Bridging The Gap Staff

Kristin Riott | Executive Director

Kristin Riott began her environmental career by growing a single sweet pea blossom from seed in lousy suburban soil in Cincinnati, Ohio. She was sidetracked for a number of years by a career in creative management at Hallmark Cards. Moving to Hong Kong in 2000 for her husband's career, she and her family witnessed the rapid environmental degradation so easy to see in crowded Asian cities. Upon returning to Kansas City, she became active in various environmental movements, and in 2007 trained with Al Gore to become a spokesperson for climate change. She is also chairperson of Johnson County Climate Protection, a group devoted to reducing greenhouse gases in greater Kansas City.

James Joerke | Associate Executive Director

James Joerke has over 20 years of experience leading local government environmental and sustainability programs in Greater Kansas City. His passion for environmental protection comes from having grown up in Michigan, where he was lucky to spend many summer days fishing on the Cass River and enjoying the state’s many natural wonders. In his spare time, he enjoys spending time with his family, reading, playing music and gardening. Prior to joining Bridging the Gap’s staff, he served on its Board of Directors for eight years. He holds a Master of Public Affairs degree, with a concentration in environmental policy and natural resource management, from Indiana University.

Becki DeRusseau | Operations and Financial Director

Becki has a Degree in Environmental Studies from Kansas University. After eight years in accounting and systems management, she finally made her way to the field of her passion at Bridging The Gap. Becki is a Missouri Master Naturalist and certified in Permaculture Design. She enjoys volunteering on an urban farm, gardening, camping, kayaking, walking, learning and teaching permaculture, sewing, barn dancing and spending time with her family.

Kechia Smith | Programs Director

Noelle Morris | Marketing + Outreach Director

Noelle graduated from the University of Kansas with a degree in Biology. Shortly after graduation she packed up her car and moved to San Diego to pursue a lifelong dream of marine biology. At the San Diego Oceans Foundation (SDOF) she developed six environmental programs, lead a volunteer force of over 500 and developed partnerships with some of the world’s most renowned science institutions, including Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Hubbs-SeaWorld Research Institute. After eight years as Executive Director at SDOF, two years in Germany and eight years serving as Programs Director for BTG, she has found her way back to the ocean and now resides in Palm Coast, FL (working remotely now as Marketing + Outreach Director). In her spare time Noelle is quite the entrepreneur, having founded EPIC Cleaning Products, an eco-friendly line of cleaning products that donates 100 percent of its profits to environmental conservation, education and research charities.

Leslie Barland | Green Business Network Program Manager

Leslie feels that everyone is responsible for their actions and should do something to make a positive difference for the environment; therefore she chooses to work toward BTG’s goals. She participates in the Association of Fundraising Professionals activities. Leslie enjoys spending time with family, running, reading and pretty much anything outdoors.

Erin Bopp | Heartland Tree Alliance Program Associate, Community Outreach Specialist

Erin Bopp is a Kansas City native. She loves music, people and the natural world. She studied two years at the Conservatory of Music but instead completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology. When away from work, Erin is a co-host on Eco Radio, an environmental talk show on KKFI. She enjoys coming up with new ideas to help solve old problems. Erin is excited to work at Bridging The Gap!

Jacob Canyon | Kansas City Wildlands Program Coordinator

Jacob Canyon is a student of the living world. He helped found the Manheim Park Garden Conservancy, an urban farm in Midtown Kansas City and serves on its board. Jacob has worked in urban agriculture, native landscape design and nonprofit administration. He is also a working artist with a BFA in Illustration from the Kansas City Art Institute, and a Charlotte Street Foundation Rocket Grant recipient. He sees this visual practice as vital a means of inquiry into both the observed world, and into the ways we engage with it.

Chris Cardwell | Green Stewards Program Manager

Chris Cardwell is a Green Industry professional with a background in native ecosystem restoration and constructed native plant systems. He brings those skills to BTG's Green Stewards program, as an educator and landscape management expert. Chris was raised in a small farming community in central KS and is a University of Kansas alumnus ('08). He is a devoted environmentalist & conservation advocate, a lifelong musician and a self-described "foodie". He lives in Lake Waukomis, MO with his wife, Lindsay, and (awesome!) son Ryder.

