Board and Staff

Officers

• Tom Cahill, President
• Lenny Corin, Vice President
• Christopher Mathews, Secretary
• Paul Goldfinger, Treasurer

Board Members

• Sandy Barney
• John Boone
• Tom Campbell
• Ken Cohen
• Grant Heiken
• Phyllis Kind
• Todd Peterson
• Dyanne Sheldon
• Leigh Smith

Staff

• Patricia Powell, Executive Director
• Jan Graham, Outreach Associate
• Elizabeth Guss, Director of Development and Outreach
• Christin Hilton, Land Protection Specialist
• Jessica Larson, Stewardship Associate
• Danielle Rideout, Program Associate
• Carrie Viers, Operations Manager

Board of Directors

SANDY BARNEY attended Central Methodist University and was a flight attendant for United Airlines for 37 years. She has been a long time active member of the League of Women Voters of Seattle, serving four years on the board, two as co-president. She and her husband moved to Freeland from Seattle in 2007 and immediately became Land Trust supporters and volunteers. She also enjoys volunteering with Learning Partners and the M Bar C Ranch.

 

JOHN BOONE served as a surgeon in the U.S. Navy Medical Corps retiring in 2007. His favorite WCLT project is the Hammons Preserve, where his son led the building of a footbridge as an Eagle Scout project. John loves to work restoring the land and hopes to recruit more volunteers for the WCLT. He lives north of Greenbank with his son and daughter.

 

TOM CAHILL is a retired attorney who practiced law in Palo Alto, California with the law firm of Lakin Spears. He was its Managing Partner for the last twenty years of his career. Tom and his wife Sally have been residents of Whidbey Island since 2003, have been supportive of various community organizations and are active land trust volunteers. Tom is currently the President of the North Beverly Beach Association.

 

TOM CAMPBELL is retired from the US Navy after a career that included command of an aviation squadron and departmental leadership on an aircraft carrier. Tom holds a business degree from University of Florida and an MBA from University of Chicago. Following his career with the Navy, Tom worked in the public and private sectors. Tom resides in Langley and is an avid nature photographer, birder, and fly fisherman. He is also a member of the Whidbey Audubon Society and Island County Beach Watchers.

 

KEN COHEN retired as Vice President and Treasurer of Intermec, Inc., a NYSE listed multinational corporation. Ken is a CPA, graduated from the City College of New York and received a JD from Case Western Reserve University and an MBA from the University of California, Berkeley. Ken and his wife, Susan, moved to Langley in 2003. Ken is active in the community and also serves on the Board of WICA (Whidbey Island Center for the Arts).

 

LENNY CORIN recently retired from a thirty year career in natural resource management with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service.  With a Bachelor’s in Wildlife Conservation from Cornell University and a Master’s from Northern Michigan University, focusing on wetlands management, Lenny worked on a variety of restoration projects throughout the country including places like the Great Lakes and Alaska. Lenny resides in Oak Harbor.

 

PAUL GOLDFINGER served as a school finance consultant to school districts and county education offices in California for over 30 years and brings to the board budgeting and lobbying experience. Now retired, Paul is active in the community and also serves on the Langley Community Club board. He enjoys hiking and recently co-founded a men’s hiking group. Paul lives in Langley.

 

GRANT HEIKEN worked for NASA during the Apollo Program, in the Lunar Receiving Laboratory, as a geology instructor and researcher. In 1975 he and his wife moved to the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory in New Mexico, where he was a researcher in the geological sciences. He has co-written or edited 10 books. Retired in 2003, he lives on Whidbey Island, with his wife Jody, who is a scientific editor. Heiken volunteers for several service organizations and is on Island County’s Water Resources Advisory Committee.

 

PHYLLIS KIND retired from a career in academia at the George Washington University as Professor Emerita of Microbiology and Immunology and of Genetics. She holds a B.A. from the University of Montana and an M.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. She moved to Whidbey Island in 1999 and became acquainted with the environmental issues on our islands by taking the Beach Watcher training course. She is dedicated to preserving the rural atmosphere and the beautiful wildlife habitats on our islands. She an active member of the Whidbey Audubon Society and co-directs the Pigeon Guillemot Research Project. She enjoys walking our beaches, birding, kayaking and playing with her pooch.

 

CHRISTOPHER MATHEWS is a physician experienced in executive, operational, and professional leadership within the U.S. healthcare system. For the past seven years, he has been with the Community Health Network (CHNW) and the Community Health Plan of Washington State (CHPW) where he serves as Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer. These organizations share a mission of providing quality health care for disadvantaged populations across Washington State and currently serve over 700,000 Washington residents yearly. He has served on various non-profit boards and is passionate about giving back to his community.He believes that the health of our island population can be favorably influenced by the stewardship activities of the Land Trust. Christopher has been a resident of Greenbank since 2003 where he spends a lot of time in his perennial gardens and enjoys exploring the spectacular natural environment of Whidbey.

