2017 Board retreat. Top, from left: Don Goldberg, Bruce Roll, Executive Director Mike Wetter, Jonathan Nicholas, Doug Menke, Sue Marshall, Shirley Craddick, Kathleen Brennan-Hunter. Bottom, from left: Isabel LaCourse, Catherine Ciarlo, Mike Houck, Phil Wu, Mike Abbate. Photo Mike Houck.
Kathleen Brennan-Hunter, President
For the past 20 years, Kathleen Brennan-Hunter has worked on land conservation and access to nature. She is currently the director of conservation programs for The Nature Conservancy (TNC) in Oregon. Prior to joining TNC, Kathleen served as director of parks and nature for Metro Regional Government, where she led teams who acquire, restore and steward natural areas, plan and develop nature parks and regional trails, and support local communities through grants and volunteer opportunities. Before that Kathleen worked on various conservation efforts in the northern San Francisco Bay area.
Scott Archer
Scott currently serves as the director of the North Clackamas Parks and Recreation District (NCPRD). He has over 25 years of local government agency leadership in parks, recreation, and open/natural space services. Prior to his current post at NCPRD, Scott served as Parks and Recreation/Community Services Director for the cities of Oregon City, OR; Medford, OR; and Ellensburg, WA. He holds degrees in Health & Human Performance Education and Sports Management. Scott has a passion for advocating and promoting quality-of-life opportunities for our community via parks, trails, and recreational experiences. He has served on various boards & committees, including the American Parks and Recreation Association’s Pacific Northwest region, and is a current board member and past president of the Oregon Recreation and Parks Association. In addition to his professional endeavors, Archer enjoys spending time with his wife of 26 years and his three adult children.
Jon Blasher
Jon is the director of Metro’s Parks and Nature Department, where he leads an extraordinary team that protects water quality, fish and wildlife habitat, and creates opportunities to enjoy nature close to home through an interconnected system of parks, trails and natural areas. He joined the greater Portland area’s regional government in 2017. Prior to Metro, Jon spent 13 years with Playworks, a national nonprofit that believes in the power of play to bring out the best in every kid. Jon is a Senior Fellow of the American Leadership Forum of Oregon, Oregon State Parks and Recreation Commissioner, Harper’s Playground advisory council member, All Hands Raised board member, and AmeriCorps alumni. In his leisure time, he likes to play basketball, travel, play music, fly fish and spend time with his wife and sons.
Paul Henson (ex officio member)
Paul is the Oregon state supervisor for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. Paul has a B.A. in environmental studies from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a Ph.D. in wildlife biology from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. He has worked as a field biologist in Minnesota, California, Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, and Hawaii. Paul returned to the Oregon State Office after working as assistant manager in the NV-CA Office. He also served as project leader for the Pacific Islands Office for four years.
Mike Houck
Mike, executive director of the Urban Greenspaces Institute, has worked on parks, trails and natural areas, climate change, and urban biodiversity issues for 36 years. The Institute’s mission is integration of the built and natural environments, and incorporating green infrastructure for urban watershed and innovative stormwater in local and regional land use planning. He is a founding member of The Intertwine Alliance and serves on the City of Portland’s Planning and Sustainability Commission. Houck leads natural history tours throughout the metropolitan region and is coeditor of Wild in the City, A Guide to Portland’s Natural Areas, Wild in the City: Exploring The Intertwine, and the international Routledge Handbook of Urban Ecology. He is a native Portlander and holds a B. S. in zoology from Iowa State University, a MST in biology from Portland State University and was a Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.
Sue Marshall
Sue Marshall recently moved to Clark County, Washington, to co-manage her family farm in Ridgefield, after a career working in Oregon on environmental and social justice issues. Sue also serves as Vice Chair of the board of Friends of Clark County and on the board of Slow Food SW Washington. Past environmental work includes principal of Trillium Consulting, an independent government affairs consulting firm representing and providing technical assistance to several Oregon non-profits with an emphasis on issues of clean water, fish and wildlife conservation. Sue honed in on regional environmental policy issues as director of Tualatin Riverkeepers, is a skilled facilitator, and has expertise in outcome-based strategic planning, fundraising, nonprofit governance and policy analysis. She likes to kayak and is a licensed rail motor car operator.
