Board of Directors

Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation
Division of Natural Areas
500 James Robertson Parkway, 8th Floor
Nashville, TN 37243

Sam King is Natural Areas Program Manager with the Division of Natural Areas in the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation. His work involves a variety of natural resource management projects (including invasive plant management, native plant restoration, and rare species protection) within the natural areas of middle Tennessee. Sam also works closely with Tennessee State Parks on resource management projects.

Cleveland, TN

Byron has a BS in Environmental Science from UT Chattanooga, 2001. He has more than two decades of invasive species management experience, working for private nonprofit conservation organizations (Tennessee River Gorge Trust, The Nature Conservancy, and Reflection Riding Arboretum and Nature Center) and for a government agency (Kentucky Nature Preserves Commission). Byron is currently a private Independent Contractor (Weed-Killer-for-Hire). He is also the world's mediocre-est guitar player.

EnSafe Inc.
308 North Peters Road
Suite 200
Knoxville, TN 37922

Jimmy Groton is an Environmental Scientist/Ecologist with EnSafe Inc., an environmental consulting firm. At EnSafe he works on wetland and stream mitigation and natural resource management projects (including invasive species control/replacement) for federal, state, and private clients. Jimmy is also a board member of Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning, a 55-year-old nonprofit, environmental advocacy organization based in Oak Ridge. At TCWP, Jimmy helps to manage stewardship activities including cedar barren restoration and invasive plant control at the Oak Ridge Barrens State Natural Area and TVA’s Worthington Cemetery Ecological Study area. Jimmy is a member of the Tennessee Native Plant Society, Emory River Watershed Association, Society of Wetland Scientists, and Association of State Wetland Managers. He joined the TNIPC Board in 2015 as a representative of TCWP.

Writer

Margie is a writer and author of Gardening with the Native Plants of Tennessee: The Spirit of Place. She gives presentations on native plants and natural history, serves on the boards of the Tennessee Native Plant Society and Tennessee Naturalist Program, and volunteers with the Spring Wildflower Pilgrimage in Gatlinburg. Her blog on hiking in the Great Smoky Mountains features trail and natural history accounts for the national park and the Appalachian Trail. (Photo by J. Paul Moore)

Kris retired from the National Park Service at Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee and North Carolina where she served as Supervisory Forester working with exotic plant management, forest health and native plant restoration in the park. A member of TN-EPPC’s original board of directors, she has served continuously since, including a term as president.

Natural Resources Management Team
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
P.O. Box 2008
Oak Ridge, TN 37831-6351

Kitty McCracken is a member of the Natural Resources Management Team of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Her responsibilities include management of invasive plant species and native grass restoration projects for the Oak Ridge National Environmental Research Park (a Biosphere reserve). She is on the ORNL Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee and is lab manager of the Aquatic Ecology Laboratory. Kitty also leads a project to survey bats and identify habitat crucial to 3 species of endangered bats on the NERP. She has worked in environmental sciences and animal research for over 40 years.

Red Bank, TN

Bill is active in the Tennessee Valley Wild Ones native plant advocates and helps organize their Plant Natives! Symposium &Expo. He is currently the Chair of the Sierra Club Tennessee Chapter Conservation and Political Committees. He has practical experience managing invasive plants on his 3 acre private botanical garden.

Retired Oak Ridge National Laboratory Natural Resources Manager

Pat is retired from Oak Ridge National Laboratory where her responsibilities as Natural Resources Manager included natural resource management, integrated land use planning, and management of the Oak Ridge National Environmental Research Park (also a Biosphere Reserve). She is Past President of the Association of Southeastern Biologists and TN-IPC, Chair-elect of the Executive Committee of the Southern Appalachian Man and Biosphere Cooperative, and board member of the East Tennessee Regional Leadership Association and Discover Life in America.