Board of Park Commissioners - Who We Are

The Board of Park Commissioners is a nine-member citizen advisory board, serving three-year terms. The composition of the Board is:

• Four members appointed by the Mayor and confirmed by City Council
• Four members appointed by City Council
• One member appointed from the Get Engaged Program

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Antoinette Angulo
Primary Interests: Community building; community centers; equity in access to physical activity and healthy lifestyle choices; Parks’ role in urban agriculture and food security; community solar; and protecting park spaces and programs for all users.
City Council Appointment: May 2011
Term Expires: March 2014

Commissioner Angulo is an advisor to both Prometheus Public Health Consulting Group and Just Health Action! She was the Preventive Health Services Director at Sea Mar Community Health Centers, and received a Masters Degree in Public Health from the University of Washington. She is a 2010 graduate of Leadership Tomorrow.

Commissioner Angulo serves on the Board of Directors for the Associated Recreational Council (ARC) and served as Chair of the Neighborhood Matching Fund’s Citywide Review Team. She was a founding board member of the Latino Community Fund of Washington State. She has served on a number of additional boards and community groups. Commissioner Angulo was a member of the Peace Corps in Nicaragua from 1999-2001 with a focus on community health. Her work has been published in peer-reviewed journals and she has made public health presentations across the United States and in Canada, Thailand, and Uruguay.

John Barber
Primary Interests: Community, health, and nature/environment
City Council Appointment: May 2007
Term Expires: March 2013

John Barber earned his Masters Degree in Sociology from the University of Chicago and completed one year in the Graduate Landscape Architecture Program at the University of Michigan. He retired from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, where he specialized in the development of public housing on Indian Reservations in the Pacific Northwest and the Midwest, and is a certified Public Housing Manager and professional Project Manager. On a citywide level, he is chair of two groups, Parks and Open Space Advocates (POSA) and Friends of Street Ends. He is a master gardener, native plant steward, and urban forest steward. He is currently chair of the Parks and Greenspace Committee of the Leschi Community Council, and has worked on a number of park projects in the Leschi neighborhood, including Leschi Natural Area, Frink, Flo Ware, and Powell Barnett Parks, and Lake Washington Boulevard. He walks his dogs daily in Leschi Park and gardens at the Colman Park P-Patch. In 2005, he received a Seattle Parks' Denny Award in recognition for his 30-year involvement in the stewardship and preservation of Seattle's parks and open space.

Commissioner Barber represents the Board on the Citizen's Oversight Committee for the West Point Settlement Funds.

Megan Heahlke
Primary Interests: Healthy living and community recreation, access for all to parks, and environmental sustainability 
City Council Appointment: March 2012
Term Expires: March 2015

Megan Heahlke is currently an Intergovernmental Affairs Specialist with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Seattle. Previously, she was a Legislative Aide and Communications Director for King County Councilmember Bob Ferguson and interim Chief of Staff. After graduating Phi Beta Kappa from St. Catherine University and receiving her Juris Doctorate from the University of Montana School of Law, Megan served as law clerk for the Honorable Susan P. Watters in Billings.

Prior to law school, she served as an adjunct professor at Montana State University and as an analyst with Accenture. During law school she was Vice President of the Women’s Law Caucus and a member of the Montana Law Review. Megan is active in the St. Catherine University Seattle Alumnae Chapter.

Jourdan Keith
Primary Interests: Youth, equity and access to programs and parks, habitat and cultural preservation, urban forestry, and waterfront and aquatic resources
Mayoral Appointment: May 2009
Term Expires: March 2014

Jourdan Keith is the founder and director of Urban Wilderness Project and has a strong interest and background in creating, planning, and organizing activities and wilderness trips for youth. She was previously the Environmental Restoration project lead for the University of Washington’s Restoration Ecology Network which restored habitat for Seattle Parks Department. She works with North Cascades National Park and the United States Forest Service leading trail-building projects. Ms. Keith is a Washington Native Plant Steward, Washington State University Beach Watcher, a naturalist, educator, environmental specialist, and a poet and published writer.

Diana Kincaid, Acting Chair
Primary Interests: Access for all to parks, environmental sustainability
Mayoral Appointment: May 2009
Term Expires: March 2013

Diana Kincaid is a lifelong resident of Seattle and a professional educator and business owner. She is an active community volunteer and served as president of Friends of Magnuson Park from 2003-2004, is a member of the Parks and Open Space Advocates (POSA), and served on the Open Space 2100 Project Guidance Committee.

In her professional career, Ms. Kincaid was certified at the Foeldi College in Germany and attended the University of Washington. She served on the Massage Therapy Foundation’s Board of Trustees and was the Founder and Chair of the Best Practices Committee. Ms. Kincaid was also National Chair of the American Massage Therapy Association’s Ethics and Standards Committee, chaired numerous hearings and educational forums in that role, and is a continuing education instructor in the United States and Canada. She received a national award for her volunteer services.

