Board members are visible and vocal ambassadors. The most effective ones demonstrate a commitment to the organization and to its overall goals, which in our case include environmental stewardship, promoting park-friendly policies, preserving open spaces in our urban community and providing a vehicle for citizen engagement.
That’s why we are turning to you — our members — to help us find potential board members for Friends of the Parks and Trails or to step forward yourself.
- Have ideas for people who would add depth and diversity to the board — in age, gender identity, ethnicity, skill set, geographic location in the city or county?
- Would you like to talk over what the position entails?
- Contact Amy Gage, executive director, at 612-381-4110 (mobile) or amy@friendsoftheparks.org.
We have added five board members to our small but growing roster since fall 2022. We are pleased and proud to introduce:
- Reier Erickson, a native of International Falls, left Minnesota for adventures in Washington, D.C., Baltimore and Monrovia, Liberia. He and his wife and two children recently moved to St. Paul from Saint Albans, Vermont, where Reier served as a school board director and a justice of the peace and was on several nonprofit boards. He lives in the Payne-Phalen neighborhood.
- Clara James, a resident of Highland Park, enjoys riding a fat-tire bike and is a maps and data enthusiast. She is an instructor of information technology at Minneapolis College and already has shown herself to be a valuable advisor in bringing our website up to date.
- CJ Lindor brings a strong multimodal perspective to our board. As education coordinator for the Bicycle Alliance of Minnesota, he works to inspire others toward his vision of bicycling as a means to improve the lives of individuals and communities. Previously, CJ worked in outdoor and environmental education.
- Kathy Sidles is a master naturalist and a retired electrical engineer whose full-time work now is volunteerism in parks and on natural lands. Our friends at Saint Paul Parks Conservancy featured Kathy in a “Volunteer Spotlight” in March 2022. Keeping our parks free of trash and invasive species is a particular passion.
- Ashley Ward, who lives near Battlecreek Regional Park, moved to Minnesota from North Carolina in 2018. She teaches blind and visually impaired children from birth up to age 21 in the Saint Paul Public Schools and aims to plan and promote more activities for kids and teens in our city and county parks.
Please be in touch if you have ideas for additional board members or would like to discuss a position for yourself. We welcome the conversation!
