Deno A. Hicks, EAC Chair
Managing Partner
Southern Strategy Group

A Jacksonville native, Deno Hicks has spent his professional career in the private sector working in the engineering and consulting industry. Deno earned an interdisciplinary degree in Environmental Science and Policy through the College of Natural Resources and Environment at the University of Florida, and still remains an active member of the College’s Advisory Council.

Prior to joining Southern Strategy Group, Deno successfully managed all government relations and business development for one of the largest civil engineering firms in Northeast Florida, servicing both public and private sector clients. His previous experience as a practicing environmental consultant in the real estate and land development industry has allowed Deno to become one of the most effective government affairs professionals in the industry.

Throughout his professional career, Deno has directed his attention to public policy and offering himself as a public servant. Deno served the Bush Administration as a Florida Liaison to the Department of Political Affairs of the White House. In 2004, Deno was elected as the Republican State Committeeman in Duval County, and Chairman of Congressional District 4, where he served a four year term. During his tenure, Deno served in many leadership roles from fundraising to managing “Get Out The Vote” Campaigns in support of our candidates. In 2005, Deno was appointed by Governor Jeb Bush and subsequently by Governor Charlie Crist to the Florida Greenways and Trails Council where he is still active. Deno has also received appointments by Governor Charlie Crist as a Nominee to the Electoral College, as a Delegate to the 2008 Republican National Convention, as a member of the 4th Circuit Court Judicial Nominating Commission, and as one of the Governor’s 10 Appointees to the Executive Board of the Republican Party of Florida. Locally, Deno serves on the Planning Commission for the City of Jacksonville appointed by Mayor John Peyton, the recently completed Zoning Code Re-Write Committee for the City of Jacksonville, and Charter Revision Commission.

Deno’s commitment to his community is represented through the many non-profit and civic Boards and Committees in which he serves, including his service as a Trustee for Florida House, our State’s Embassy in Washington, DC.

Victoria Tschinkel, EAC Secretary
Private Environmental Consultant

Victoria Tschinkel is a private environmental consultant based in Tallahassee, FL. She previously served as the state director of The Nature Conservancy's Florida Chapter, which protects more than 1 million acres of natural lands, advocates and supports public funding for conservation at state and local levels, and influences the management of conservation lands in public and private ownership.

Before serving as state director, Tschinkel was a senior consultant with Landers and Parsons, P.A., where she represented clients before state and federal agencies and the legislature on issues such as strategic environmental planning and compliance with environmental permitting requirements.

For more than six years, Tschinkel held the position of secretary of the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation. As chief administrative officer of an agency with more than 1,200 employees, she was involved with major environmental legislation, including the Save Our Rivers Program, State Underground Petroleum Environmental Response Act of 1986, State Comprehensive Plan of 1985, Wetlands Protection Act of 1984, and Water Quality Assurance Act of 1983.  She also adopted the state's first water policy.

Tschinkel is a Florida Environmental Regulation Commissioner. She is a member of the advisory council of the Florida Growth Management Conflict Resolution Consortium and a member of the board of directors of Resources for the Future, Audubon of Florida, 1000 Friends of Florida, and the Environmental and Energy Study Institute. She also serves on the board of directors of Phillips Petroleum Company as chair of the Public Policy Committee. She serves on the National Research Council's Board on Radioactive Waste Management, the advisory council of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory's Environmental Technology and Engineering Division Review Committee.

Tschinkel has held posts on the National Environmental Enforcement Council, the advisory committee of Administrators Toxic Substances, the national panel to review management of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Energy Research advisory board, and the Florida House Speakers Task Force on Water Issues. She chaired Governor Chiles' Committee on Land Use Planning and Water Management, Governor Bush's Technical Advisory Committee on Electricity Deregulation and the Environment and is former vice-chair of the Florida Communities Trust. Tschinkel is a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration. She was educated at the Lycee Moliere in Paris, France and received her BS in zoology from the University of California at Berkeley. 

Soji Adelaja
Director and John A. Hannah Distinguished Professor
Land Use Policy Institute, Michigan State University

Dr. Soji Adelaja is the John A. Hannah Distinguished Professor in Land Policy and Director of the Land Policy Institute at Michigan State University. He holds joint faculty appointments as professor in the Departments of Agricultural Economics; Geography; and Community, Agriculture, Recreation and Resource Studies.