Doug Menke
Doug was appointed general manager of the Tualatin Hills Park & Recreation District (THPRD) in 2006. He oversees delivery of high-quality park and recreation programs, services and facilities to more than 240,000 people in the greater Beaverton area. Doug has worked for THPRD for over 30 years. He is also active in his community, serving as a board member for the Beaverton Area Chamber of Commerce and the Beaverton Urban Redevelopment Agency.
Jonathan Nicholas
Born and raised in the coal-mining valleys of Wales, Jonathan graduated from the University of Bristol then spent four years working on a series of international aid projects in the Himalayas. In 1982, he joined The Oregonian newspaper where he spent 25 years writing a column that served as a breakfast table staple for our state. In 1988, Nicholas invited readers to join him on a week-long bicycle ride across Oregon. Each September since, thousands of cyclists – now coming from all over the world – join him on Cycle Oregon. In 2008, Nicholas says, he decided the time had come to stop writing about what ought to be done and start actually doing something. He joined Moda, Inc., where he serves as a vice president, helping Oregonians reform the way they provide and pay for healthcare. Jonathan currently serves as president of The Intertwine Alliance board of directors.
Bruce Roll
As watershed management department director for Clean Water Services of Washington County, Bruce manages staff working on water resources infrastructure, watershed ecology, and policy and marketplace development. Prior to joining Clean Water Services, he served as assistant director of public works for Whatcom County in Bellingham, Washington, where he oversaw storm water management and water resources protection programs. Bruce has over 20 years experience protecting public health and the environment.
Noah Siegel
Noah Siegel is a senior policy advisor to the Metro Government for the greater Portland region. He focuses on infrastructure strategies for natural areas, transportation and land use. Noah works directly with the elected Metro president and council and the chief operating officer to deliver desired outcomes for the region. During his time at Metro, Noah has seen the launch of the Willamette Falls Riverwalk and a successful renewal of the regional Natural Areas Levy. Before joining Metro in 2013, he worked as director of international affairs and policy director in two successive mayoral administrations in the City of Portland. In that capacity, he initiated a highly successful partnership with the Brookings Institution and developed one of the first Metro Export Initiatives in the country. Previously, Noah served as a foreign service officer with the Department of State, working as an economic attaché in Israel, Yemen and Washington. Noah has a Master’s Degree from the Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy at Tufts University and a BA from the University of Michigan. He is married with two daughters.
Owen Wozniak
Owen was formerly a project manager with The Trust for Public Land, leading conservation projects and related policy work in Oregon and Washington. Reflecting The Trust for Public Land's mission of land for people, Owen’s work includes urban community gardens, parks and natural area acquisitions, community forests, and habitat protection on private land. Owen currently represents The Trust for Public Land in the Coalition of Oregon Land Trusts, The Intertwine Alliance, the Rivers to Ridges Partnership, and the Oregon Department of Forestry's State Forest Stewardship Coordinating Committee. He is also author of Biking Portland (Mountaineers Books, 2011). In his spare time, he loves to explore Oregon and Washington on skis and take his five year-old son on bike rides.
Philip Wu
Philip is a pediatrician and member of the Community Benefit team at Kaiser Permanente Northwest and works to promote healthy, equitable communities through policy advocacy and system changes through the lens of the “social determinants of health.” He serves on the boards of the Northwest Health Foundation, Oregon Oral Health Coalition, Outside In, Westside Transportation Alliance and the Community Cycling Center. He is a member of the transportation committee of the Westside Economic Alliance, the Washington County Transportation Futures Study project, and Metro’s Equity Strategy Advisory Committee. He previously served on ODOT’s Transportation Options Policy Advisory Committee, the Advisory Board of the Initiative for Bicycle and Pedestrian Innovation at PSU, the Board of Upstream Public Health, and Metro’s Blue Ribbon Committee for Trails.