03/14/2007: "New Committee Will Help Critical Area Ord UpDate"

A Leadership Sub-Committee for the San Juan Initiative has been appointed by the SJ County Council. They will work as a part of the Policy Group, which consists of their group, and a Resource Managers sub-committee. The Council also voted to appoint Kevin Ranker to present the County Council.

The new Leadership sub-committee members were selected by the County Council to "represent expertise in many fields including: construction, marine policy, real estate, farming, land conservation, land use, affordable housing and business. The members are:

Tom Cowan
Jonathan White
Sam Buck
Patty Miller
Peter Kilpatrick
Lincoln Bormann
Lynn Bahrych
Liz Illg
Nick Jones
Lisa Byers
Ron Zee
Kit Rawson
Jeri Ahrenius

In addition to each person's professional expertise, these individuals are, according to Project Manager Amy Windrope -hired by Share Strategy to oversee the project- "able to represent their community's needs and culture during the San Juan Initiative process".

Many of the members are well known to the community, and all have connections, and are active in other organizations and/or work for county government.

In a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed last year by the CC and Shared Strategy,, one of the "Whereas" stated that there "SJC Critical Areas Ordinance update, the Resource Manager Working Group, the Stormwater Ordinance, and the Marine Stewardship Area", are all areas that may "leverage conservation actions and set the stage for building an example of community-based ecosystem management".

There will also be another committee appointed by the County Council that will work only on updating the Critical Areas Ordinance. The County is asking citizens interested in that committee to contact the Planning Department