 

TODD PETERSON is a public involvement facilitator and consultant on environmental and community issues. He earned a B.A. with Honors in English from Dartmouth College and an M.A. in Education from Stanford. Todd served on the board of directors for the South Whidbey School District and International Association for Public Participation. He is the editor and a writer for BirdNote, broadcast on Seattle’s National Public Radio affiliate, KPLU. He and his wife, Chris, have owned land on Whidbey since 1978. He enjoys beekeeping, fly fishing and hiking the bluff at Ebey’s Landing.

 

DYANNE SHELDON is a semi-retired restoration ecologist who has been working on Whidbey since the early 1990′s. She was the first Wetland Planner for King County, and then ran her own environmental consulting firm specializing in aquatic resources, land-management planning, and wetland issues for 16 years. After merging with a larger civil/planning firm she continued to work on a wide range of environmental and permitting issues. She teaches through the University of Washington for the Professional Certificate in Wetland Science and Management. She has a Bachelors of Science in Botany from the University of Minnesota and a Masters in Education from Arizona State University. She has lived on Whidbey since 2002 and spends a lot of her time gardening, birding, fishing, walking, and being grateful for this opportunity to give back to the natural environment.

 

LEIGH SMITH is a retired National Park Service natural resource specialist. He has a degree in American History from Western Washington University, and a good deal of natural resource training from NPS programs. He has lived in Coupeville and Seattle since 1992.He retired in 2008 after working 27 years for the NPS in a variety of parks, including 8 years in Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve. During that time, he served on the Land Trust Board in 2006-2008 as a non-voting Liaison to the NPS and is glad to be back. He spends his free time walking, reading, knitting, and destroying invasive exotic weeds.

Staff

PATRICIA POWELL, executive director, was hired in January 2003, as the first staff for the Whidbey Camano Land Trust. Pat has extensive experience in land protection, grant writing, and natural resource planning and management. Her successes include acquiring and protecting over 250 conservation properties, totaling well over 75,000 acres, and working on numerous grants that awarded nearly $100 million to land acquisition projects. Before joining the Land Trust, Pat owned a successful land protection consulting business. Prior to that, she was the Director of Land Protection for The Nature Conservancy of Washington. She was also the Special Lands Acquisition and Trust Land Transfer manager for the Washington State Department of Natural Resources. Pat has experience working in small communities and rural areas, having been a planner for San Juan County and a natural resource planner in Alaska for eight years. She resides in Greenbank.

 

JAN GRAHAM, outreach associate, joined the Land Trust in September of 2006. She has a background in technical writing, training, and project management. Jan has a B.A. in English and a teaching credential in elementary education. She lives in Coupeville with her husband Dick and two cats on a property with a scenic easement.

 

ELIZABETH GUSS, director of development and outreach, began with the Land Trust staff in 2007. With extensive experience in both the business and non-profit world in Utah and Washington, she has founded and nurtured organizations through management, organizational development, and marketing work. Earning a BA at the University of San Francisco, California and an MA at St. Mary’s University in Minnesota, she infuses daily tasks with a sense of purpose and achieves goals with enthusiasm and cheerfulness. Moving to Whidbey Island in 2004, she served for three years as the director of the nationally recognized Whidbey Island Writers Conference. Passionate about caring for the land and building the community, she believes in inviting everyone to help create a vibrant, healthy environment. She and her husband, Steve, live near Langley in a home that overlooks the Saratoga Passage.

 

CHRIS HILTON, land protection specialist, began working at the Land Trust in May of 2007. Chris came to the Land Trust from The Nature Conservancy where she spent three years working in operations followed by seven years working on land conservation projects in Washington. She has extensive experience managing and negotiating land acquisitions for protection. A native of western Washington, Chris has long been passionate about conservation of the Pacific Northwest’s habitat and history. She has a B.S. in Landscape Ecology from Western Washington University. In her spare time, Chris enjoys knitting and spending time outdoors.

 

JESSICA LARSON, stewardship associate, joined the Land Trust in October 2008. Her background is in forest management, flood restoration, and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Prior to joining the Land Trust, Jessica worked with Mount Rainier National Park and Longview Timber. She received her B.S. in Environmental Science and Resource Management from the University of Washington and a certificate in GIS from Green River Community College. She lives near Langley where she helps her family operate a small farm. Jessica enjoys running, hiking, triathlons, logging sports and volunteering for the local fire department/Red Cross.

 

DANIELLE RIDEOUT, program associate, began working for the Land Trust in September of 2006. Prior to joining the Land Trust, she was a city planner for the City of Champaign, Illinois for five years. Danielle has a B.A. in urban planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and has experience in comprehensive and neighborhood planning. She also studied in Sheffield, England for one year to gain an international perspective on planning issues. In her free time, Danielle enjoys trail running, camping, quilting, and collecting stamps from National Parks. She resides in Oak Harbor.

 

CARRIE VIERS, operations manager, joined the Land Trust in 2008. Carrie started with us part-time as our Bookkeeper and then became the full-time Operations Manager and Bookkeeper. She brings 25 years of accounting/bookkeeping experience to keep the finances straight as well as extensive office/operations experience in various organizations.  Moving to Whidbey in 2006, she enjoys gardening, exploring the outdoors, caring for her chickens, and spending time with her husband and children. She resides in Clinton where she also makes a phenomenal raspberry jam.