Previously, he was at Rutgers University for 18 years, during which period he served as Executive Dean of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Dean of Cook College, Executive Director of the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station, Director of Rutgers Cooperative Extension, Professor and Chair of Agricultural Food and Resource Economics, Director of the Food Policy Institute, Director of the Food Innovation Center, and Director of the Eco-policy Center.

Dr. Adelaja has a Bachelor's degree in Agricultural Mechanization from the Pennsylvania State University, dual Master's degrees in Agricultural Economics and in Economics from West Virginia University, and a Ph.D. in Economics from West Virginia University.

G. Ronnie Best
Coordinator, Greater Everglades Priority Ecosystems Science
United States Geological Survey

G. Ronnie Best is the coordinator of Greater Everglades Priority Ecosystems Science Program for the U.S. Geological Survey.

Best joined the USGS in 1995 as chief of the Wetlands Ecology Branch at the National Wetlands Research Center in Lafayette, La.  He relocated to south Florida in 1997 as chief of the Restoration Ecology Branch and was promoted to his coordinator position in 2001.  Best has been awarded several USGS STAR awards for exceptional service.

In addition to his U.S. Geological Survey functions, he serves as a member of the multi-governmental South Florida Ecosystem Restoration Task Force Science Coordination Group and several teams dealing with restoring the nation's Greater Everglades. Best served as chair for the 1st National Conference on Ecosystem Restoration held in December 2004 and has chaired two Greater Everglades Ecosystem Restoration conferences in 2000 and 2003.

Best is a Professional Wetland Scientist certified by the Society of Wetland Scientist (SWS). He served on the SWS board of directors for almost a decade including elected to terms as president, vice president, and treasurer. 

Best has an extensive research, education, and outreach history in Florida in the area of ecology and ecological engineering. Prior to moving to federal service in 1995, Best retired from the faculty of the College of Engineering at the University of Florida. While at UF, he taught graduate courses in wetlands ecology. In 1991, he was appointed director of the University of Florida's Center for Wetlands and Water Resources. While at the University of Florida, Best's research focused on wetlands biogeochemical cycling, wetlands restoration and creation, use of wetlands for wastewater management, and ecological engineering. Best also served as major advisor to more than 45 graduate students and on committees for over 120 graduate students. He received two University of Florida Research Achievement Awards given to select members of the faculty for their research program and accomplishments.

Best has over 60 publications including book chapters, technical reports, and journal publications and was co-editor of a book on Okefenokee Swamp.  Best earned a BS degree in biology from Augusta State University and an MS degree in botany and a PhD in plant ecology from the University of Georgia.

Patrick Brezonik
Professor, Department of Civil Engineering
University of Minnesota

For over 25 years, Patrick Brezonik has been a faculty member in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Minnesota - Minneapolis, where he served as the Director of the Water Resources Center from 1985 to 2002. He acted as program director for Environmental Engineering at the National Science Foundation from 2004 until 2007.

Brezonik served on the faculty at the University of Florida in the Department of Environmental Engineering Sciences from 1966 to 1981, rising through the ranks from assistant professor to professor.

He earned a BS in chemistry from Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and an MS and PhD in water chemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Scottie Butler
Legal Council and Soverign Lands Issues
Florida Farm Bureau

William O. Cleckley
Northwest Florida Water Management District

William O. Cleckley is Director of the Division of Land Management and Acquisition at the Northwest Florida Water Management District. Cleckley has been with the District for the over 21 years and currently oversees the management of approximately 207,000 acres of District property. In addition, he purchases properties for water resource protection and preservation purposes under the State's Florida Forever land acquisition program, as well as, acquiring other wetland properties to satisfy DOT mitigation needs.

In addition to his land management and acquisition accomplishments, Cleckley has been actively involved in conducting habitat restoration activities for the past 18 years, especially longleaf pine and wiregrass groundcover restoration. He is also a NRLI Fellow and on the Steering Committee of CEFOR.

Before coming to the water management district, he worked for five years at the U. S. Forest Service's Southern Forest Experiment Station out of Starkville, Mississippi conducting continuous forest inventories (CFI). Under this assignment, Cleckley travel extensively and lived and worked in the States of Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, east Texas and southeastern Oklahoma. In 1984, under special assignment, Cleckley conducted the first ever forest inventory of the Island of St. Vincent and in 1985, he conducted a mid-cycle update inventory on the forest resources of Puerto Rico.

