper, an affiliate and subsidiary of the American Littoral Society, a national conservation organization concerned with coastal issues.
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Bruce Reznik
Board of Directors
Bruce Reznik, a California licensed attorney specializing in environmental law, joined San Diego BayKeeper as Executive Director/BayKeeper in August 1999, where he directs the organization’s advocacy and outreach efforts to protect the region's bays and coastal waters. Under his leadership, BayKeeper has grown to a staff of eight, making it the largest clean water advocacy organization in the region. During his tenure, BayKeeper launched its successful Environmental Law & Policy Clinic, its Bi-national Citizen Water Monitoring Program and its Kelp Restoration project. Bruce is a Gray Davis’ appointee to the statewide AB 982 Public Advisory Group assisting the State Water Resources Control Board in its implementation water quality programs, and he also sits on the City of San Diego’s Clean Water Taskforce, co-chaired by Mayor Murphy and Councilmember Scott Peters. He is the Vice President of the California CoastKeeper Alliance and a member of several Board of Directors, including Vote The Coast, the League of Conservation Voters (San Diego chapter), and The San Diego United Way. Bruce was named the 2001 “Outstanding Young San Diegan” by the San Diego Junior Chamber of Commerce, and San Diego City Councilmember Donna Frye recognized his work with “Bruce Reznik Day” on June 24, 2001. Bruce graduated from the University of California Berkeley with a degree in Political Science, the University of San Diego School of Law, where he earned his Juris Doctor, and the George Washington University, where he completed environmental law coursework. Prior to joining BayKeeper, Bruce was the Senior Associate at Gladstein & Associates, a Los Angeles-based consulting firm specializing in air quality, alternative fuel and advanced transportation projects.
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Casi Callaway
Board of Directors
Casi (kc) Callaway is from Mobile, Alabama and graduated with a degree in Philosophy and Ecology from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. While in school, she held her first environmental organizing position as the Southeastern Regional College Campus Coordinator for Earth Day 1990.
As Baykeeper and Executive Director of Mobile Bay Watch Inc./Mobile Baykeeper, Ms. Callaway is responsible for coordinating public education; community organizing; research and fundraising. MBK has more than 2,400 members and deals with issues such as sewage, air toxics, mercury exposure, permit violations and industrial growth. The organization focuses on air and water quality issues, water quantity, health, and the protection of our natural resources.
Two governors have appointed Ms. Callaway to the Mobile Bay National Estuary Program’s Management Committee, the Gulf of Mexico Program’s Citizen Advisory Committee and Management Committee, the Alabama Commission on Environmental Initiatives, the Coastal Resources Advisory Council and the Scenic Byways Advisory Committee. She also serves on the Boards of the Alabama Rivers Alliance, Gulf Restoration Network, the Scenic Causeway Coalition and the Steering Committee for the Mobile County Air Quality Study.
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Cheryl Nenn
Board of Directors
Milwaukee Riverkeeper Cheryl Nenn earned a B.S. in Biology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1994 and an M.S. in Resource Ecology and Management from the University of Michigan School of Natural Resources and Environment in 1999. Her master’s thesis research investigated the conservation and management of the Columbia spotted frog (candidate species) and Lahontan cutthroat trout (federally threatened species) on federally managed lands in central and northeast Nevada. Before joining FMR, her job experience included: consulting on environmental projects and writing environmental assessments for the U.S. Forest Service, as well as writing management plans for Wisconsin DOT wetland mitigation sites; providing forestry and wildlife related information to private landowners in southeast Michigan for the Michigan DNR and Dept. of Agriculture; and helping manage forest restoration, reforestation, and erosion control projects for the City of New York, Department of Parks and Recreation. She also served as a forestry extension/environmental education Peace Corps volunteer in Ecuador, and as a Crisis Corps volunteer in Honduras, helping with community rebuilding and reforestation projects after Hurricane Mitch.
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Dean Naujoks
Board of Directors
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Deb Self
TREASURER- Board of Directors
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Erick Bozzi II
Board of Directors
Erick Bozzi II, Founder and Director, STAR ECO Station.
Erick is Founder and Director of STAR ECO Stations in Sacramento, San
Francisco, and Culver City. The Culver City ECO Station is an official
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Rescue Center and Environmental Science Education
Center that houses over 100 species of tropical and exotic animals from
around the globe. A trained biologist, Erick is ECO Station's Wildlife
Instructor and presents for 32 school districts.
Erick has received many awards for his efforts to protect wildlife.
Among them are Commendations from California Governor Davis, Los Angeles
County, and Culver City, as well as the Environmental Education Award
from the Los Angeles World Trust Foundation. Erick also serves on the
Board of Directors of the Latino American Association in Boyle Heights,
California and on the Boards of STAR Education and Cartagena Baykeeper in Colombia. Erick has worked
extensively with Latin American Waterkeeper programs, and serves as the Latin American Representative on the Waterkeeper Alliance board.
