Board of Directors

SYRCL Board of Directors

George Olive

President

Over three decades, George has explored the Yuba’s three forks and their many feeder creeks. SYRCL offers him an opportunity to give back to, and know more fully, this engaging, living system that calls for our protection.

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A New Englander until 1975, George learned about fish and their habitats from his grandfather and the locals at the village store. He heard about creeks feeding Maine’s Kezar Lake in the Mt Washington Valley from mountains in New Hampshire, his first exposure to watersheds. George’s undergraduate and graduate degrees were earned at Harvard and his education credentials at Sac State. Living in Marin County, George and his spouse Suzanne discovered the Yuba in 1978, fishing around Downieville. Their South Yuba baptism occurred in July, 1980 while they hunted for housing. George taught at Nevada Union; Suzanne was a botanist with the Tahoe Nat’l Forest. Among George’s students was Caleb Dardick, later SYRCL’s executive director. Along the way, George moved into school administration and worked in Nevada City’s, Chicago Park’s and North San Juan’s elementary school districts. In 1994, he helped establish the Yuba River Charter School.

Syd Brown

Secretary of the Board

A third generation native Californian, Syd has called northern California “home” all her life. As a child, she spent summers tent camping, hiking, and whiling away the hours next to trout and steelhead rivers with family.

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She had a dream career, as the geologist for California State Parks, and worked to protect and manage the full spectrum of mountains, beaches, rivers and watersheds from Angel Island State Park to Zmudowski State Beach. Syd and her husband Jesse moved to Nevada County in 1983, and built their home on previously mined land just outside of Nevada City, where they raised their two children, Parker and Hilary. After commuting to her Sacramento office for more than 30 years, Syd retired in late 2012, and began to immerse herself in community activities, volunteering and later working for the Center for the Arts. She continues her support activities for State Parks, serving on the Friends of North Bloomfield & Malakoff Diggins Executive Committee, and most recently as a director for the Sierra Gold Parks Foundation.

Dustin Harper

Treasurer

Dustin has a six-year relationship with the Yuba Watershed; one that began weeks before the birth of his second daughter. His children and wife, Amy live with him a mile from the Jones Fire scar and his mother, Kathy lives in Lake Wildwood.

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One of his first weekends in Nevada City and initial exposure to SYRCL was The Wild & Scenic Film Festival and his family enjoys participating in the annual river cleanup. His respect for pure water as the ultimate resource and intrigue with water systems comes from his father. Dustin has a BS in Economics from UCLA and an MBA from SFSU. He is currently the Chief Strategy Officer at Institute on Aging, a statewide non-profit serving older adults and people with disabilities. Dustin has led significant growth, innovation, and expansion of services in his tenure there and brings considerable experience developing new initiatives at the local, state, and national level. Dustin was formerly the President of the MSSP Site Association and also has experience developing public health programs for individuals living with HIV. Dustin believes SYRCL and the Yuba can be a national source of inspiration in an era of extraordinary strain on watersheds (and the communities who rely on them). He is also excited to have more reason to take his family to the river!

Jeffrey Adams

Jeff grew up in the Sonoran Desert of southern Arizona and has lived in the Yuba watershed since 2005.

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Jeff currently works as a licensed architect at Atmosphere Design Build where he practices a daily commitment to sustainability and reducing the carbon footprint of buildings. He previously served as the Executive Director of the North Columbia Schoolhouse Cultural Center on the San Juan Ridge overseeing the execution of two California Humanities Community Stories grants, which deepened his connection to this place and community. Jeff received a broad education in engineering, architecture, and the humanities, first at Princeton University (B.S.E.) and then at UCLA (M. Arch.). Jeff is a father to a young daughter and an emerging adult son and husband to a midwife. In his spare time, he cooks a mean meal, grows a garden, and backpacks in the High Sierra.

Rebecca Coffman

Originally from Boston, Rebecca grew up primarily in the Bay Area. At an early age she developed a deep love for the mountains through backpacking and fishing with her family in the Sierra and Rocky Mountains. Rebecca went on to serve as a rafting guide on California rivers, a mountain guide in the Andes, and then organized and ran a backcountry ski retreat in the San Juan Mountain of SW Colorado.