Cleckley received his BS degree in forest management from the University of Florida, Class of 1978.

Alan Covich
Professor
Institute of Ecology
Eugene P. Odum School of Ecology
University of Georgia

Alan P. Covich joined the University of Georgia in August 2003 as director and professor of the Institute of Ecology in the College of Environment and Design. He previously served as head of Colorado State University's Department of Fishery and Wildlife Biology and was the assistant chair of the Zoology Department at the University of Oklahoma.

Covich is the Past-President of the Ecological Society of America and is on the International Association of Ecology board of directors. Covich was president of the American Institute of Biological Sciences in 2000 and president of the North American Benthological Society in 1996. He served as chair of the board of directors of BioOne, a consortium of electronic journals. He was awarded the Icko Iben Award for Excellence (in interdisciplinary work) by the American Water Resources Association in 1997 and elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1999. Covich was a Sabbatical Fellow at the National Science Foundation's National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis in 2000. He served as chair of the Ecological Society of America's Aquatic Ecology Section, Corporate Awards Committee, Program Committee, and Futures Planning Committee.

Covich co-edited two editions of the Ecology and Classification of North American Freshwater Invertebrates (Academic Press) and published reviews on freshwater ecosystems in Water in Crisis: A Guide to the World's Freshwater Resources (Oxford University Press), the Encyclopedia of Biodiversity (Academic Press), and the Encyclopedia of Hydrologic Processes (Wiley).

His research interests include assembly and function of stream food webs; predator-prey chemosensory communication; species-specific roles in detrital processing chains; and species redundancy in stream ecosystem functions in temperate and tropical streams. As a Fulbright Fellow in 2004, Covich collaborated with stream ecologists in Portugal on drought impacts on food webs. Long-term effects of droughts on species-specific regulation of stream food-web dynamics and ecological integrity of riparian communities are major areas of his research. He continues to work on tropical riparian communities and stream food webs at the National Science Foundation's Long Term Ecological Research Program in the Luquillo Experimental Forest, Puerto Rico. Covich has recently participated in several international workshops on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning and on effects of climate change on freshwater ecosystems. His current interdisciplinary research focuses on the biocomplexity of food-web dynamics of tropical streams affected by intersecting road and river networks.

Mimi A. Drew
Deputy Secretary for Regulatory Programs and Energy
Florida Department of Environmental Protection

Mimi A. Drew is the Deputy Secretary for Regulatory Programs and Energy with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. Ms. Drew received a BA in English and an MS in Environmental Engineering from the University of Florida in 1976. Ms. Drew has been a career public servant with the State of Florida for the last 30 years, working in the Legislature briefly and then moving to the Department of Environmental Regulation, now the Department of Environmental Protection. She managed a number of programs within the agency, gradually rising to the position of Director of the Division of Water Resource Management. In January of 2007, she accepted the position she currently holds as Deputy Secretary.

Some of her career highlights include directing adoption of the state's first rule to control dairy waste, developing and achieving adoption of one of the first stormwater management rules in the country, oversight of construction of a nationally acclaimed environmental laboratory, and introducing the integration of Geographic Information Systems within the department.

Her current role involves management and supervision of the Regulatory Divisions of Water, Waste, Air, the Energy Office, and the six regulatory Districts around the state. Most recently, issues related to climate change and helping Florida develop a renewable fuel portfolio have become very high on her agenda.

Paul Gray
Science Coordinator
Lake Okeechobee Watershed Program

Paul Gray is the Science Coordinator of Audubon of Florida's Lake Okeechobee Watershed Program. He mainly works with various agency technical committees on projects involving Lake Okeechobee, the Kissimmee River and basin, and other regional efforts. Paul uses information gained from the committees to provide technical input to various governmental agencies and elected officials, and in support of Audubon's policy staff to keep Audubon positions science-based and solution-oriented. He serves on numerous (innumerable) committees and in many ways, serves as a science "translator" for the lay public.

Paul's early work experience included song bird surveys, waterfowl mortality and feeding studies, bat foraging ecology, and pesticide studies. He worked three years as supervisor of the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission's South Florida Waterfowl Field Station in Okeechobee. Upon joining Audubon, he managed their Ordway-Whittell Kissimmee Prairie Sanctuary where he was responsible for land management and restoration, as well as facilitating research projects.

