The Lomakatsi Board of Directors represents various viewpoints and areas of expertise to guide the organization most inclusively and effectively. We appreciate all that our Board Members do to strengthen and sustain the success of Lomakatsi’s programs.

President

Tonia Red Eagle-Gonzalez

Tonia Red Eagle has worked in Native American communities extensively for more than three decades.  She brings a deep and nuanced understanding of area tribes and the issues facing tribal communities in our region to the Board of Directors.  Her capacity to support Lomakatsi’s Tribal Partnerships Program through detailed knowledge of area tribes is invaluable to the organization.  She brings a wealth of relationships with tribes in the region to the leadership of Lomakatsi, and has years of experience working in communities in which Lomakatsi’s economic and workforce development programs have been impactful.

Tonia currently works as the Recreation Therapist and Coordinator for the American Indian/Alaska Native Program at the Veterans Administration (VA) Southern Oregon Rehabilitation Center & Clinics in White City, Oregon.

Vice President

Will Sears

Will Sears has served on the Lomakatsi Board of Directors since 2003 and is a former Board President.

He has a degree in Political Science from the University of Washington and has completed 3 years of postgraduate study in Anthropology at Portland State University. Will has also studied at the American University of Beirut and The University of the Philippines.

Will is currently a semi-retired contractor, woodworker and artist and also serves on the Boards of Directors of the Birch Creek Arts and Ecology Center and the Health Research Institute, among others.

As his father’s career involved designing and supervising landscape restoration projects, first for the U.S. Forest Service and later, the United Nations, Will was literally born into the ethos of restoration. For the last 35 years, Will has carefully studied and encouraged natural process as he has steadily worked toward the healing and management of his own 40 acre home property in the forested mountains of Southern Oregon.

Treasurer

Carl Wilmsen, Ph.D.

Carl joined the Lomakatsi Board in 2009. Carl is the Executive Director of the Northwest Forest Worker Center (NFWC). With a Ph.D. in geography from Clark University (Worcester, Massachusetts), he specializes in social justice in the management of U.S. public lands, the intersection of race and environmental issues, and participatory research methods. Prior to joining NFWC, Carl was Program Director of Community Forestry and Environmental Research Partnerships at the University of California, Berkeley. He has served on the advisory boards of several community forestry groups. He has also evaluated sustainable agriculture programs, worked as an oral historian, and (before college) worked as an apple picker and orchard hand, landscape laborer, school bus driver, and truck driver. He has authored several book chapters and journal articles on race and the environment, oral history methodology and participatory research. He is also co-editor of Partnerships for Empowerment: Participatory Research for Community-Based Natural Resource Management (Earthscan, 2008).

Secretary

Belinda Brown

Belinda has been with Lomakatsi Restoration Project for 6 years as a consultant and currently serves as the Tribal Partnerships Director and Secretary of the Lomakatsi Board of Directors.

She is honored to bring the voice of tribal communities to the leadership of Lomakatsi and work to maintain their integrity as the first, best stewards of the land, incorporating Indigenous Traditional Ecological Knowledge into our policies, procedures and protocols and assisting the development of the tribal youth curriculum, positive youth development and live classroom environments where experiential learning takes place.

Belinda served a term on the California Rural Indian Health Board as a tribal delegate for the Pit River Tribe, and was an ex-officio board member for Modoc Indian Health Project/Strong Family Health Center for six years as the Executive Director of an Indian Health Service, tribal nonprofit. She has held elected office for the Pit River Tribal government, including council and cultural representative. She has served on advisory and steering committees for many health and human services organizations, including the Commission on Children and Families, Prop 36 Steering Committee, First 5, Harney County Partners for Children and Families, Inter-Tribal Council of California Board Advisory Committee appointee.

Belinda excels at building partnerships between NGOs, government agencies, and Tribal governments.

Board Member

Robert Brothers, Ph.D.

