Kerry Flaherty Walia – President
Kerry Flaherty Walia is a Restoration Ecologist with the Tampa Bay Estuary Program. Kerry works with partners to support habitat restoration and identify relevant ecological indicators for success. Previously, as a marine fisheries research scientist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, she spent 18 years studying fish community and species-specific responses to environmental and anthropogenic stressors within estuarine and coastal habitats.
Sara Turner – Vice President
Sara Turner is a statistician at the NOAA Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office. She processes fishery dependent data for management and also handles data requests for fisheries in the Northwest Atlantic. For more about Sara, check out her Fish Sister Profile.
Kimberly Bonvechio – Secretary/Treasurer
Kimberly Bonvechio is a freshwater fisheries research scientist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. She helped develop and evaluate Florida’s longterm monitoring program for lentic systems and manages the American Eel research and monitoring programs for the State. For more about Kim, check out her Fish Sister Profile.
Chelsey Crandall – Board Member
Chelsey Crandall is a social scientist at the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Her work focuses on the human dimensions of fisheries and natural resources, and includes exploring people’s attitudes and behaviors as well as ways we connect stakeholders with science and management.
Lynn Mattes – Board Member
Lynn Mattes works in marine recreational fisheries management for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife working primarily with groundfish and Pacific halibut. She is heavily involved in the Pacific Fishery Management Council process doing data and policy analysis. She also worked for about 18 years with commercial groundfish, shellfish, and Pacific halibut fisheries in Alaska, mostly in the field. For more about Lynn, check out her Fish Sister Profile.
Laura Slater – Board Member
Laura Slater is a fisheries biologist with over a decade’s worth of experience conducting research in the marine realm (Bering Sea crabs) and the freshwater realm (salmonids in California). She currently works as a biologist for the US Food and Drug Administration working in a shellfish aquaculture policy group. Prior to that, she served as a Monitoring Program Manager for California Sea Grant supporting salmonid recovery in central California and as a Research Program Manager for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game supporting sustainable management of commercial crab fisheries. She received her BS in marine biology at Hawaii Pacific University, her MS in marine biology at University of Alaska Fairbanks, and is a PhD candidate in fisheries at University of Alaska Fairbanks. For more about Laura, check out her Fish Sister Profile.
Board Members Emeritus
Janice Kerns is the Reserve Manager for Old Woman Creek National Estuarine Research Reserve within the Ohio Department of Natural Resources. Her work focuses on stewardship of Great Lake coastal ecosystems through research, education, and training. Janice was a co-founder of Women of Fisheries and served as a Board member from 2018-2022. For more about Janice, check out her Fish Sister Profile.