Originally from Missouri, Paul earned a BS from the University of Missouri, an MS from Texas Tech University and a Ph.D. from the University of Florida; the graduate degrees focusing on wetlands and waterfowl.

Ken Haddad
Executive Director
Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

Ken Haddad is the executive director of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), a Florida constitutional agency responsible for rule-making, management, enforcement, and science relative to fish and wildlife resources statewide. FWC has a budget of over $180 million and over 2,000 full- and part- time employees. 

Haddad is responsible for the leadership and management of the FWC and serves on a seven-member commission that has rule-making authority.  He is a member of the state lands Acquisition and Restoration Council, the chairman of the Science Coordinating Group of the Everglades Restoration Task Force, and a member of the Executive Committee of the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies.

From 1993 to 2002, Haddad served as the director of the FWC Florida Marine Research Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla. with a 420-member staff conducting applied scientific monitoring and assessment of Florida's marine resources. He also served as the FWC and the state's chief scientific liaison to the Florida legislature, other state agencies, and federal government on resource management and marine resource scientific issues.  Haddad's technical background is in remote sensing, habitat and resource mapping and monitoring, and fisheries management. He has been an active participant in coastal and marine management issues his entire career.

Haddad also has served as the interim director of the FWC Division of Marine Fisheries from 2000 to 2001 and acted as the state's fisheries manager directing the planning, coordination, administration, and policy formation of the affairs of the Division of Marine Fisheries.

Haddad received a BS in biology from Presbyterian College in Clinton, S.C. and an MS in marine science from the University of South Florida in St. Petersburg.

Allan Horton
Conservationist

Allan Horton is a conservationist, land owner, rancher and former editorial writer for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

Larry Libby
Professor Emeritus
Ohio State University

Larry Libby is Professor Emeritus of Agricultural, Environmental and Development Economics at Ohio State University and former interim director of the John Glenn School of Public Affairs at that University. He held the C. William Swank Endowed Chair in Rural-Urban Policy while in the Ohio State faculty. His research and outreach program has focused on the economic consequences of alternative institutional devices for affecting patterns of resource use. He works on subjects related to competition for land and water at the rural-urban interface; policies designed to affect the rights and responsibilities of competitors for natural resources; the environmental consequences and contributions of production agriculture; and the economic and social performance of policies and institutions affecting the use of natural resources. Libby spent 26 years as a professor and administrator at the University of Florida and Michigan State before coming to Ohio in 1997.

Andrew McElwaine
President and CEO
Conservancy of Southwest Florida

Andrew McElwaine joined the Conservancy from The Pennsylvania Environmental Council where he served as president and CEO since 1999. He has two decades of environmental policy and fundraising experience. In Pennsylvania, McElwaine chaired a successful campaign to pass a $625 million statewide open space bond, and assisted in the creation of the state's Growing Greener land preservation and Growing Smarter land use planning laws. He also helped to craft the state's water resources planning program.

Prior to joining the Pennsylvania Environmental Council, McElwaine was director of environmental programs at the Pittsburgh-based Heinz Endowments. In 1998, he co-founded Enterprising Environmental Solutions, Inc. (EESI), a non-profit corporation devoted to the use of market forces to improve environmental quality.

McElwaine earned a master's degree in environmental policy and history from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. He also has a master's in history from George Mason University and a B.A. in political science.

Mark Middlebrook
President
The Middlebrook Company

Charles G. Pattison, AICP
Executive Director
1000 Friends of Florida

Charles has served since 1998 as the Executive Director of 1000 Friends of Florida. Previously, he was the Director for the Division of Resource Planning and Management at the Department of Community Affairs from 1992 to 1998. From 1989 to 1992, he worked as a Field Representative for The Nature Conservancy's Virginia Coast Reserve. Between 1983 and 1989, he opened the DCA Florida Keys Field Office in Key West, served as the Monroe County Planning, Building and Zoning Director, and was the first executive director of the Monroe County Land Authority. Charles also has also served as a planning director in coastal North Carolina and spent five years with the North Carolina Office of Coastal Management in beach access and coastal permitting work. A North Carolina native and an Eagle Scout, he received an undergraduate degree from N.C. State in Raleigh and a Masters in Regional Planning from the University of North Carolina. He spent six years working on coastal development issues in North Carolina before moving back to Florida. A member of the American Institute of Certified Planners, he serves on the Florida Conflict Resolution Consortium Advisory Council, Betton Hills Neighborhood Association, and Apalachee Land Conservancy. He is a graduate of Leadership Florida, Class 18. In 2005, Charles was appointed by Senate President Tom Lee to a four year term on the Century Commission for a Sustainable Florida. He has also recently been appointed to the Florida Energy Commission's Climate Change Subcommittee and the Governor's Climate Action Team which is developing a state climate action plan.