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Fred Tutman
Board of Directors
Fred Tutman was born and raised along the Patuxent River as were seven generations of his ancestors before him. Prior to founding Patuxent Riverkeeper in 2004, Fred operated a business that provided professional media and mass communication services internationally. As a freelance video journalist he covered the Falklands War on behalf of the BBC and worked on many other breaking news stories on four continents for U.S. and foreign television and radio networks including CBS, NBS, ABC and also Canadian and other international broadcasters. Operating from an office in Rome, Italy during the mid-1980’s Fred saw much of the world from a newsgathering perspective before feeling a decided pull toward public interest advocacy, and particularly water quality advocacy. Through the 1990’s Fred worked as a media scriptwriter, Director, Producer, on air announcer and in many other creative and production roles in television, radio and satellite communications. In the early part of this decade Fred worked as a Ford Foundation funded consult teaching computer and media production skills to Ford Foundation grantees in several West African countries. Fred also worked as volunteer activist in the Patuxent for over 20 years until the momentum of the volunteer environmental work overcame his media career and the challenge of Riverkeeping beckoned. As Riverkeeper for the Patuxent, Fred works on a continuum of issues and concerns and including land preservation, stormwater reform, point source pollution and environmental justice where his media background and grassroots experience have been a valuable asset.
Fred is a recipient of numerous awards and recognitions for his work on behalf of environmental causes and issues in Maryland. He also serves on a variety of Boards, Task Forces and Commissions related to the work of protecting the Patuxent. Among them, Fred serves on the Board of the Environmental Integrity Project and also as a Governor appointed Commissioner on the State’s Patuxent River Commission.
He has a Master of Arts degree in Media Management from, Beacon College, attended two years of full time law school at David A. Clarke School of Law in Washington, DC before transferring into a part time program where he is presently completing his law degree. Fred is an adjunct professor at Historic St. Mary’s College of Maryland where he teaches an upper level course in Environmental Law and Policy. He is an avid kayaker and backpacker on locations all over the world, and helps to maintain trails on the Appalachian Trail.
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Joe Payne
Board of Directors
Joe Payne, Casco Baykeeper, was the first full-time employee of Friends of Casco Bay, which was a volunteer, grassroots organization until he was hired to be the professional steward of Casco Bay. Joe left the environmental consulting firm, Normandeau Associates, where he had worked as a marine biologist for 12 years to become the Casco Baykeeper. A native Portlander who summered on Peaks Island as a child and the grandson of a fisherman, Joe is guided by both a passionate love for the Bay and an understanding of its physical and biological dynamics. Under his leadership, FOCB implemented programs that combined environmental protection with economic pragmatism.
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Karl Coplan
SECRETARY- Board of Directors
Professor Coplan is co-director of the Environmental Litigation Clinic at Pace University. Eight years prior to joining the Pace faculty, he practiced land use and environmental litigation in New York City with the firm Berle, Kass & Case. Professor Coplan’s career in private practice includes numerous environmental and civil rights cases on behalf of citizens groups and plaintiffs. Two such cases were Houston v. City of Cocoa, which applied federal environmental review laws to federally financed municipal redevelopment activities designed to displace a minority community, and County of Westchester v. Town of Greenwich, which established that an airport could not cut trees on neighboring properties under a theory of prescriptive rights. Before entering private practice, he clerked for The Honorable Warren E. Burger, Chief Justice of the United States, and The Honorable Leonard I. Garth, Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.
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Mark Mattson
Board of Directors
Mark Mattson the Lake Ontario Waterkeeper. Mark is a litigator with experience in criminal defence, environmental prosecution, and administrative law. Over the past ten years, Mark acted as counsel for environmental and public interest groups in more than 40 hearings and represented clients in both Provincial and Federal courts.
In the past, Mark prosecuted environmental offenders for the Province of Ontario and recently acted as co-counsel in the environmental prosecution for private informants. Further, Mark has the unique experience of investigating environmental offences and testifying as a witness in court.
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Pete Nichols
Board of Directors
Pete is co-founder of Humboldt Baykeeper, and has been Baykeeper and Executive Director since its inception. Pete has a background in Conservation Biology and has been involved in conservation in northern California for over fifteen years.
Originally inspired from the lakes and coastal waters of his childhood home of Maine, Pete has always been an advocate for the environment. Upon arriving in northern California in 1992, Pete was deeply involved in the struggle to protect the last remnants of the region's ancient redwood forests. Prior to his arrival at Humboldt Baykeeper, Pete acted as the Project and Science Coordinator for the California Wildlands Project, a habitat-based conservation planning project of the California Wilderness Coalition.
A successful effort to defeat a proposed Liquefied Natural Gas proposal on Humboldt Bay in 2003, led Pete and others to realize that there was a need for a and strong advocate for Humboldt Bay and coastal waters of the north coast of California. In October of 2004, Humboldt Baykeeper was formed, and has been a strong voice for the Bay and coast ever since.