As a Harvard and UC Berkeley graduate, Robert has dedicated his life’s work to advocating balance between protection and use through sustainable forestry. Having worked for multiple nonprofits and written numerous articles and newsletters, he has led the initiative for a “path to volume” via thinning of inventoried plantations on federal lands, a path Lomakatsi is guided by. The following article illustrates his work:  Respectful Forestry: Forest Ecosystems Could Serve Us Generously if We Would Work with Them.

Robert was on the Lomakatsi Board from 2001 to 2003, and again since 2008. He served as Treasurer for eight years. During this time he co-authored Lomakatsi Restoration Project’s “Ecological Principles” with Marko Bey.  In 2005 he co-founded the Agnes Baker Pilgrim Fund with Julie Norman.  He is currently the Board President of Earth Devotion Support, a non-profit group based in California who has sponsored the multi-cultural ceremony, Blessing Mount Ashland, since 2007. Most recently, he has started a collaborative, wiki new service from the Facebook page titled GoodNews FortheEarth, with over 1,100 members worldwide.

Board Member

Braulio Cortez Maya

Braulio Cortez Maya has worked for Lomakatsi since 2004, and serves as the Lead Restoration Crew Manager, overseeing all on-the-ground workforce personnel operations.  He brings a strong background in reforestation, forestry and wildland fire management, primarily in the Pacific Northwest, as well as across multiple western states, working for private forestry contractors on federal, state and industry timber lands.

His current responsibilities include directing forest restoration crew members in ecological thinning, slash treatments, prescribed burning, tree planting and other re-vegetation projects. The majority of my work is performed in the field, working directly with and managing the daily activities of a 10-person Latino workforce.

He serves as Lomakatsi’s cross cultural workforce liaison engaging Latino, Native American and Euro-American workers, utilizing not only his years of forestry and restoration implementation experience, but also my Spanish/English bi-lingual skills to direct operations. He additionally serves as one of Lomakatsi’s key workforce training staff, mentoring workers in ecological forestry techniques and restoration application skills, from entry level, to advanced.

Board Member (Ex Officio) and Executive Director

Marko Bey

Executive Director and Lomakatsi’s Founder, Marko oversees all aspects of the organization’s efforts, working in close coordination with the Board of Directors.  Marko’s central focus is on program and organizational development, project procurement, planning and operations. His other responsibilities include grant writing and fundraising, technical planning, and the management of cooperative agreements, stewardship agreements and contracts.

Lomakatsi’s ten regional ecosystem restoration programs and associated workforce initiatives are a primary result of his work.  Most essential has been his leadership in the orchestration and formation of collaborative partnerships — partnerships that are strengthened by a wide variety of stakeholders, including federal and state agencies, Indian tribes, organizations, private landowners and community members.

Marko also serves as one of the core members of Lomakatsi’s Technical Team, working closely with the organization’s staff of ecosystem resource professionals on the overall design of ecological forestry projects, silvicultural prescriptions, habitat restoration and watershed enhancement projects.

Beginning as a tree planter working on federal lands in 1987, Marko has over thirty years of experience in forestry and ecosystem restoration, from the ground up.  He has worked throughout six western states and a variety of ecological communities, most extensively in the forests and watersheds of southern Oregon and northern California.  With an applied knowledge of restoration practice and local landscape conditions, he has researched, studied, and developed a wide range of ecological forestry and watershed restoration practices.  Specific areas of on-the-ground expertise include riparian, oak woodland and mixed conifer restoration, reforestation, restoration forestry, fuels management, technical work, and the development and direction of worker training programs.

Working locally and regionally to advance the full spectrum of ecosystem restoration, green job creation and forest-based community revitalization, Marko serves as the Board President of the Northwest Forest Worker Center, as a Board member of the Southern Oregon Forest Restoration Collaborative, and as member of the Klamath-Siskiyou Oak Network. Marko also participates in a variety of strategic coalitions, committees and interdisciplinary teams, both regionally and nationally, contributing to the development and advancement of community-based ecological restoration.

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