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Staff & Board
Staff and Board Members
STAFF
Barry Rosenberg, Executive Director
Barry has lived in the Priest Lake area for 33 years where he and his wife and son established a “homestead” on a remote 40 acres of forestland. They live off the grid and rely on solar energy as their primary source of power.
Barry has been actively engaged in environmental issues for over 27 years and has extensive, forest, hydrology, media, and organizing experience. Barry graduated in 1965 from Temple University with a BA in English.
He spent about 11 years working in the woods, a couple of years as a logger, and nine years as sole proprietor of a reforestation business.
Beginning in 1981, Barry began filing administrative appeals against illegal and destructive Forest Service timber sales in the Priest Lake area. His efforts resulted in a significant logging reduction.
In 1987 Barry helped found, and was the first chairperson of the Selkirk-Priest Basin Association (now called the Selkirk Conservation Alliance).
From 1990-1997 Barry worked at The Lands Council as the creator and director of its Forest Watch Program. This enable him to travel around the Inland Northwest training forest activists on how to work with the Forest Service and when necessary, how to challenge its illegal timber sales.
He was hired as the Executive Director of the Kootenai Environmental Alliance in October 2001. As Executive Director for KEA, he has spent considerable time working for the quantity and quality of the Rathdrum-Spokane Aquifer and to revise Idaho’s water allocation laws so they encourage, instead of discourage, water conservation.
Michael Mihelich, Forest Watch Coordinator
Mike was born and raised in Coeur d'Alene. He has been a member of KEA for approximately 20 years and has been involved in monitoring and commenting on forest issues since 1990. Mike is currently a board member for the Coeur d'Alene Audubon Society (formerly the president). His hobbies include viewing areas on the Coeur d'Alene National Forest and the St. Joe National Forest.
Cathleen O'Connor, Outreach Coordinator
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Janet Torline, President
Outside of home and family, Janet has two passions – art and the environment. Janet created, and for 14 years, administered, Art-in-the-Schools, an arts education partnership between a local arts organization, Citizens Council for the Arts and county wide school districts. She is currently involved in various aspects of art facilitation through her “paying” job at The Art Spirit Gallery. Outside of her vocation in the arts, Janet devotes much of her time to advancing KEA’s goals and programs, with a particular interest in land use issues. Janet enjoys organic gardening on the homestead she and her husband began building 30 years ago along with all types of outdoor recreation that this beautiful area provides.
Steven Foxx, Vice President
A life long Coeur d’Alene resident, Steven is a Lake City High School graduate.
Before and after graduating from Western Washington University, Steven spent time traveling in Latin America doing human rights work and later as a journalist covering the Zapatista Revolution in Chiapas, Mexico.
He has taught coastal biology in North Carolina, led wilderness expeditions along the Appalachian Trail, and has been working in the field of mental health, drug, and alcohol treatment for six years.
Steven has been active in local and state issues effecting the environment, growth, and development. In 2006, he lost a close race for District 4 State Senate.
He has been on the Board of Directors for KEA since 2005.
Korrine Kreilkamp, Secretary,
Community Roots Program Coordinator
Born and raised in Southern Idaho’s Salmon Falls Creek Canyon at Miracle Hot Springs, Korrine’s environmental values were instilled early. As the daughter of well-known Southern Idaho environmental activist Bill Chisholm, Korrine grew up in a home where environmental discussions, hearings, debates, and protests were part of an all-encompassing lifestyle.
After moving to North Idaho and attending North Idaho College, Korrine worked as a Self Reliance Specialist for the State of Idaho in Child Support Services. It was while working in the social sector that she began to see the fundamental disconnect between civil rights and environmental justice. What surfaced from the experience was the urge to do something hands-on for her community that encouraged the connection between people and the earth.
In 2007, with the help and direction of KEA staff, Korrine started a new KEA program called Community Roots. The Community Roots program works to create a charitable local food system that increases fresh local produce donations at food assistance facilities, builds community relationships, and fosters discussion on the shared social, environmental, and economic interests in localizing our food supply.
Donna Hollister, Treasurer
Wes Hanson
In the past year Wes has helped KEA designed co-facilitated sub area community planning workshops funded by the Bullitt Foundation and been steadily involved in revising the Kootenai County's comprehensive plan. He believes people who stay involved in local issues create their community's future.
For the past three years he has monitored the proposed dredging and enlargement of Blackwell Island's toxic-laden marina basin. He helped write the 1994 comprehensive plan, and spent twelve years working to preserve Cougar Bay in its natural state. This was accomplished through land purchases by The Nature Conservancy, Bureau of Land Management, and Kootenai County and two conservation easements held by Inland Northwest Land Trust.
Wes lives on a family farm protected by a conservation easement south of Coeur d'Alene. He writes, paints watercolors, and teaches adult classes on both these subjects. He taught high school English for thirty years and served as Idaho's National Endowment for the Humanities Teacher-Scholar in 1990, studying the civil rights movement.
Buell Hollister
Merlyn Nelson
merlyn@ribbonwood.com
Merlyn and his wife, Jean, moved to North Idaho in 1974 and purchased a 70 acre stump ranch on the eastside of Coeur d’Alene Lake. Both were enamored with the outdoor activities and the abundance of animal life here in Idaho. They discovered KEA in 1985 and became members to help protect, preserve and restore animal habitat and corridors which will inevitably lead to healthy and robust wild animal populations – wolves and grizzlies included. Merlyn has served on the KEA board since 1988 and is currently assisting Wes Hanson, on community planning issues for Kootenai County. Favorite hobby: flyfishing!