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TREC Staff

We are activists helping activists with the business of activism.

Dyan Oldenburg, Executive Director
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Phone: (505) 986-8400

Jeff DeBonis, Senior Associate
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Phone: (541) 387-2651

Amy Bianco, Operations Manager
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Phone: (505) 986-8400

James (Kim) Gilliam, Senior Associate
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Phone: (434) 823-5437

Cyndi Harris, TREC Associate
Phone: (505) 989-9703
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Elizabeth Hospodarsky, Senior Associate
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Phone: (520) 299-1903

Bonney Hughes, Administrative/Program Assistant
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Phone: (505) 986-8400

Katy Medley, Administrative Assistant
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Phone: (505) 986-8400

Donna Neusch, Director of Evaluation and Applied Research/Senior Associate
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Phone: (505) 986-8400

David Thomson, Senior Associate
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Phone: (604) 987-3667

Linda Schaeff, TREC Associate
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Phone:

Richard Schaeff, TREC Associate
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Phone:

Megan Seibel, Director of Finance and Senior Associate for Resource Development
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Phone: (303) 284-6968

Cheri Ryan, Website Designer
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Jeff DeBonis, Senior Associate, has led a distinguished career in forestry, environmentalism and employee activism. He worked on national and international government forestry projects in the Peace Corps, the U.S. Forest Service, and the Agency for International Development. In 1989 he founded and was the Director of the Association of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics (AFSEEE), a group of dissident, environmental activist agency employees within the Forest Service. In 1992 he founded and directed Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), an expanded national organization of public employees of numerous environmental agencies that work to ensure the integrity and public accountability of their agencies.

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Amy Bianco, Operations Manager, is a lifelong lover of the outdoors, Amy runs the Santa Fe office. She has over 25 years experience in many varied aspects of administration, for both non-profit and for-profit ventures. She feels fortunate to have worked in free-form radio, first as program director at the University of California, Santa Cruz where she graduated with a degree in English and Italian Literature, then on to the "semi-legendary" KFAT Radio. Lured to the beautiful Sierra foothills to work for the Strawberry Music Festivals in Yosemite, she coordinated marketing, contract fulfillment, workshop scheduling and liaison duties for the events for over a decade. In New Mexico, Amy has worked as an executive administrative assistant in the field of Native American arts and as Website Merchandising Coordinator for the Museum of New Mexico Foundation Shops, where she was editor of their sites and oversaw artist contract administration.

James (Kim) Gilliam, Senior Associate, has been involved in the creation and direction of dynamic fundraising efforts for more than two decades. After several years of working as a VISTA volunteer in various community organizing roles in North Dakota, from 1988-2002 he was the Chief Development Officer for the Southern Environmental Law Center, based in Charlottesville, Virginia. During his fourteen year tenure the organization grew from a $500,000 to a $5 million annual budget. He was primarily responsible for building a nationally recognized individual major gifts program that grew to generate fifty percent of the organization’s annual budget. He also spearheaded the organization’s successful $15.5 million Campaign for the Environmental Future of the South from 1997-2000.

Since 2003, he has managed a full time consulting practice working with a national client base in developing fundraising plans and major gift and capital campaign efforts, as well as doing extensive training in environmental fundraising throughout the country. In addition to his training and coaching role with TREC, he also serves as a lead fundraising consultant to grantees of the French American Charitable Trust in San Francisco, a foundation supporting organizations working on root causes of poverty and inequity.

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Cyndi Harris, TREC Associate, has over 16 years of hands-on experience in organization and group development consulting, coaching and training in non-profit and for-profit organizations. Her work with non-profits has included leadership and board development, strategic planning, culture alignment with strategy, organizational change and transition, diversity and inclusion, team and group development and organizational assessment processes. She served as Senior Consultant for social justice non-profits for a philanthropic organization. At Antioch New England Graduate School Environmental Studies PhD program, her studies were focused on the development of resilient environmental leaders. She has a deep passion and focus on fostering resilience at individual, group, and organizational levels. Cyndi is a certified professional coach, a member of National Training Laboratory’s Institute for Applied Behavioral Science and has a MS in Human and Organizational Development from American University and a MS in Medical Microbiology. Prior to her consulting work, Cyndi was the Director of Technical Services for bioMerieux Vitek, Inc.

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Elizabeth Hospodarsky, Senior Associate, grew up exploring wild places like the Cascade Mountain Range and the Appalachian Trail with her mountaineer father. Though her pack was nearly as big as she was, she developed a deep passion for wilderness and biodiversity. Elizabeth brings this passion into her work at TREC by helping clients with fundraising planning, strategies and donor development. Elizabeth has been a non-profit professional since 1995 and has successfully fulfilled the roles of founder, board member, Development Director, and Executive Director for organizations working to care for our earth and the plants and animals living on it. Most recently, Elizabeth served as Interim Executive Director for the International Dark-Sky Association and worked as an organizational and development consultant, helping a wide range of organizations overcome challenges to successfully fulfilling their critical missions.

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Bonney Hughes, TREC's Administrative/Program Assistant, has an M.S. in Environmental Toxicology, has conducted OSHA inspections, and wrote and spoke on water quality regulations and watershed protection for the New Mexico Environment Department for 10 years. She has done a variety of writing, editing, and administrative work for Santa Fe nonprofits including her assistant director position with Eldorado Children's Theatre and Teen Players. Bonney enjoys singing and spending time with her husband and two teenage sons.

