Meet our Board

Stephanie Cairns, Chair

Stephanie has worked on environmental and economy policy for 30 years. She serves as the Director of Cities and Communities with Smart Prosperity, a national green economy think-tank/do-tank. She has been a consultant or board member with many of Canada’s leading environmental think tanks and ENGOs, and a strategic advisor in the Prime Minister’s Policy and Research Office. Stephanie has also worked with the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, Parks Canada, and the IUCN on major policies and guidelines for protected areas management, conservation, and ecological restoration.

Pearl Roberts, Vice-Chair

Pearl Roberts has been an islander since 1994, on Mayne and on Galiano. Her career history includes time as a teacher, business owner, communications professional and fundraiser. She has worked as a consultant with non-profit organizations of all sizes across B.C. and has served on various Boards in Vancouver and provincially. She now volunteers her time with Galiano organizations, including the Galiano Library Society where she led the campaign to build the island’s first dedicated library. Pearl is a past warden for the Ballingall Islets and is committed to preserving the rare beauty of the Southern Gulf Islands.

Risa Smith, Treasurer

Risa Smith is a founding director of the Galiano Conservancy and the volunteer warden of the Galiano Ecological Reserve.  She is an ecologist by training who currently works on international biodiversity policy issues.  Her work experience ranges from the control of invasive alien species to lead on many ‘state of the environment’ and ‘state of biodiversity and ecosystems’ reports for provincial and federal governments and international organizations. She continues as an international negotiator on biodiversity issues both globally and in the Arctic.  Risa’s personal interests include ecosystem resilience, natural history, impacts and adaptation to climate change, social justice, gardening, and advanced energy systems (especially solar).  Most of all Risa is committed to the potential for the Galiano Conservancy Association to have a positive impact on natural history education and the restoration of damaged ecosystems on Galiano Island and beyond.

Julie Gardner, Secretary

Recently retired, Julie Gardner had a career as an academic and then a consultant in the area of environmental policy and planning. Most of her later contracts were with First Nations. She and her partner, Dan Moore (a hydrologist), are grateful for their perch overlooking the beauty and ecological diversity of Retreat Cove – Xetthecum. Hiking and kayaking are their favourite activities.

Suzanne Fournier, Director

Suzanne Fournier is a journalist and author with a special interest in First Nations and environmental issues. Her first book “Stolen From Our Embrace” was awarded a BC Book Prize, the Hubert Evans award for nonfiction. Her book about the Portuguese-Coast Salish history of the Gulf Islands and early BC is called “Shore to Shore: The Art of Ts’uts’umutl Luke Marston,” (Harbour Publishing, Nov. 2014), tells the story of a monumental bronze Coast Salish sculpture was erected in Stanley Park. It is a tribute to the early founding families of Reid, Galiano and Vancouver Islands. A former daily newspaper reporter, who covered beats ranging from the environment and education to First Nations, social justice, courts and crime, Ms. Fournier also has written for a wide variety of newspapers and magazines and provided commentary to Canadian, US, French and German broadcast media.

Laurene Stefanyk, Director

Laurene has called Galiano her full time home for over 32 years. She is currently a volunteer at the Conservancy’s Food Forest and has participated in many of the educational offerings on the island throughout the years. Laurene is particularly interested in environmental education/eco-therapy and food security/indigenous food sovereignty, especially in the light of our rising climate crisis. She holds a BA Honors degree in Geography and Sociology and has a Child Care Workers certificate, with experience in working with youth in mental health. Laurene currently works at our community school as an EA (education assistant) and enjoys working in the woods alongside her partner, Gord Palmber.

Sheila Anderson, Director

Sheila has lived, worked, and volunteered on Galiano for over 40 years. The changes she has seen in that time convince her that the more we can all learn about and respect our unique natural environment here on Galiano, the better chance there is for a positive future. She has served previously on the Galiano Conservancy board in its early years, held positions on Galiano Parks and Recreation Commission, Galiano Club Board, Activity Centre and LTC Advisory Planning and Transportation Commissions. She also served one term as a Galiano Local Trustee. More recently she volunteers with the Galiano Island Emergency Program and the Galiano Library. Her personal interests include family, gardening, keeping a small flock of sheep and working with their fibre to weave and knit.

Ian Chunn, Director

Ian is a retired teacher and college instructor of English and Communication Studies with experience in the not-for-profit sector through his work with the B.C. Book Prize Society (President, Executive Director) and Columbia College (instructor, Assistant Dean of Social Sciences, member of the Board of Governors). He recognizes the wisdom of Greta Thunberg’s words, “We must take action”, and looks forward to supporting the Conservancy’s leadership role in shaping a sustainable future for all of us.

Holly Schofield, Director

Holly obtained a Forestry degree in 1981 and worked for the BC Forest Service on Haida Gwaii for several years in the silviculture department. She then moved on to various administrative and managerial roles in the financial field. Since retirement, she has lived on Galiano part-time for the first three years and full-time for the past seven years.
She currently writes speculative fiction with an emphasis on eco-fiction, with over a hundred short stories published in Rising Tides, Save the World, Cli-Fi: Canadian Tales of Climate Change, and many other publications throughout the world.  A long-time member of SFWA, she has been a fiction editor at Solarpunk Magazine and media content coordinator for SF Canada, as well as mentoring new writers and conducting writing workshops.
She is passionate about the environment and believes it is not too late to protect, steward, and restore critical habitat and that, by working together, we can create a new reality.

Chris Tollefson, Director

Chris is an educator, author and public interest litigator. He has been a professor at the UVic Faculty of Law since 1991, and is currently executive director of the Pacific Centre for Environmental Law and Litigation, and Principal at Tollefson Law.
He has appeared before all levels of court, including the Supreme Court of Canada. He has been counsel on many leading environmental cases including the Northern Gateway pipeline review (for Nature Canada & BC Nature: 2012-2015); the Trans Mountain pipeline review (for Nature Canada and BC Nature: 2014 to 2020); the Pacific North West LNG environmental assessment (for Skeena Wild: 2015-2018); and the Teck Frontier oils sands environmental assessment (for Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society: 2017 to 2020).
Early on in his career, he was part of the legal team that successfully represented the Galiano Conservancy and its trustees in a SLAPP-style lawsuit brought by MacMillan Bloedel. He later co-founded, with Ken Millard and Carolyn Canfield, an NGO that helped secure passage of Canada’s first anti-SLAPP law. He continues to write about and represent public interest clients facing litigation of this kind. His current clients include the Heiltsuk Tribal Council, the Tahltan Central Government and the Haida Gwaii Management Council. Tollefson Law is also co-counsel along with Arvay Finlay LLP, on La Rose v HMTQ, a climate lawsuit case filed by fifteen Canadian young people against the federal government. He is co-author (with Meinhard Doelle) of Environmental Law: Cases and Materials (Carswell 3rd ed, 2019) and has won various awards for his teaching and research including Nature Canada’s Conservation Partner Award for his work leading their legal team during the Northern Gateway pipeline hearings. His litigation career was profiled in The Narwhal.
Chris has been a part-time resident of North Galiano for almost 30 years, along with his children Hannah and Rory.