Our Team

Resiliency Council

Robert Longatti

Robert Longatti grew up on a small farm in Chowchilla and is a fourth-generation resident of Madera County. Through his expansive career as a local banker, Bob has worked in executive management of community banks headquartered in Fresno. He earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Agriculture Business Management from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. In 1986, the Longatti family moved to Yosemite Lakes Park with their two sons. In 2007, they built a home on 40 acres in the O’Neals area. Bob is a graduate of Class 11 of the California Ag Leadership Program and has worked with numerous local nonprofits over the years in an advisory board function including, Sierra Foothill Conservancy, Fresno Blood Bank and most recently as a founding member of Citizens for Forest Sensible Management, an organization striving to bring back balanced forestry management practices to California.

John Mount

John R. Mount worked for Southern California Edison for 31 years, managing the company’s 20,000 acres of private land surrounding Shaver Lake. He has a total of 57 years in forest management starting with the Forest Service and then 15 years in private practice.

John has received the Governor’s Environmental and Economic Leadership Award, Stewardship Award, and the Conservationist of the Year award from the western section of the Wildlife Society. He was the recipient of the Francis Raymond Award, as outstanding forester in California for 2010.

In 2010, he published a comprehensive book on forest management in the Sierra Nevada titled “Torching Conventional Forestry, the Artful Application of Science”.

He is a 1961 graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, where he received a B.S. degree in forest management. John has 5 children, 12 grandchildren, and 10 great-grandchildren. He has lived in the Shaver Lake area since 1961.

Kristin Rathmann Telles

Kristin Rathmann Telles grew up spending lots of time in the Sierras—at Bass Lake, Huntington Lake, and the YMCA camps at Sequoia Lake, specifically. Though they live on the Valley floor, she and her husband, Connor, have a cabin at Huntington Lake and spend considerable time there. They both love recreating in the outdoors with their two children—skiing, hiking, exploring, and playing in the lake.

Kristin has a degree in History from UCLA, a Social Studies teaching credential and a Masters of Teaching. While raising her family, she spent seven years serving on the Board of Directors for San Joaquin Valley Town Hall and several years volunteering in the library at the kids’ school. Both her time with Town Hall and her time in the library have strengthened her love of words, history, and the stories, places and experiences that connect us.

Sahara Saude Bigelow

Sahara Saude-Bigelow was raised in Tollhouse and attended Sierra High School. She left home for college and then proceeded to travel the world working with conservation organizations on three continents. While living in Indonesia, she finished a graduate degree in international environmental policy (Middlebury Institute of International Studies), gaining with her M.A. the awareness that development work is most meaningful when done in your own ‘community’. She returned home and has worked with California conservation groups for the last fifteen years. In 2015, she launched a non-profit consulting company, B6 Consulting. Some of her favorite activities in the Sierra are snow skiing, kayaking, hiking and spending time in Shaver and Huntington Lake with family and friends. After the Creek Fire destroyed many of these areas and dozens of friends’ homes, Sahara wanted to help connect local needs with resources. She is dedicated to the long-term vision of thriving Sierra communities living within healthy forests. Sahara resides with her husband Frank and their two young daughters (3 and 6) in O’Neals, Ca.

Julianne Stewart

Juli was born and raised on the Georgetown Divide, located in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. She attended Humboldt State University, graduating in 2006 with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Forestry, with an emphasis in Hydrology. She spent the early part of her career working for SCE Forestry, using prescribed fire and applied silviculture to manage the Company-owned lands for water, wildlife, recreation and timber. In 2014, Juli left SCE to form Vermilion Resource Management Inc., a forestry and environmental consulting firm. Vermilion provides services to a diverse set of clients, including small private landowners, researchers, universities, agencies and public utilities.

Juli and her husband Ryan feel incredibly lucky to raise their daughters Juniper and Rowan in the mountains of the Central Sierra. Family adventures in the woods are one of their favorite pastimes, and they are dedicated to the management and continued restoration of these critical natural resources.

Juli is a Registered Professional Forester and a member of the Board of Directors of the Central Sierra Historical Society.

Chasie Thiele

Chasie Thiele has lived in Shaver Lake since 1998 and moved to the area because of her love of all that the Central Sierra has to offer. She is a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist and graduated from Fresno State University with a B.S. in Food and Nutritional Sciences. She and her husband have two children with which they enjoy spending their time as a family boating on the lake, snow skiing, backpacking, & motorcycle riding. Her passion and care for the community, the forest, and the wildlife in the Central Sierra is what motivated her to help establish the Central Sierra Resiliency Fund. Chasie believes that the devastation from the Creek Fire will require many groups and agencies to come together to help the area recover but it is imperative that the long term stewardship of these lands occurs so that a healthy forest can be enjoyed and lived in for generations, of humans and animals, to come.

Riley Young

Riley Young was born and raised in the Shaver Lake area, where his father logged trees for more than 40 years.

Riley graduated from Fresno State with a BS in Ecology. Riley started his career with SCE Forestry working on the Shaver lands. For the last fourteen years he has been working for hydro electric companies in the Central Sierra.

He is happily married to his lovely wife Carolyn Young with whom he shares three amazing kids: Mason, Ivie , and Travis. Riley’s spare time is spent in the woods or coaching his kids sporting teams.