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Katy Medley, Administrative Assistant, is a member of the TREC operations team. Katy works to support the field staff and operations of TREC. She has worked in administrative, consulting, and management positions for a variety of non-profit organizations since 2001, including the Carnegie Museum of Art, the Greater Pittsburgh Arts Council, and the the Santa Fe Arts Commission. In addition to her work at TREC, Katy currently serves as Managing Director of the arts and social justice organization Wise Fool New Mexico. She holds an M.A. in Non-Profit Arts Management from Heinz College at Carnegie Mellon University, and fills her free time riding her bike, performing, and hiking the Sangre de Cristo Mountains.

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Donna Neusch, Director of Evaluation and Applied Research/Senior Associate, has over 20 years of experience with for-profit and not-for-profit organizations serving in a variety of roles—from vice president of human resources to consultant to director of education at a local wildlife center, where she is now a Board member. Her passion for wildlife, especially wild birds, drew her to TREC as she is deeply concerned about environmental issues, especially habitat protection. Donna leads the evaluation and applied research efforts and heads TREC’s new Human Resources Program. She has a Ph.D. in educational psychology from the University of Texas-Austin, with a major in program evaluation. She is also a certified compensation professional and certified professional coach.

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Dyan Oldenburg founded Training Resources for the Environmental Community (TREC) in 1997. As executive director, she assists in developing and directing TREC’s programs and provides services to TREC clients. She has worked on numerous legislative, electoral and issue campaigns since 1979. Dyan ably assists environmental nonprofits in growing their leaders, boards and organizations. Her love of the wild people and the wild places and critters that they’ve dedicated their lives to saving is what keeps her going. She is dedicated to helping groups meet their missions and manage change. Her straw bale, solar house at the end of the road is her refuge. She can often be seen riding one of her horses in the back country of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in Northern New Mexico with her dog Bella running along side her. She is a graduate of Antioch College with a degree in political science, management and community service.

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Linda Schaeff, TREC Associate, joins the TREC team part time as she transitions out of her current position as founder and CEO of WolfCreek Partners, an educational, consulting and training group focused on the transformation of health care systems in the U.S. Prior to forming WolfCReek Partners, Linda worked closely with Larry Wilson to develop the Playing to Win organizational change model for Pecos River Learning Centers where she was senior faculty, consultant and executive Vice President.
As Playing to Win curriculum developed, it became the foundation for addressing critical culture issues within national and international organizations as they experienced mergers, acquisitions, rapid expansion and unprecedented change. In addition to extensive work in organizational and leadership development, Linda spent 10 years as the director of counseling at Punahou School in Hawaii and five years working for the U.S. military, in Hawaii, where she developed a prevention based family mental health center that was adopted at military bases throughout the world. She and her husband Richard Schaeff currently live in Ashland, Oregon where she divides her time between work, family and the development and maintenance of their 85-acre sustainable agriculture organic farm.

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Richard Schaeff, TREC Associate, was an executive of Pecos River Learning Centers, a division of Aon Consulting, for 13 years. With a background in educational psychology, he has developed exceptional skills in adult learning strategies. Although the majority of his work focuses on large group intervention and facilitation, his passion is for one on one coaching and the long-term development of small executive groups. His clients have included Pillsbury, Norwest Bank, Dupont, General Motors, Kaiser Permenente Health Systems, Patagonia and Northwest Airlines. In 2000, Richard took a break from corporate consulting to earn his degree in biology, help raise his grandson, Sean, and focus on building his organic farm business. Richard assists executive groups of all kinds in advancing their abilities to grow and develop themselves, their employees, and their organizations. Using a series of cognitive models, experiential activities and communications skills and tools, he facilitates the creation of sustainable solutions to chronic problems as well as the creation of an optimal culture within the organization. Reconnecting individuals with the passion and meaning that originally attracted them to their organization, and then creating an architecture for sustaining that sense of meaning and purpose (with tools to support it), will allow members of any team to continue to operate with one another in the most productive and synergistic way.

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Megan Seibel, Director of Finance and Senior Associate for Resource Development, manages TREC’s finances and provides specialized help to TREC clients in the areas of fiscal management and resource development. Megan has over 25 years of experience working with grassroots non-profit organizations. Megan began her non-profit career as a successful fundraiser and Executive Director for PIRGs (Public Interest Research Groups) in Colorado and Illinois. Then she brought her talents to the national management of the PIRGs where she oversaw fundraising databases and initiated a successful direct mail program. Most recently, Megan managed the budget and finances for the national PIRG network.

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David Thomson,  Senior Associate, has 20 years experience working as a leader, trainer, and consultant in both the private and public sector. His specialties include leadership development, governance, coaching, strategic planning, change management and team development. David spent eight years working with Outward Bound, where he was in a senior management role. David works with Organizational Effectiveness Program clients, Leadership Development Program clients and provides Customized Training and Consulting services on a range of topics, including strategic planning and board development. David is the National Board Past-President of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society.

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Cheri Ryan, Website Designer, has designed and developed websites and online applications since 1997. She does website assessments and offers technology consultation to nonprofit organizations. Cheri has worked with Facing the Future, NPower, WithinReach, Group Health, Housing Resources Group and WildEarth Guardians.