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This enduring exposure to outdoor wild places ingrained in her a sense of commitment to environmental stewardship and a respect for diversity, both in people and in places. After receiving her Masters degree from UC Berkeley, Rebecca joined a non-profit architecture firm in Sausalito forwarding the practice of strawbale and rammed earth construction while connecting the dots between architecture and the environment. Rebecca has been practicing as an Architect and Landscape Architect in Nevada City for the past 20 years where she lives a short hike from the Yuba. She has served on the Bear Yuba Land Trust Board and on the Wild & Scenic Art Committee. It is important to her to participate in our local community recognizing that building a strong sense of place and ownership leads to environmental awareness and protection.

Kurt Lorenz

Kurt grew up on a farm near St Louis, MO, earning a BA from Kenyon College in Ohio, and an MAT from Webster University in St. Louis. He moved to his then home on San Juan Ridge (an incomplete garage with a partially broken roof) in 1976 and went to work teaching school in Camptonville and later for the Twin Ridges District and for Sutter County Office of Education.

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All along he installed solar panels, well pumps, and worked on construction projects. He retired from teaching eleven years ago, and with his wife Nancy, spent ten years exploring coastal Mexico, US, British Columbian, and Alaskan waters on their sailboat, Raven. Kurt has been a lifelong community activist in environmental causes, and served four years on the Nevada County Planning Commission. Kurt’s adult daughter, Emily, lives in Portland, OR, and Kurt and Nancy live off the grid at 4,000’ on the San Juan Ridge.

Gerard van Steyn

Gerard has a deep passion for wilderness areas, mountains, rivers, trees, wildlife and the ocean. His first encounter with the Yuba River occurred during his college years as he explored, swam and camped near Emerald Pools.

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Gerard has an undergraduate degree from UC Davis and an MBA from UC Berkeley, with an emphasis on finance and real estate. He is CEO of SCI Consulting Group, a firm that specializes in opinion research to determine the feasibility of increased local funding for public agencies and ballot measure and educational outreach campaigns to boost revenue for a wide range of public services, including parks and open spaces. Growing up on a dairy farm near Lodi, California, likely sparked his strong interest in regenerative agriculture, organic farming, permaculture, viticulture and winemaking.

Amy Guy Wagner

Amy was born and raised a few miles from Edwards Crossing bridge. She spent formative childhood and teenage years hiking, swimming and basking on rocks at the Yuba River and has a deep connection with the land and the watershed.

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She was an early volunteer at SYRCL and wrote articles and spent time in Sacramento as a part of the early team that won the Wild and Scenic designation.
Amy has a BS and MS from Stanford University in Earth Systems, an interdisciplinary program around energy and environmental studies. She has a second masters degree in Management Science and Engineering also from Stanford. Amy’s career has always focused on climate and energy but has evolved from working directly on direct building improvements with energy efficiency audits and renewables to advising on city and state level policies to advising new technology companies including solar, wind and battery companies to enable their growth. Amy is currently a Senior Expert at McKinsey and Company, a global management consulting company which advises clients around the world. She is a global leader in the Sustainability and Energy practices. Amy moved back to Nevada County a few years ago with her husband Eric and their two young boys, Reed and Bryce, who have also fallen in love with the river.

Steve Medina

Born in San Jose, Steve grew up in the heart of Silicon Valley—surrounded by innovation and driven people who shaped the modern tech world. After earning a degree in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from San Diego State University, he launched a career in sales, management, and consulting within the fast-paced San Francisco tech scene. Working with both enterprises and startups, he gained certifications, built valuable connections, and developed a reputation for blending strategy with service.

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His pivot into Bay Area real estate came from a simple goal: to bring a more tech-savvy, service-driven approach to buying and selling homes. In one of the most competitive markets in the country, Steve honed his skills in negotiation, marketing, and client care. In 2018, Steve and his wife traded the Bay’s density for five acres in Rough and Ready, seeking more space, fresh air, and a family-centered lifestyle. Today, while still a gadget geek and tech tinkerer at heart (yes, his server closet is impressive), Steve has shifted focus to building community, supporting the environment, and raising four kids in Nevada County.

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