Ben Carpenter | Heartland Tree Alliance Program Coordinator

Ben was raised in Rochester, New York where he spent time camping, hiking, hunting and fishing in the Finger Lakes of Upstate New York. It was there he developed a passion for the outdoors, and an awareness and appreciation of the interdependence of human and nonhuman systems. After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in English and Creative Writing from SUNY Fredonia, Ben served two years in AmeriCorps, his second term landing him in Kansas City in 2015. After working for a brief stint with the Heartland Tree Alliance, Ben left for graduate school at SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse, New York. There he received a Master of Science in Environmental Studies. Having returned to Kansas City and the Heartland Tree Alliance, Ben hopes to apply lessons in policy and communication to the work Bridging The Gap does throughout the region.

Sarah Crowder | Heartland Tree Alliance Program Manager

Sarah is a certified arborist with a degree in Urban Forestry and a certificate in Environmental Studies from the University of Missouri, Columbia. She grew up in Northwest Arkansas floating, camping and hiking. Her deep love of all things tree came early in life when it was time to cut down the family Christmas tree. After her indecisive grandfather cut down several cedar on his Texas cattle ranch confident, (some may say stubborn) young Sarah insisted he stopped “killing trees!” Sarah has experience working in state and municipal forestry before joining Bridging The Gap. She has been a long time supporter of BTG by volunteering and previously sitting on the Heartland Tree Alliance Steering Committee. Sarah enjoys spending time in her yard and loves talking to anyone that will listen about the importance of a healthy urban forest.

John Fish | Litter and Green Events Program Associate

John grew up in the small towns of Edwardsville, IL and Mapaville, MO, running wild in the woods around his home with his brothers. He traces his concerns about what we’re doing to the world to seeing the film Soylent Green at the drive-in theater in 1973, though he didn’t become active until his late-20s. His history with BTG goes back to our early days, first as a volunteer at the Independence Recycling Center before working as a site manager from late-1996 to early-1998 at the Bannister and Chouteau Recycling Centers. After he left that position, he resumed volunteering at the recycling centers in Midtown KCMO. He returned to BTG as a fill-in Community Recycling Center Manager in 2012 and became the regular 3 Trails manager in March 2014. Outside of BTG, he advocates for cultural change and works with 350KC to build a grassroots climate action and clean energy movement. He loves to spend time with his lovely wife Rakmi and learn more about why the world is the way it is, and how it came to be this way.

Kate Fowler | Heartland Tree Alliance Program Associate, Neighborhood Specialist

When Kate was a kid, she was always interested in plants and nature. She loved camping and playing outside but always thought that it was just a hobby. When she went to college, she changed her major to Horticulture so that she could focus on her true passion of learning as much as she could about plants! What was once a hobby became her passion and she started to look for ways to do this as a career. After a few years of working in landscaping and the plant nursery business, she decided to start her own small landscape design business and helps others with their plants now (in addition to working part-time at BTG, of course!).

Ami Freeberg | Volunteer Program Manager

Ami is passionate about the intersection of environment, food, and community. She grew up in Fairfield, Iowa, with much of her childhood spent in a garden and running around outside with the neighbor kids. While studying Sociology and Global Development at Grinnell College, Ami spent the summer in Kansas City doing an internship with Cultivate Kansas City. She returned to Kansas City in 2010 and spent seven years working with Cultivate Kansas City in many roles, including community outreach, volunteer management, and communications. Ami is also deeply involved with neighborhood and community work and has served on the board and as president of the Longfellow Community Association over the last four years. In 2015, she founded Longfellow Farm, a volunteer-run farm where neighbors come together to grow and share good food while working side-by-side to build a stronger community. Most recently, Ami worked with neighborhoods across KCMO and KCK as the program manager of Community Capital Fund. She is excited to make an impact in the face of the current climate crisis by engaging volunteers and neighborhoods around solutions for more resilient and sustainable communities.

Amanda Gehin | Heartland Tree Alliance & Monarchs

Amanda’s modus operandi: stay balanced in her practices of conservation and art, and to weave the two together in a way that becomes ultimately inseparable. Her intimacy with and love for wild things began early. She spent half of her childhood growing up in the bucolic countryside of Wisconsin, and the other half in a defunct Victorian-era sanitarium outside of Chicago. She moved to KC to attend the Kansas City Art Institute, from which she holds a BFA. While at KCAI she studied painting, animation, and studied abroad at the International Ceramics Studio in Kekscemét, Hungary, where she made porcelain ocarinas in the shape of hybrid architecture/ animals. Amanda is a former artist-in-residence of Charlotte Street Foundation, Hoop Dog Studios and BNIM Architects. She also attended UMKC where she studied Curriculum & Instruction. Work as a floral designer and passionate self-directed learning led to her working as a Native Landscape Specialist with the Missouri Department of Conservation. Currently, her favorite topic of study is the relationships between native insects and native plants. Amanda was very excited to join the BTG team to apply her passions to both Heartland Tree Alliance and the Monarch Program!

