Executive Director

Shay (she/her) is a community steward committed to nurturing communities and communities of practice. She is a white American of Ulster Irish descent—from northeastern Ireland where the land meets the sea. Shay has been a student of justice and equity for as long as she can remember and has especially learned from Indigenous Peoples, people of color and white settlers committed to healing, repairing and reimagining social fields. She is co-editor of the book Protecting Wild Nature on Native Lands and co-author of the report “Cross-Cultural Protocols in Rites of Passage: Guiding Principles, Themes and Inquiry.” Shay has long been a practitioner of rites of passage and circle practices and other communal practices. Alongside, she has worked for social and environmental transformation through building bridges between the movements for wilderness conservation and Indigenous sovereignty and self-determination.

Her professional roles have included Program Manager for Native Oceans, Founding Director of the Indigenous & Community Lands & Seas program for The WILD Foundation and World Wilderness Congress, and Executive Co-Director of The Ojai Foundation. As Executive Director for GCILL, Shay is committed to following the lead of the Elders, supporting our team(s) to thrive, and guiding the organization toward coherence. When not working, Shay can be found exploring the Big Chico Creek tributary of the Sacramento River Watershed in in the unceded traditional homelands of the Mechoopda peoples, where she currently resides, in Northern California.