Louisiana Board of Trustees
Our trustees provide leadership, experience and oversight to advance our mission in Louisiana.
Meet the Louisiana Board of Trustees
The dedicated members of our Louisiana Board of Trustees fulfill several roles and responsibilities to help us advance The Nature Conservancy's mission in Louisiana. These include providing oversight, strategic thinking and problem-solving for all aspects of our conservation efforts. They also help to establish effective relationships with leaders in the spheres of philanthropy, public policy, science, education and other sectors, and represent TNC and our work in their communities, in personal and professional networks, and in the public eye.
Scott Anderson
Scott Anderson is a committed conservationist. He lives at Inglewood Plantation in Alexandria and maintains a home in New Orleans. One of Scott's passions is marine conservation and he enjoys traveling to remote diving locations around the world.
Thomas West Barham
Tommy Barham is the Managing Partner of Larkin Plantation Farms in Oak Ridge, Louisiana. He received his baccalaureate degree from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge and a master’s degree from University of Louisiana at Monroe.
Donald "Boysie" Bollinger
Donald T. “Boysie” Bollinger is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Bollinger Enterprises, LLC, which in part serves as a family office. He is the former Chairman and CEO of Bollinger Shipyards, Inc., a family-owned full service marine construction and ship repair company established in 1946.
Boysie Bollinger devotes considerable time to professional and civic organizations. He serves on numerous boards, including: Chairman at First Bank and Trust, Chairman at Nicholls State University Foundation, International President (2018) at the Chief Executives Organization, Second Vice President at Audubon Commission and a Member at the University Medical Center Management Corporation.
R. Foster Duncan
Foster Duncan has more than 30 years of senior corporate, private equity and investment banking experience. He is an Operating Partner of Bernhard Capital Partners, a private equity fund focused on investing across the energy services and related infrastructure spectrum. Previously, Foster was a Managing Director at Advantage Capital Partners (ACP) with senior management responsibility for the firm’s energy portfolio and energy initiatives. Prior to joining ACP, he was Managing Member of KD Capital L.L.C., working exclusively with KKR and its portfolio companies in connection with creating value and identifying and investing in the energy, utility, natural resources and infrastructure sectors.
Foster serves on the boards of Atlantic Power Corporation (NYSE:AT) in Boston, Massachusetts and on the Advisory Council of Greentech Capital Advisors in New York. He is also an immediate past board member of Essential Power, LLC in Princeton, New Jersey.
Christine Figley
Christine Figley is a native of Louisiana who now resides in Fort Worth, Texas. She grew up in Alexandria, a short drive from Forest Hill, the home of many wholesale nurseries. She graduated from Holy Savior Menard High School and then received her accounting degree from Louisiana Tech. However, horticulture was in Christine's blood and in 2017 she bought a small landscaping company, rebranded it as West Fork Landscaping, and changed the direction from mostly commercial installations with some maintenance to residential design, installation and management. She also opened West Fork Garden Market, a retail extension of the landscape company. Today, West Fork has over 50 team members and was connected to all five of the homes on the Historic Fort Worth’s Hidden Garden tour in 2023. Christine was also named Entrepreneur of the year in 2023 by Fort Worth, Inc. Magazine.
In addition to running her businesses, Christine is also involved in various non-profits in Fort Worth like the Fort Worth Tennis Association, the Fort Worth Garden Club, Colonial Kids for a Cause, Jewel Charity and most recently, The Nature Conservancy of Louisiana.
Tina Freeman
Tina Freeman has been a longtime supporter of The Nature Conservancy in Louisiana both as a member,and through the two foundations on which she is a board member: the Coypu Foundation and the Ella West Freeman Foundation (a family foundation created in honor of her late grandmother). Tina has deep ties to New Orleans and is well versed in the conservation issues facing our state.
Tina works as an artist with a focus on photography. Her Lamentations exhibit was featured at the New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA). For this exhibit, Tina photographed the wetlands of Louisiana and the glacial landscapes of the Arctic and Antarctica. She then paired the images from these disparate regions in a series of diptychs that function as stories about sea level rise, ecological balance, and the connectedness of disparate landscapes across time and space. Tina was also the curator of photography for NOMA. Her work has been featured in a variety of magazines (The New York Times Magazine, Architectural Digest, etc.). In addition to at NOMA, she has had exhibits featured at museums including the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, Bibliotheque Nationale de Frane (Paris), National Media Museum (UK) and the Luiciano Benetton Imago Mundi (Italy).
H. Merritt Lane
H. Merritt Lane, III has served as the President and Chief Executive Officer of Canal Barge Company, Inc. since 1994 and as a director of that company since 1988. He is actively involved in industry affairs, having served as Chairman of the Board of the American Waterways Operators (2008-2009) and currently serves as Chairman of the Waterways Council, Inc. He also holds positions as a member of the Board for the National Waterways Foundation, the U.S. Coast Guard Foundation and the International Shipholding Corporation.
Mary LaVigne
Mary is a native of Shreveport, Louisiana who currently resides in North Carolina. She has previously served on the following boards in the Shreveport area: Sci-Port Discovery Center, Southfield School and the LifeCare Hospitals, Inc. In the early 1990s, Mary lived in South Africa where she farmed Angus stud, beef cattle, dairy, corn and seed potatoes. She is a graduate of Sweet Briar College with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Government. Mary is a life sponsor of Ducks Unlimited and a member of the U.S. Equestrian Federation. She loves to travel, hike, garden, bird hunt and train animals.