Linda Lehrbaum | Kansas City WildLands Program Manager

Linda’s passion for wildlife and wild places started early. As an Air Force brat, she had the opportunity to explore wild habitats all over North America, observing the connections between animals, plants and humans in a wide range of situations. After graduating from the KC Art Institute, she stayed put in Kansas City and intertwined her love of the wilds, animals, education and art into a variety of nature and science-based ventures, with habitat health and conservation always a primary focus. Working with KC WildLands has allowed Linda to directly work on these issues, from both “hands-on” and educational angles. She can now look a lizard on a glade square in the eye and know she’s doing her best for its future, and know that the next generation of humans will be able to experience what a healthy prairie really is. Linda is an active volunteer with Friends of Lakeside Nature Center, Missouri Stream Team #175 and the Kansas City Herpetological Society.

Jerri Miller | Office Manager

Jerri joined the BTG family in early 2012 as a volunteer and was happy to accept a permanent position with the organization. She holds a B.A. degree in Business Administration with a major in Management and a Master’s degree in Liberal Arts. Jerri’s educational and professional experiences provide her with a wealth of knowledge to utilize as she assists with various operations and programs. When not supporting BTG staff, she can often be found with her fingers flying on a keyboard, swiping the pages of a book, looking through a viewfinder, or lacing up her running shoes.

Mark Morales | Metro North Community Recycling Center Manager

Mark Morales, a lifelong resident of Kansas City Missouri, volunteered with Bridging The Gap for 10 years before coming on board in 2008. Mark now manages the 3 Trails Community Recycling Center and is the Rain Barrel Coordinator. As a community organizer for more than a decade, he worked with 15 different neighborhood associations north and south of the river, established relationships with stakeholders, incorporated low maintenance plantings, native grasses and rain gardens throughout the community and generated new interests for green space and gardens in urban core parks. As BTG Rain Barrel Coordinator, Mark is able to reach out to the community and educate about the importance of water issues in the KC area. He is presently working with urban gardeners from neighborhood associations who are incorporating gardens in vacant lots and reaching out to local schools and other civic groups. Mark joined BTG in 2008 and is a resident of Kansas City, Missouri.

Thomas Schlange | Recycling Center Operations Manager

Thomas Schlange was raised in an agricultural community in the Sandhills of Nebraska. Conversations of ecology, agri-business concerns and water conservation dominated dinner table conversations during his childhood years. Local faith-based organizations also impacted his educational development. A graduate of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln he spent several years working for elected officials in State and Federal Government positions. A 15-year career as Executive Director of college fraternal organizations was followed by stints in retail management, overnight freight delivery and arena guest services. Spare time activities include active participation in savoring foods of the world, healthy conversation about connecting the dots and exploring the wonderful world of words.

Carl Stafford | Green Stewards Crew Lead

Carl Stafford is a Kansas City, Missouri native. A graduate of the Kansas City Art Institute (Class of 2006), Carl founded MY REGION WINS! a multidisciplinary (501c3) nonprofit organization in 2014, and is the current President of Gregory Ridge Neighborhood Association. Carl's goal is to make history and to be remembered in Kansas City (and on this planet) as someone who made a difference. When not working, Carl enjoys playing disc golf, tennis, basketball and sports, in general. He's a dreamer! He loves to help people figure out their dreams and ways to pursue them. Carl is excited to be a part of BTG and looks to learn as much as he can from BTG.

Joe Wheelock | Heartland Tree Alliance Program Coordinator

Joe is the resident “What’s this bug??” expert for BTG having graduated from Iowa State University with a Master of Science degree in Sustainable Agriculture and Entomology. At ISU he developed a healthy obsession with native plants, native pollinators, and building a more resilient agroecosystem. An AmeriCorps VISTA position with BoysGrow brought him to KC and a position researching honey bees kept him here after his year of service. Joe is excited to get back to his roots and become more involved with the KC community and to help grow the HTA program. In his free time, he can be found playing ultimate frisbee, camping, hiking, or floating a river.