Selected Projects
Meeting Facilitation and Mediation
Making constructive and implementable decisions on community and public issues require effectively bringing people together. Before that can happen successfully, a framework for success involves several steps. Assessing the situation and planning for an effective meeting or series of meetings is the critical first step. The next step is to ensure all those who need to be included are, and next to conduct the meetings as inclusive, collaborative and outcome-oriented sessions. Lastly, to document the outcomes and ensure action steps are well understood by those responsible—effective coordination is key for successful implementation.
Alaska Maritime Workforce Development. Worked with a diverse group of maritime representatives ranging from ship building, cargo transport, fishing industry, seafood processors and K-12 and post-secondary educators to facilitate and coordinate this statewide effort. The purpose of the Maritime WFD effort is to prioritize workforce development needs and align resources to achieve those needs. Per capita, Alaska ranks third in the nation for maritime jobs and the importance to Alaska’s many coastal community and residents is critical. http://labor.alaska.gov/MaritimePlan/
Bureau of Indian Affairs—Enrollment Services. Worked with program staff and the Alaska BIA Deputy Director to clarify and document clear procedures for the regional offices in Alaska to enroll and certify Alaska Natives and American Indians for BIA and other federal agencies. This effort required interviews, workshops, and small group discussions to identify, draft and deliver the first ever procedures manual for the BIA Alaska Enrollment Services Office. The product was delivered in both notebook and electronic formats for BIA to then easily revise and update.
Alaska Climate Change Strategy—Immediate Action Workgroup. Worked with senior officials from five state agencies, two federal organizations, legislative representatives and members of the public including six Tribes, to facilitate a series of meetings that identified and prioritized funding recommendations to the Governor’s Office and State Legislature to enable the most immediate impacts from climate change—erosion in small isolated communities in Alaska—to be addressed.
http://www.climatechange.alaska.gov/docs/iaw_rpt_17apr08.pdf
Alaska Coastal Management Program (ACMP). Worked with two borough governments, including, Mayors, Assembly Chairs, Planning Directors, Attorneys and their staffs along with the ACMP Director and other senior management from the Alaska Department of Natural Resources, to facilitate formal mediations between the state and local governments on districts coastal management plans.
Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation—Water Quality Standards Assessment & Reporting Program. Worked with the program manager and staff members for this newly formed office at DEC, to conduct a strategy session that identified in 2007:
- priorities and challenges and how to constructively address them,
- each employee’s roles and functions,
- interactions with those within the new Office, and
- interactions outside the new Office critical to its effectiveness.
Bureau of Indian Affairs and Alaska Tribes Performance Measurement Project. Worked with BIA—Alaska Region, the U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary’s Policy & Planning Office and approximately 60 Alaska Tribes, to facilitate and communicate the Alaska Tribe’s consensus recommendations on performance measures to the U.S. DOI’s Strategic Plan.
Reliable and Affordable Energy for Rural Alaska Conference. Worked with the University of Alaska Fairbanks—Energy Technology Development Laboratory, the Alaska Energy Authority, and the U.S. Department of Energy, to co-design and facilitate concurrent sessions resulting in prioritizing energy issues, ideas, projects and research that conference participants identified as having the greatest value for Alaska rural communities.
Wind Technology Workshop. Worked with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and the Alaska Energy Authority to facilitate this workshop that communicated the status of wind technology and described technical assistance opportunities the U.S. Department of Energy and NREL have to offer Native and rural Alaska communities and organizations.
Federal-State Joint Summit on Watersheds for Alaska. Facilitated annual meetings with directors of federal and state agencies participating.
U.S. Army Alaska—Strategic Planning Conference. Worked with the USARAK General and his senior officers by serving as a member of the facilitation team resulting in USARAK’s realignment to more effectively meet its mission.
Working with Rural Alaska and Tribes
Chugachmiut. Social Enterprise and Business Development. Consulted with Chugachmiut’s senior managers to help align regional tribes’ needs with grant opportunities. These efforts included drafting and assisting with proposal development.
Chugachmiut Integrated Resource Management Plan. Worked with this regional nonprofit and several of its remote tribes, to develop policies and guidance to the Bureau of Land Management and other government agencies regarding management of their natural resources, including renewable energy, water and wastewater needs. http://www.chugachmiut.org/
Tanacross Village Council Visioning Retreat. Provided consultation, facilitation, and documentation for a five-day visioning session for the Council. Tanacross Village Council is recognized as a leader in tribal economic development.
Nivalena Regional Tribal Consortium. Worked with six tribal communities around Lake Iliamna to create a strategic plan for tribal environmental coordinators to advance projects and programs in their communities through coordination and collaboration.
Working with Local Government
Mayor’s Anchorage School Summit. Worked as one of a five-person facilitation team to design and conduct a series of community dialogues as part of an effort to raise awareness about how others nationally and internationally are improving K-12 outcomes, and to identify priority directions for K-12 in Anchorage. The Mayor’s vision and long-term goal was to raise the achievement bar so that Anchorage high school graduates are competitive in the international workplace.
Anchorage Mayor’s Builders Roundtable. Worked with senior representatives of the Mayor’s office and owner/ principals in local construction, engineering and development businesses to create an opportunity for building industry representatives to clarify concerns and identify issues, that if changed, would have the most positive impact on the building industry to meet local demand. Facilitated a series of meetings and documented issues, background, proposed changes and near term steps into a final report for the Mayor’s Office.
Wasilla City Council. Worked with the City Council, Clerk, Administration and Mayor, to facilitate a public meeting with over 60 people regarding issues critical to advancing Wasilla’s development plans.
Mat-Su Borough. Worked with the Borough Manager, Economic Development Director, and Transportation Planners and an environmental engineering firm to conceptualize, manage and facilitate a modified charrette process. This process allowed members of the public directly impacted by a proposed new road to have a more in depth discussion about options and recommendations to the Borough before a final decision was made.
Mat-Su Borough. Worked with Talkeetna community leaders, the Borough Manager, Public Works Director, Transportation Planners and an environmental engineering firm to design and facilitate a community meeting to identify acceptable parameters or conditions for a new road that would provide access to the east side of the community. The result was a consensus decision by community members for the new road.Sustainability
Rapid Ecoregional (Landscape) Assessments. Worked with a multi-disciplinary team of University of Alaska researchers, the Bureau of Land Management as the lead agency, and other federal and state agency representatives to write the communications strategy, and serve as lead facilitator for community input meetings and decision-making meetings with senior agency managers. http://aknhp.uaa.alaska.edu/landscape-ecology/
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Through an EPA grant, serve as the lead for advancing sustainability and pollution prevention at UAA and throughout its communities. Partnered with Green Star, Alaska Pacific University, Municipality of Anchorage and others, such as the City of Homer to produce an emission reductions plan for the City of Homer, to mentor over 20 students and advance their academic interests in sustainability, and supported numerous campus and community-wide events.
University of Alaska Anchorage. Through a strategic grant from the Chancellor, served as a lead staff member to document UAA’s carbon footprint, create a carbon emissions reduction plan, and coordinate both an employee network to encourage and motivate individuals to take actions and reduce carbon usage in their workday lives as well as encourage and enhance sustainability across the U-Med District institutions.