Who we are

 

The Healthy Ocean Coalition sprang from a rising tide of grassroots organizations around the country collectively calling for a national policy to direct the stewardship of our nation’s ocean, coasts, and Great Lakes.

Now, twelve years later, the Healthy Ocean Coalition is a network of over 200 organizations, coastal inhabitants, scientists, and people who understand the ocean is central to life on Earth and are raising our unique voices to ensure federal ocean policy ensures a healthy ocean for today and generations to come.

meet OUR TEAM

Our Advisory board

OUR VALUES

  • We prioritize collaboration.

    The HOC is only as strong as our members. We work to develop strong, authentic relationships based on time and trust.

  • We listen to network members.

    Our members have expertise in protecting the ocean. They have been impacted by federal ocean policies. Our work is influenced by their experiences.

  • We center equitable solutions.

    Ocean policy has long been exclusionary and benefitted only a subset of Americans. We advocate for policies meant to protect the ocean and undo an unjust ocean legacy.

OUR COMMITMENTS

●  We commit to focusing on ocean conservation policies that center the ocean and people in the fight against climate change.

●  We commit to lifting the voices of the HOC network members closest to the impacts of climate change and the burdens of past ocean policies.

●  We commit to centering the solutions of these network members, ocean and climate scientists in HOC priority issues.

●  We commit to enhancing our long-standing promise to remove barriers that keep people from becoming ocean advocates by keeping every HOC training free of charge and providing resources to network members.

●  We recognize the historical and current inequities found within the ocean conservation community.

●  We commit to doing our part to rectify these inequities both within the HOC and the ocean conservation community.

●  We commit to infusing the principles and ideas of ocean justice into the HOC’s goals and strategies.

 

Sarah Winter Whelan

Sarah is a Midwest native who fell in love with the ocean at an early age. For over fifteen years Sarah has worked to protect the ocean as a lawyer, advocate, and researcher. Today, she’s happy educating and engaging people in positions of power by raising and amplifying the voices of ocean lovers who know why it is so important that we protect the ocean from the worst impacts of climate change.
Since trading cornfields for coastlines, Sarah has lived in South Carolina, Florida, Vermont, Oregon, and now calls Boston home alongside her husband and two children. Sarah has her Juris Doctorate and Masters in the Study of Environmental Law from Vermont Law School and Bachelor of Science in Marine Science from the University of South Carolina.

When Sarah isn’t working to protect the ocean, she’s exploring New England beaches with her family - yes, even during winter - reading chapter books with her kids, surviving a global pandemic, and contemplating her next ocean tattoo.

 
 
 
 

Jenna Valente

 Jenna’s connection to the sea goes back generations and runs so deep that stewarding the planet in some way, shape, or form feels central to her and her family’s identity. Some of her relatives are or were ship chandlers, members of the U.S. Coast Guard, game wardens, watermen and women, regenerative farmers, and environmental policymakers. Between growing up surrounded by people with incredible environmental knowledge and being raised in Hawaii, Washington State, and Maine, following a path that led to a career in ocean advocacy feels like destiny.

Some notable points, or scenic overlooks, along Jenna’s career path were:

  • Graduating with her Bachelor of Arts degree in communication and journalism from the University of Maine in 2011

  • Participating in a series of internships working with endangered and threatened populations of shorebirds like the piping plover at Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge in Virginia.

  • Those internships led to a park ranger position. During that time, she lived on the wildlife refuge and often would wake up to find wild horses roaming around her yard.

  • Completing a communications fellowship with the Chesapeake Research Consortium stationed at the Chesapeake Bay Program in Annapolis, Maryland where she helped draft the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement and fell in love with telling conservation stories and celebrating people that are taking care of the environment and their communities.

  • Graduating from Virginia Tech with her Executive Master of Natural Resources degree in 2015

 
 

Jenna joined the Healthy Ocean Coalition team in 2015 as our Coalition Coordinator, and now serves as the Director of Advocacy where her passion is centered around empowering individuals and organizations to learn more about natural systems, the impacts humans have on those systems, and bolstering an ethic of stewardship, conservation, and social responsibility.

She is dedicated to building support for just conservation policies because she believes in the power of community and has seen the progress that can be achieved when policies and plans are inclusive and reflective of those they will inevitably impact.

