President
After spending her childhood summers at Glen Lake and along the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, Megan was inspired to move from Ohio to make northern Michigan her home in 1999. She enjoys kayaking, rustic camping, and trail running, and is passionate about protecting, conserving, and connecting lands and waterways that make our community a fun place to live, work, and play. Megan has spent her 20+ year career dedicated to community growth and development, land and water conservation and restoration, food and farming systems, housing, transportation, and access to nature and outdoor recreation. She founded Parallel Solutions, a Traverse City-based consulting firm in 2014. The company provides strategic planning, organizational development training and coaching, public-private and inter-organizational partnership facilitation and coordination, and community engagement services to public, non-profit, and private sector clients in the Great Lakes region. She lives in Traverse City with her two daughters.
Vice President & Secretary
Mindy Theis considers herself a big-city girl who loves living in small towns. Originally from Mason, Michigan, she grew up spending summers in Traverse City. After graduating from Central Michigan University, Mindy spent a combined 13 years with a benefits consulting firm in Chicago and working in HR for Dow Chemical Company. She and her family were extremely excited to make Northern Michigan their home again when Mindy joined the Short’s Family as the Human Resources Manager in February 2016. Mindy is currently the Human Resources Director for TC Foods Inc & Grandview Restaurants Inc. in Traverse City.
Treasurer
Sue was born and raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan and spent her summers on Clam Lake at her family’s cottage. This area has a special place in her heart. She loves spending her time outdoors hiking and paddling, working in the garden as a master gardener, traveling and her many hobbies. Professionally, she is a medicinal chemist with a degree from Kalamazoo College. She worked for 30 years in drug discovery in pharmaceutical companies and is a certified project manager. She retired 5 years ago and lives at her home on Clam Lake with her husband Kjell. Besides volunteering at Paddle Antrim, Sue volunteers for Grass River and Friends of Glacial Hills where she is a board member and leads the invasive species removal team.
Director
Harry has established himself as one of the foremost authorities in Michigan for water trails and recreation authorities. In 2019 Harry took on the role as COO at The Traverse City Downtown Development Authority (DDA). Prior to this, he was with the Land Information Access Association (LIAA) where he established himself as one of the foremost authorities in Michigan for water trails and recreation authorities.
Director
Gary is a retired landscape architect that lives with his wife Lisa in Williamsburg, Michigan. His professional career spanned four decades with two nationally recognized park and recreation agencies in the northwest suburbs of Chicago. Gary’s passion for building and creating “state of the art” recreational, fitness & aquatic facilities, community theme parks, sport complexes, golf courses, ice area and over 200 neighborhood parks & playgrounds earned him and his agencies national Gold Metal Award recognition. His passion for creating and building still exists in his retirement with his involvement as a volunteer with Paddle Antrim, Grass River Natural Area, Grand Traverse Land Conservancy and TART Trails. Gary enjoys gardening, cycling, paddle sports and experiencing nature especially in Northern Michigan. Gary and Lisa have two children, Jennifer who lives In Kansas and Christopher and his wife live in Chicago.
Executive Director
Deana grew up in the Midwest before setting out to explore the western states for 13 years. She enjoyed eight years in Washington State while working in water resources policy and planning and exploring the waterways of the Pacific Northwest. She also spent three years coordinating a non-profit in the Mojave Desert of California focused on environmental and economic development projects. In 2012 she moved to Northern Michigan with her husband and two children. She enjoys being outside as much as she can hiking, kayaking, or gardening. She is a Level 2 Coastal Kayaking Instructor, certified by the American Canoe Association. In 2021 Deana was honored with the Quiet Water Society’s Verlen Kruger award at the 22nd annual Quiet Adventure Symposium for her work at Paddle Antrim and developing the Chain of Lakes Water Trail.
Marketing & Outreach Specialist
Ellie grew up in Kalamazoo while spending summers along Lake Michigan in Benzie county. She has over ten years of varied marketing experience in industries including furniture manufacturing, coworking, non-profit, and legal services. In 2020 Ellie moved from Grand Rapids to Elk Rapids with her husband and two young children, and is very excited to call Northern Michigan “home”! In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her family, skiing, running, kayaking, paddle boarding, camping, traveling, and generally being outdoors as much as possible.