Commissioner Kincaid has represented the Park Board on the Community Center Advisory Team, the Magnuson Park Advisory Committee, and is currently its representative on the Central Waterfront Design Committee.

Brice Maryman
Primary Interests: Park system planning and funding; children’s play spaces; environmental sustainability; healthy parks and recreation
Mayoral Appointment: February 2012
Term Expires: March 2015

Brice Maryman is a landscape architect with SvR Design Company in Seattle. He has written extensively about urban landscapes and has been a lecturer at the University of Washington. Mr. Maryman holds a Masters in Landscape Architecture from the University of Washington and a B.A. in English from St. Mary’s College of Maryland; his professional expertise includes historic preservation, sustainable site design, playgrounds and green infrastructure design and planning. 

Mr. Maryman shares his landscape expertise and passion for healthy, sustainable urban living as a volunteer, serving on the Board of the Arboretum Foundation and the Planning and Design Technical Advisory Committee of the STAR Sustainable Community Index. He has previously served on the Board of Great City, which he chaired from 2009-2010, the Cultural Landscape Foundation and the Friends of Seattle’s Olmsted Parks.

Caitlin McKee
Primary Interests: Urban green space, public access to open space, accessible recreation programs, and public engagement in park planning processes
Mayoral Appointment-Get Engaged Program: September 2012
Term Expires: August 2013

Caitlin McKee received a B.A. in Community, Environment, and Planning from the University of Washington, and is currently earning a Master of Public Administration from the University’s Evans School of Public Affairs. She is also a Research Assistant for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Agricultural Development Team. Previously she served the Peace Corps in Guatemala as a Municipal Development Advisor on citizen participation initiatives for women living in rural areas. She recently served as an agency representative for the Federal Green Challenge Program to reduce the federal government’s carbon footprint, as Grants Committee Chair and Board Member of the Seattle Returned Peace Corps Volunteers organization, and as a member on the Gender and Development committee in Peace Corps Guatemala. Ms. McKee volunteers with a Latino immigrant day workers center and participates in public planning meetings, and also enjoys playing soccer, trail running, and bachata dancing.

Ms. McKee is the Park Board’s first young person appointed from the Get Engaged program by the Mayor. Her goal is to be a good steward for Seattle’s parks, open spaces, and recreational programs.

Yazmin Mehdi
Primary Interests: Sustainable funding for parks and recreation, recreation opportunities for all, open space
Mayoral Appointment: May 2012
Term Expires: March 2015

Yazmin Mehdi served the City of Seattle for 14 years, working variously as a fiscal and policy analyst in the City Budget Office, a special assistant to the mayor for arts and culture, a special assistant to the City Librarian for strategic planning and projects, and as director of the Seattle Public Library community programs and events. In the early 1990s, she helped develop Seattle Parks Department’s Comprehensive Plan. In the private sector, Yazmin worked as an editor for Microsoft’s Encarta, and more recently, served as the first Business Director for Crosscut, Seattle’s “News of the Great Nearby.”

Ms. Mehdi serves on the governing board of Town Hall, a non-profit that presents and produces civic, cultural, and other programming for the Seattle area, and was a founder and first treasurer of Queen Anne Elementary PTSA through June 2012. She previously served on the boards of Hilltop Children’s Center, the Washington Community Alliance for Self-Help, and the Library Council of Washington. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Social Studies from Harvard University and a Master of Public Policy from the University of Michigan.

Barbara Wright
Primary Interests: Healthy living; Environmental Sustainability; and Park Design
Mayoral Appointment: February 2012
Term Expires: March 2015

Barbara Wright is currently a healthy community advocate working on transportation and community livability issues. She is the Chair of Transportation Coalition and has been a board member for over five years and she is also a member of Seattle’s Bridging the Gap Oversight Committee.

Most recently she has been  a member of the Governor’s Connecting Washington Task Force, the Seattle Transit Master Plan Advisory Committee, and the Seattle Citizens’ Transportation Advisory Committee. She was previously the Deputy Director of the Environmental Health Division, Public Health – Seattle & King County. She also served as Parks Director for King County, Washington, and Parks Director for the City of Omaha as well as Chief of Staff to the Mayor of Omaha. She has been an active member of the Arboretum Foundation for over 11 years and chaired the Arboretum Foundation Board of Directors.

In 2010, she chaired the Arboretum Botanical Garden Committee, a management oversight committee for the Washington Park Arboretum. In this position, she provided leadership in working collaboratively with the Washington State Department of Transportation to develop the State Route 520 I-5 to Medina Project Arboretum Mitigation Plan which was transmitted to Governor Gregoire on December 21, 2010. 

Currently, she assists with teaching a health impact assessment course at the University of Washington.