Marjorie McKeithen
Marjorie McKeithen affiliated with Jones Walker after serving as Secretary of the Louisiana Mineral and Energy Board and as Assistant Secretary of the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources, Office of Mineral Resources, where she oversaw the granting and administering of mineral leases, storage agreements, and alternative energy agreements on state-owned land and water bottoms. In addition to her upstream oil and gas practice, Marjorie routinely serves as project counsel for large energy infrastructure projects, including pipelines, LNG and liquefaction facilities, crude oil and hydrocarbon liquids export facilities, hydrocarbon storage facilities (salt dome and depleted reservoir storage), solution-mining facilities, petrochemical and chemical plants and refineries, and commercial saltwater disposal facilities. Marjorie also represents a number of energy service companies and renewable energy companies. Marjorie is currently an appointed member of the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission and serves on the Board of the Louisiana Oil & Gas Association.
Hermann "Buck" Moyse, III
Hermann "Buck” Moyse is retired from serving most recently as the CEO at Healthnet One, L.L.C. Prior to that, he served in the banking industry, including as Executive Vice President, Bank One N.A. after the merger with First Commerce Corporation. The majority of his career – 20 years – was spent in a variety of positions with City National Bank, concluding with the chairmanship for six years.
W. Adams Rodgers
Adams Rodgers is a successful financial advisor and supportive of conservation in Louisiana, both for the future of our state and for his family. Adams has been in the financial services industry since 2001 and is presently a Senior Vice President and Senior Financial Advisor. He is a 1998 graduate of the University of Louisiana at Monroe. He holds the Chartered Retirement Planning Counselor SM designation. Adams was named to the Forbes "Best-in-State Wealth Advisor" list in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022. Within The Rodgers Group, Adams focuses on Investments, Relationship Management and Business Development.
Adams and his wife, April, live in Monroe with their two daughters, Adelene and Ellanora. He currently serves as a member of the Board of Directors of Camp Ch Yo Ca and he previously served as President of The ULM Alumni Association, Chairman of the Board for Seeker Springs Ministry, The Jeremy Barnhill Foundation and President of the Northeast Monroe Rotary Club. When he is not serving in men’s spiritual retreats and church worship, he enjoys playing drums and fishing.
Lawrence Rozas
Lawrence Rozas, a resident of Sunset, Louisiana, has been a lover of nature his whole life and therefore received his Ph.D. in Environmental Sciences from the University of Virginia, a M.S. degree in Marine Biology from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington and a B.S. degree in Wildlife Management from the University of Southwestern Louisiana. Over 35 years of his life has been dedicated to studying and writing about the estuaries of the nation's Southeast Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. The last 25 years of his professional career was with NOAA Fisheries Service where his primary research interests were identifying the habitat requirements of estuarine-dependent fishery species, understanding how to successfully restore coastal habitats, and assessing the habitat function of coastal wetlands.
Since retirement, Lawrence is now involved with many organizations including the Louisiana Native Plant Society, the Acadiana Native Plant Society, the Board of the Bayou Vermillion Preservation Association and The Nature Conservancy of Louisiana.
Cathy Schieffelin
Originally from Lakewood, Ohio, Cathy has lived in New Orleans for twenty-six years. She served on the board of St. George’s Episcopal School for six years and was a vestry member for Christ Church Episcopal Cathedral. She also served as St. George’s Parent’s Group President and chaired various fund-raising committees during her time.
In 2017, Cathy founded a wildlife education business, Wild Times, that she brought to schools and community centers to encourage children to explore, appreciate and protect the natural world. She is a Master Naturalist and loves exploring the bounty of natural parks and reserves in Louisiana and beyond. Since Covid, Cathy has rekindled her love for creative writing. Her work has been published in a few literary magazines, online and print. Her first novel, The Call will be published in late 2024. Wildflowerspress.com is her website and blog devoted to writing inspiration and craft.
Cathy is a graduate of Denison University (1990) and the Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine (1996) where she holds a Master’s in Public Health. She has lived and worked in many capacities: writing and editing for the Frontier Nursing Service (FNS) Quarterly Bulletin in Hyden, Kentucky; teaching English at a bilingual girl’s school in Bogota, Colombia and serving as a health education volunteer in the Peace Corps in the Comoros Islands where she met her husband, John. Cathy and John have three grown children and over the years, innumerable pets – dogs, lizards, turtles and horses. She splits her time between New Orleans and Folsom, Louisiana where she enjoys tackling privet (lots of it), birding, cooking, gardening, wildlife rehabilitation and watching her pack of hairy mongrels run their upland piney-woods habitat.
Donna Wright
Donna Wright is a resident of Lafayette, Louisiana and is an avid outdoors enthusiast. She is retired from a successful career in the financial sector and wealth management. She and her husband John love spending time in the coastal marshes of Louisiana and traveling to fishing destinations such as Alaska.
Thanks to your support, w are protecting lands, waters and wildlife in Louisiana.
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