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Staff

photo of Bob Scowcroft

Bob Scowcroft - Executive Director
Bob is a co-founder of OFRF, serving as Executive Director since 1990. Bob specializes in information about the organic industry and as a resource to the media on organic issues. Bob has also served as Executive Director of California Certified Organic Farmers and as a national organizer on pesticide issues for Friends of the Earth.


photo of Jane Sooby

Jane Sooby - Organic Research Specialist
Jane manages OFRF's grantmaking program and serves as an information specialist on organic research. She tracks and documents organic research and extension activity in the U.S. land grant system, which is published in OFRF’s State of the States bulletins. Jane has worked with the Nebraska Sustainable Agriculture Society and University of Nebraska as a sustainable agriculture organizer and research technician. Her educational background is in biology and agronomy.


photo of Mark Lipson

Mark Lipson - Policy Program Director
Mark is OFRF's senior analyst and ambassador for organic issues in the policy arena. His primary focus is cultivating organic research programs in the public sector, and he has had a significant role in debates over transgenic technology in agriculture. His seminal work Searching for the 'O-Word' documented the absence of publicly funded organic research and provided the platform for OFRF's advocacy success. Mark is also a member of the Molino Creek Farming Collective, a multi-family

producing certified organic tomatoes and vegetable crops for wholesale and farmers' markets since 1982.

photo of Tracy Lerman

Tracy Lerman - Policy Program Assistant
Tracy brings over seven years experience as an organizer for environmental and social justice campaigns. Before joining OFRF, Tracy coordinated the California based Genetic Engineering Policy Alliance, and prior to that was the Senior Organizer for Public Citizen’s Food and Agriculture Campaign. Tracy was a farm apprentice at New Leaf Farm in Durham, Maine and has a Bachelor’s Degree in Anthropology from the State University of New York at Albany.


photo of Zach Baker

Zach Baker - Policy Associate
Zach is OFRF's representative in Washington, DC, lobbying Congress to support OFRF's policy objectives and providing up-to-the-minute analysis of events and legislation related to organic agriculture. He also assists the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, of which OFRF is a member, in its organic and research policy and appropriations work. Zach has a BA in Community Health and Political Science from Tufts University.


photo of Don Burgett

Don Burgett - Development Coordinator
Don works with OFRF supporters to meet our programs’ financial needs, coordinating a diverse spectrum of foundation, corporate, and individual giving and government grants. Previously, Don was the Development Coordinator for the apprenticeship program of the UC Santa Cruz Center for Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems and worked in community development, urban agriculture and community food security organizations in Los Angeles.


photo of Amy Van Scoik

Amy Van Scoik - Development Associate
Amy handles event coordination, fundraising, and donor relations to support OFRF's development work. Amy is from Florida, where she did organic certification work and grew produce for restaurants, a CSA and farmers markets. She has recently been working on sustainable food systems, agricultural policy, youth development, and community organizing at UC Davis and with the Food Project's BLAST Cadre. Amy has a B.S. in Agronomy from the University of Florida, and a M.S. in Community

Development from the University of California.

photo of Erica Walz Erica Walz - Communications Projects Manager Erica oversees OFRF print and electronic communications. She is editor of OFRF’s print newsletter, the Information Bulletin, which delivers the results of OFRF-funded research and program activities to certified organic farmers, researchers and other audiences throughout the U.S. She is also coordinator of special projects, including OFRF’s National Organic Farmers’ Surveys. Erica has a BS in Natural Resource Policy from the University of Michigan and extensive experience working with
non-profits in Washington, DC, and California.

photo of Jose Torres

Jose Torres – Technology Manager
Jose serves as OFRF’s IT manager, overseeing internal technology functions of the organization, as well as OFRF's email communications and database management activities. Jose is a recent graduate from the University of California–Santa Cruz, majoring in psychology.


photo of Jean Peterson

Jean Peterson – Bookkeeper
Jean has helped manage OFRF’s finances since 2002. She has her own business doing accounting for nonprofit organizations. Many of her clients are doing sustainable agriculture work. She also has her own small organic backyard farm raising chickens, fruit, herbs, flowers and vegetables.


photo of Brenda Carey-Winser

Brenda Carey-Winser - Administrator
Brenda joined OFRF in November 2006 as our office Administrator. She grew up in County Tipperary, Ireland, on a vegetable and livestock farm that her parents still own and manage.


...and Ed Nelson is currently serving as OFRF's Policy Intern until he leaves for graduate school in Edinburgh, Scotland later this summer.

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