MIKE BROWNING, Colorado

Mike Browning Wilderness Watch Colorado

Mike Browning grew up in Great Falls, Montana. After graduating from Yale Law School, he had a 40-year career in Colorado as a water lawyer. Mike spent most of his summers in high school and college backpacking in Glacier National Park and the Bob Marshall Wilderness, where he fell in love with mountains and wild places. He has climbed Mt. Everest and finished the rest of the Seven Summits when he was 60, climbing another 500 or so peaks along the way. Mike has served six years (two as chair) on the board of the Eagle Summit Wilderness Alliance, a volunteer organization working to protect the four Wilderness areas in Eagle and Summit counties, Colorado. He is passionate about the intrinsic values of Wilderness.

 

 

TRACY DAVIDS, North Carolina, Vice President/Secretary

Tracy Davids Wilderness Watch North Carolina

Tracy Davids is the Southeast Program Coordinator for Defenders of Wildlife in their Asheville, NC field office and the former Executive Director of Wild South and Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project.  A New Hampshire native, she has been an ardent advocate for public lands protection, imperiled species, and individual ecological footprint reduction since 1998. Tracy's current work focuses on connecting people with the wild world around us and engaging Southeastern communities in wildlife/habitat protection efforts. Her experience also includes non-profit consulting/coaching/training, the practice of civil law, and volunteer board service for local, regional, and national conservation organizations including Fund for Wild Nature, Dogwood Alliance, Cherokee Forest Voices, National Forest Protection Alliance, and Southern Appalachian Forest Coalition. When she's not advocating for wild places, she's spending time in them. 

 

 

JON DETTMANN, Minnesota

Jon Dettmann Wilderness Watch Minnesota

Wilderness Watch welcomed Minnesota attorney Jon Dettmann back to our board of directors in Fall 2023. Jon first joined the WW board in 2003, where he served for eight years, including in the role of president of the board. Jon represented Wilderness Watch in our epic successful legal challenge to stop the National Park Service from conducting motorized van tours through the Cumberland Island Wilderness in Georgia. He argued our case through federal district court up to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals and won a sweeping decision there in 2004 in favor of Wilderness. Jon enjoys visiting Wilderness, including winter camping in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.

 

 

MARK PEARSON, Colorado 

MP

Mark Pearson is a long-time advocate for Colorado’s wilderness, wildlife and public lands. Mark currently serves as the Executive Director of the San Juan Citizens Alliance in Durango, a position he has filled for 15 years. He has been engaged with public lands and wilderness advocacy in western Colorado for almost 40 years, in both staff and volunteer positions. Mark previously worked with the Wilderness Land Trust purchasing inholdings within designated and proposed wilderness for conveyance into public ownership. Mark holds a M.S. from Colorado State University in Natural Resource Management and a B.S. in Engineering Physics from the University of Colorado. He has authored several guidebooks to existing and proposed Colorado wilderness areas.

 

MARK PETERSON, Wisconsin, President

MPDr. Mark Peterson has camped, hiked, kayaked, sailed and skied his way throughout national parks and wilderness areas. He’s pursued his outdoor recreation passions on campus with a Ph.D. in park and wilderness management from Colorado State University and also in the workplace serving as the Rocky Mountain Regional Director for the National Parks Conservation Association, a Vice-President for the National Audubon Society, and the Executive Director of the Sigurd Olson Environmental Institute at Northland College. Peterson's efforts to advocate for conservation measures span worldwide as he is a member of the World Commission on Protected Areas with the International Union for Conservation of Nature. He has served on a number of regional boards, including the Listening Point Foundation, St. Croix River Association, Friends of the Apostle Islands and the Minnesota DNR’s Council for Scientific and Natural Areas.

 

RENE VOSS, California, Treasurer

ReneRené Voss is a solo attorney in San Anselmo, California where he works to protect our National Forests, wildlife, and wild lands from harmful development. He started his environmental career 25 years ago as Campaign Director for Georgia ForestWatch and helped protect the remaining roadless lands of the Chattahoochee National Forest and helped stop most new logging on that forest.  He then moved to Washington, D.C., to lobby Congress on behalf of the John Muir Project of Earth Island Institute to end commercial logging of our National Forests. He is a life member and long-time Sierra Club leader, and was elected to the Sierra Club Board of Directors in 1999. During his time in D.C., while continuing his work, he returned to school to study law and in 2008 passed the California Bar Exam. He then moved to California and has been practicing public interest natural resources law from his solo practice in San Anselmo. He helps many clients, but he is most passionate about defending the Sequoia National Forest and Giant Sequoia National Monument on behalf of Sequoia ForestKeeper. He is a member of the Town of San Anselmo’s Open Space Commission, whose goal is to acquire, protect, and restore undeveloped open space lands for the public.

 

HOWIE WOLKE, Montana

Howie WolkeHowie Wolke is a retired wilderness guide/outfitter who has led over 500 multi-day wilderness backpack treks from northern Alaska to Mexico. He has been a wilderness activist in the Northern Rockies since the mid-1970s including many years as a board director of Wilderness Watch. He has authored two books on wildland conservation, and enjoys backpacking, canoeing, backcountry skiing, whitewater rafting, hunting, wildlife viewing and bird-watching. He and his wife Marilyn Olsen and their dog Rio live in the foothills of the Gallatin Range in southern Montana just a few miles from the northern border of Yellowstone National Park.

Contact Us

Wilderness Watch
P.O. Box 9175
Missoula, MT 59807
P: 406-542-2048
E: wild@wildernesswatch.org

Minneapolis, MN Office
2833 43rd Avenue South
Minneapolis, MN 55406

P: 612-201-9266

Moscow, ID Office
P.O. Box 9765
Moscow, ID 83843

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