Leslie Poole
Freelance Writer on Environmental and Community Issues

Leslie Kemp Poole is a freelance writer, student, and teacher. She was a newspaper reporter with four different papers, ending with the Orlando Sentinel. At the Sentinel, she covered many topics including an award-winning series on the environment and growth management.

She continues to focus on freelance writing about environmental and community issues. Currently, she is an adjunct professor in the Environmental Studies Department at Rollins College in Winter Park, FL and is a PhD student in History at the University of Florida.

Leslie is married for 25 years to Michael Poole, an investment banker, and she is active in several groups including the board of the Hamilton Holt School at Rollins College.

Doug Shaw
Research Hydrologist
The Nature Conservancy

Hilary Swain
Executive Director
Archbold Biological Station

Hilary Swain is the executive director of Archbold Biological Station, an independent non-profit research facility which conducts extensive ecological research on its 8,800-acre scrub preserve on the Lake Wales Ridge and at its 10,300-acre working cattle ranch, the MacArthur Agro-ecology Research Center. Her research interests are in the application of conservation biology to reserve design, management, and planning for natural communities and endangered species.

Swain is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is past president of the Organization of Biological Field Stations. She currently serves on the Babcock Ranch Inc. Board of Directors, which oversees the Babcock Ranch, recently acquired by the state of Florida.

At the MacArthur Agro-ecology Research Center (MAERC), Swain has worked extensively with staff research biologist Dr. Patrick Bohlen and Ranch Manager Gene Lollis, as well as a large number of IFAS faculty, to build a dynamic research program focused on understanding the relationships among ecological, economic, and physical factors in grazing lands and how these change over time. Her work at MAERC has brought her into extensive liaison with ranchers, and local, state, and federal agencies, helping to build a bridge between the agricultural and environmental communities in Florida.

George Willson
Conservationist
Willson Consulting, LLC

George W. Willson is a conservationist working with private landowners under Willson Consulting, LLC. Previously, he was corporate vice president of conservation lands for St. Joe Company since 1999. Willson worked with state and federal agencies, conservation groups, corporations, and individuals to develop strategies for St. Joe's landholdings with conservation significance in northwest Florida and southwest Georgia.

Prior to his position with St. Joe Company, Willson served as Florida director of land acquisition for The Nature Conservancy, where he was responsible for numerous program functions, including scientific resource evaluation, acquisition, and land management. He built acquisition partnerships among private landowners, major corporations, and all levels of government agencies to achieve Florida's conservation goals. He also worked with federal agencies to bring Land and Water Conservation Fund monies to Florida for the purchase of various sites, including Osceola National Forest Pinhook additions, Archie Carr National Wildlife Refuge, Lower Suwanee National Wildlife Refuge, Key Deer National Wildlife Refuge, and Tate's Hell Swamp. Willson also worked with numerous Florida agencies to protect natural areas, including Big Bend Coast, Wakulla Springs, North Key Largo State Preserve, Fisheating Creek, Lake Wales Ridge, Kissimmee Prairie, and Sebastian Creek.

Willson also made significant contributions to the public policy debate on natural resources management throughout his career. Prior to The Nature Conservancy, Willson spent seven years with the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation (now Department of Environmental Protection). He was also a key staff member of the Governor's "Save Our Everglades" program and represented many nationally recognized state programs such as Environmentally Endangered Lands (EEL), Conservation and Recreational Land (CARL), and Land Acquisition and Management Advisory Council (LAMAC).

In addition, Willson is an active participant in watershed and natural resource planning programs and has been appointed to a variety of resource management boards throughout Florida, including serving as an at-large member of the board of governors for the Northwest Florida Water Management District and the Governor's Florida Greenways Commission.

Willson earned his BS and MS degrees in environmental planning from Florida State University.