Apalachicola Riverkeeper is seeking a Director of Outreach.
Staff
Cameron Baxley, Riverkeeper
[email protected]
(850) 323-0760
Susan Anderson, Executive Director
[email protected]
(850) 653-8936
Susan Macken, Administrative Director
[email protected]
(850) 653-8936
Georgia Ackerman, RiverTrek Coordinator
[email protected]
(850) 321-6262
Cameron Baxley was born and raised in Montgomery, Alabama. Cameron grew up tromping around in the Mobile-Tensaw Delta and found her first love, water. Determined to somehow transition a fervent hobby into a career, she moved to Charleston, SC to obtain a degree in Marine Biology. For nearly two decades Cameron ran the professional gamut of working in the academic, private and government sectors as a scientist. She says, “It is with sincere gratitude and earnest anticipation that I step into the role Riverkeeper at Apalachicola Riverkeeper.”
Cameron explains, “When I first moved to Apalachicola to work as a scallop biologist with FWC, I noticed a trend of nearly everyone I became friends with had volunteered their time with Apalachicola Riverkeeper. So, I began volunteering. And serendipitously I discovered Apalachicola Riverkeeper’s goals and my goals are aligned: to create a strong, cohesive network of stewards to protect and restore the Apalachicola River and Bay.”
A hard fast hydrophile, with a drive for problem solving, look for Cameron Baxley somewhere in, on, near water trying to fix something.
Susan Anderson grew up living at the river’s edge at the end of Bluff Road in Apalachicola. Her parents ran the Rod and Gun Sportsman’s Lodge. Her first love was being in the River and swamps swimming, fishing, wading barefoot through the backwaters investigating all of nature’s wonders. Her formative years were shaped by the rhythms of river seasons and seeing how they influenced the recreational, commercial and spiritual lives of the natural and human communities of the basin. The study of bioregional native plants and herbalism that began then along the river has been her livelong avocation.
She attended FSU where she double majored in sociology and religion and pursued graduate work in Urban and Regional Planning and later went on to study Cultural Sustainability at Goucher College. She worked as a reporter while in college and was Executive Director of the Monticello Opera House. While in Monticello she was appointed to the Jefferson County Planning Commission. A passion for Environmental and cultural issues led Susan to further her career by working for DEP, FWC and the Department of Community Affairs as a Resource Planner. She asked to be assigned to the six counties along the Apalachicola River. What she learned in her time at the agencies demonstrated the need for protections beyond governmental action. In 1998 she worked with a group of dedicated citizens to create the citizen’s advocacy organization Apalachicola Bay and River Keeper. Susan served as this organization’s first Riverkeeper-Executive Director and now returns to continue serving the resource and people she so greatly admires.
Susan Macken, a native Georgian, spent countless childhood weekends exploring stretches of the Ogeechee River, a beautiful black water river near her hometown. This instilled in her a lifelong love of waterways. She first visited the Apalachicola area in the mid-eighties and was quickly pulled in by its vast natural beauty, returning again and again over the years. As she explains, “I wasn’t born here but I got here just as fast as I could.” Prior to relocating to the Apalachicola River region thirteen years ago, Susan worked as a special education teacher and administrator in several north Georgia school systems.
Susan is a longtime supporter and member of many local, regional, and national environmental organizations. As Administrative Director at Apalachicola Riverkeeper, she manages our membership databases, online store, and fields phone calls and email inquiries from both visitors and citizens throughout our basin. Susan also keeps the two Scipio Marina office cats spoiled with kitty treats. She loves all animals.
When she’s not in the office, you’ll probably find Susan on one of her frequent beach rambles, exploring and photographing the area she now calls home.
Georgia Ackerman, a former kayak instructor and river guide, ran a north Florida ecotourism company for nearly a decade where she spent time learning about the Apalachicola River system and began volunteering with Apalachicola Riverkeeper. Prior to moving back to Florida (from Arizona) in 2001, she worked in children’s advocacy and taught at Arizona State University. Georgia believes outside play and wild places are fundamental to both the health of humans and the planet.
She began coordinating the RiverTrek campaign in 2012 and then served on the board of directors of Apalachicola Riverkeeper before joining the staff 2017. Georgia is returning to the role of volunteer in leading the annual awareness and fundraising campaign, RiverTrek.