Outside of her role with the Healthy Ocean Coalition, Jenna is a dog mom, photographer, and hosts the Sea Change Podcast, where she highlights the complex and inspiring stories of ocean lovers and coastal conservation advocates. She also is a poet, bookworm, record collector, avid journaler, and baker.

 
 

Jennifer Felt

Jennifer is the HOC's Senior Strategist and Conservation Law Foundation's (CLF) Ocean Campaign Director. In this position Jennifer works to build and expand a diverse, multi-stakeholder network for regional ocean planning across New England.. Prior to CLF, Jennifer was at the Marine Conservation Institute, where she worked for five years in Washington, D.C. and New Hampshire. Previously, she worked for Humane Society International in Latin America and the Caribbean and served in the Peace Corps in Honduras.

Jennifer is a native of Maine, a proud graduate of the University of Vermont and lives in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

 
 

Hermina Glass-hill, MHP

Hermina Glass-Hill is Director of the Susie King Taylor Ecology Center and Women’s Institute in Midway, Georgia. Hermina is a writer, historian, preservationist, and sustainability advocate who has been a voice for environmental justice and human rights for more than twenty years.

Hermina founded the Susie King Taylor Women’s Institute and Ecology Center to honor this Gullah Geechee freedom seeker and to provide educational programming on the influence of coastal ecology in the lives of enslaved and free women. In 2019, she received the Georgia Governor’s Award for Arts and Humanities for her service in preserving African American history and culture.

Hermina has served as the research historian for the National Center for Civil and Human Rights where she learned the value of hard-won struggles for racial equality and ocean justice during the Civil Rights Movement. Hermina has also worked as the climate justice advocate at Georgia Interfaith Power and Light, engaging communities and educating local, state, and federal policymakers on the impact of climate change on frontline coastal communities. She is currently the Georgia Field Representative for Oceana, where she builds on-the-ground support for ocean conservation.

 

Francisco “Paco” ollervides, ph.d

Francisco, better known as “Paco,” a common nickname in Mexico where he was born and raised, has worked in the nonprofit world, specifically developing leadership and building the capacity of individuals in environmental and conservation organizations in the United States and throughout Latin America for over two decades.

Paco is currently an Advisor for the Green Leadership Trust, a network of people of color and Indigenous people who serve on environmental boards and proactively build the environmental movement’s power. Paco was formerly GLT’s first Executive Director. Prior to this, he worked for River Network as leadership development manager helping leaders in the Great Lakes region think and act strategically, equitably and inclusively by improving their efficiency and efficacy. Paco has served as Senior Field Coordinator with the Waterkeeper Alliance advising numerous nonprofit advocacy groups throughout Latin America. He has also served as Director of the School for Field Studies (Center for Coastal Studies) in San Carlos, Mexico.

 
 
 

David Riera, M.Sc., ed.s

David is an environmental scientist, educator, and advocate with 15 years of leadership experience, academic, and research training.

David is a United States Marine Combat Veteran and First-Generation Afro-Hispanic college graduate who is driven daily to tackle various social and environmental issues. He is an Adjunct Professor and a McKnight Doctoral Fellow at Florida International University and an Oceans Advisory Committee Member for the Hispanic Access Foundation. David is an educational professional with a Master of Science - MS focused on Agroecology, Sustainable and Urban Agriculture, Plant Biotech, & Natural Resource Conservation Management.

David is the embodiment of the adage, "don't talk about it, be about it". David is bilingual and has worked in service of his communities for over 25 years. He is an experienced Researcher with a demonstrated history of field and laboratory work, skilled in Veterinary Medicine, Microsoft Word, Heavy Equipment, Gardening, and Molecular Biology.

 
 
 

Priya shukla

Priya is an ocean and climate scientist and science communicator. Priya is a PhD Candidate at UC Davis studying how climate change affects shellfish aquaculture operations within the coastal ocean.

Priya is also a contributor for Forbes Science, writing about ocean and climate science. She also writes and speaks about civically engaged science and the need for justice, equity, diversity and inclusion. Public scholarship and activism are core components of her work to communicate climate and ocean science, while amplifying marginalized voices and perspectives. Priya also participates in the Point Blue Science Advisory Committee and published a children's book in 2022.