Located on California’s rugged north coast, roughly 250 miles north of the Golden Gate Bridge, Humboldt Bay is California’s second largest natural bay. This picturesque Bay exhibits the richness of an ecologically diverse estuary, while offering a variety of recreational activities such as kayaking, sailing, sport fishing, bird watching, and hiking. Humboldt Bay also boasts a vibrant fishing culture. Commercial fishing in and around the Bay is a significant part of the local economy, and emblematic of the region’s cultural heritage. Humboldt Bay has a productive commercial salmon, albacore, and Dungeness crab fishing fleet, and also produces 90% of the oysters harvested in California.
Unfortunately, these ecologically important systems are being threatened by toxic pollution, sedimentation from industrial logging, and poorly planned development. Despite clear evidence of water pollution problems and habitat loss, very little has been done to reverse the alarming trend of degradation in Humboldt Bay. Humboldt Baykeeper has been successful in identifying severely contaminated sites around Humboldt Bay and in late 2007 reached settlement with one of the largest timber companies in the Pacific Northwest to clean-up one of the most significant contributors to Humboldt Bay’s dioxin pollution problem.
In addition to serving on the Waterkeeper Alliance Board of Directors, Pete is also the Secretary of the Board of the California Coastkeeper Alliance, and the President of the Northcoast Environmental Center, a bioregional conservation organization for northwest California and southern Oregon.
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Richard (Rick) J. Dove
Board of Directors (Honorary)
Rick Dove has been Waterkeeper Alliance's Southeast Representative since July 2000. A former Riverkeeper, Rick spends much of his time training new Waterkeeper programs. He also works alongside Jeff Odefey on the Alliance’s Sustainable Agriculture campaign. Before serving as the southeastern representative for Waterkeeper Alliance, Rick enjoyed a varied career that began with two tours in Vietnam with the United States Marine Corps, for which he later served as a military courts-martial judge, Congressional Liaison and Provost-Marshal. After retiring from the military, Rick commercially fished the Neuse River and owned and operated a wholesale fish store until 1991. He then practiced civilian law until becoming the Neuse Riverkeeper in 1993, a post he held until the year 2000. As the river’s spokesperson, Rick has been in more than 4000 news stories in both major and local media, and his work was detailed in a chapter of the 1997 Simon and Schuster book, And the Waters Turned to Blood. From 1996-1998, Rick was the Governor’s appointee to the Neuse River Basin Advisory Council, during which time he was asked to testify before the U.S. Congress Committee on Resources, Fisheries Conservation, Wildlife and Oceans Subcommittee on the microorganism Pfiesteria Piscidia and its effects on the river. In 1999, Rick was named one of “100 People Who Have Shaped the North Carolina in the past Century” by the Raleigh News and Observer, and in 2000 he received the Environmental Protection Agency’s IV Merit Award. In 2001, Rick received an Appreciation Award from the Alliance for a Responsible Swine Industry, and later that year he was given the Nancy Susan Reynolds Award for Advocacy. In 2002 he again testified for the government as an invited witness before the U.S. Senate Committee, Government Affairs about pollution from industrial animal factories. Rick graduated from the Baltimore School of Law in 1962, and from the National War College in 1980.
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Terry Backer
VICE CHAIRMAN - Board of Directors
Terry Backer is the appointed Soundkeeper and Executive Director of the Long Island Soundkeeper Fund, Inc., whose mission it is to protect and enhance the environmental integrity of Long Island Sound. He oversees all projects with approval from the Board of Directors. A third generation fishermen long-active in his family’s shellfishing business, Terry has fished Long Island Sound for much of his working life. He has also fished the Pacific Northwest and Alaska for salmon and is a United States Coast Guard licensed master.
Terry built a reputation on the Sound by monitoring and patrolling its waters and watershed, tracking down polluters and making them accountable for violations. Today he monitors the regulatory processes for projects that may jeopardize the biological integrity of the Sound, and he develops programs that will make a difference in the future of the waterbody.
Terry has been a State Representative from Connecticut’s 121st District (Stratford) since 1992 and serves as Vice Chair of the Appropriations committee. Terry is also a member of the Environment committee, Energy and Technologies committee and Regulations Review committee. His duties include overseeing budgets for ten state agencies totaling over three billion dollars annually. He was appointed by Governor Weicker to serve on Connecticut's Council on Environmental Quality from 1990 to 1992, and he was appointed by Senate President Pro Tempore to serve on the Long Island Sound Advisory Council. Moreover, Terry is an advisor to shellfishing and environmental organizations concerned with water quality both in Long Island Sound and in estuaries around the nation, and he is a founding member of the Long Island Sound Watershed Alliance. He has been a member of the Interstate Shellfish Sanitation Conference since 1988, and he is currently an Executive Board Member.
Terry has been honored by the U.S. Committee for the United Nations Environment Programme for his contributions in protecting the Earth's Environment. Additionally, under Terry's leadership, Soundkeeper received an Environmental Achievement Award from Renew America, a national environmental organization based in Washington D.C. Soundkeeper was selected by leaders of the nation's environmental community for its success in protecting the environment, while serving as a model for similar organizations around the country.
Terry Backer lives in Stratford, Connecticut and has two sons, Jacob and Luke.
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