WildWest Institute

WildWest Institute
P.O. Box 7998
Missoula, MT 59807
P: 406.542.7343
F: 406.728.5779
info@wildwestinstitute.org

Who We Are - Staff & Board of Directors

Board of Directors

Paul Edwards
Helena, MT

Bobby Grillo
Missoula, MT

Rick Meis
Bozeman MT

Jeanette Russell
Missoula, MT


	Matthew Koehler, Executive Director Matthew grew up in rural Wisconsin surrounded by dairy farms and the Kettle Moraine State Forest. His love for forests and wildlands came from his family's vacations spent hiking, biking, fishing, canoeing, cross-country skiing and camping in the state and federal forestlands of Wisconsin and upper Michigan. In addition to being a certified high school English and history teacher, he paid his way through college by working at a lumber company and spent a summer as a wildland firefighter in Oregon. In his free-time he enjoys hiking in national forests with his wife Jeanette, organic gardening, hunting morels and elk and playing sports with friends.
	Jake Kreilick, Restoration Coordinator Jake's involvement with national forest issues began in 1985 when he attended graduate school in the Environmental Studies Program at the University of Montana. He worked as a tree planter for five years on the Kootenai National Forest where he learned valuable lessons about the U.S. Forest Service and its logging program. Kreilick travelled in Australia and Southeast Asia working and studying the root causes of deforestation in the tropics. While in Australia, Jake founded the Native Forest Network, which later became the WildWest Institute. Jake currently serves on the National Forest Restoration Collaborative as well as on the Steering Committee of the recently formed FireSafe Montana. He is head coach of the Missoula Maggots Rugby Football club and lives in Missoula with his wife Heather and their three children, Tashina, Uriah and Violet.

	Cameron Naficy, Staff Ecologist Cameron graduated from Rice University in 2003 with a B.S. in ecology and evolutionary biology. In 2008 he received a Masters degree from the Department of Organismal Biology and Ecology at the University of Montana, where he researched the relative effects of logging and fire suppression on structural characteristics of ponderosa pine/Douglas fir forests of the Northern Rockies. An avid backcountry adventurer, photographer and naturalist, Cameron's interest in public lands advocacy stems from his longtime history with Montana's wildlands, especially around his family's ranch on the Rocky Mountain Front. In 2008 Cameron was awarded a prestigious Fulbright Scholarship and he's currently in Argentina conducting research. He'll be back in Montana in Spring 2010.