Kathy is the food advocacy manager at TomKat Ranch Educational Foundation. The ranch exists to practice and promote regenerative agriculture, inspire and catalyze action to transform five million acres to regenerative land management, and to shift five million eaters to purchase food raised from regenerative farms. Growing up in California, Kathy studied nutrition/dietetics at CSU Chico State and is passionate about food and farming. She has been with the ranch since 2007 and, in 2008, helped launch the ranch’s grassfed beef business, LeftCoast GrassFed. Kathy is on on the board of American Grassfed Association and is the vice president. At TomKat Ranch, she works on various projects, including Beef2Institution, improving the quality of school food, overcoming processing issues for ranchers, certification adherence and implementation, and building consumer demand for regenerative agriculture.

Roundtable Facilitator

Robyn Paulekas is a Senior Mediator and Program Director at Meridian Institute. She has led and supported both domestic and international projects on agriculture, water, conservation, outdoor recreation, and climate change—often working at the nexus of more than one of these issues. She currently facilitates a group of ranchers, researchers, NGOs, and others who are exploring the intersection of western rangelands and data. They are digging into some big, hard topics like public land grazing, as well as drought and ranch resilience.

Robyn has extensive experience finding and catalyzing collaborative solutions. Prior to Meridian, Robyn applied geospatial information to find solutions to water-related conflict in the Klamath Basin in Oregon. At the University of Wyoming Ruckelshaus Institute of Environment and Natural Resources, she supported multi-stakeholder dialogues on energy, climate change, and endangered species.

Away from work, Robyn can be found chasing her two wild and curious sons through the mountains, prairies, and rivers of the West.

Roundtable Facilitator

Supporting Innovation and Flexibility in Public Land Grazing

Deborah Clark is a partner with her husband Emry Birdwell at the Birdwell and Clark Ranch near Henrietta, Texas. Deborah and Emry have worked for the past 20 years to improve rangeland conditions through holistic and regenerative management practices. Recently, a sheep enterprise was added to the stocker operation. Deborah now focuses on “saving the ranch”. External challenges include pipelines, highway development, transmission lines, and a proposed reservoir that would decimate the current grazing management and inundate 2,000 acres of prime riparian habitat and native tall grass prairie. Deborah and Emry put the ranch into a conservation easement and Deborah leads efforts on a local, regional, and statewide basis to defeat the proposed reservoir.

Roundtable Facilitator

Melinda is, Is’ Ton’ Aiyeh’ (San Carlos Apache) born for Kin łichíí’nii (Diné). Melinda is a child at heart. As a child she often visited her Father’s homelands in the Lukachukai, Round Rock and Chuska Mountian region of the Navajo Nation. As a young girl she became attached to the land and chose to nurture her family among her relatives in Round Rock, Arizona. Melinda started her career working at a geotechnical environmental engineering firm, later worked as a Transportation Planner with the Denver Regional Council of Governments. Here she was introduced to the water quality program which led her to a career with the Navajo Nation EPA – Water Quality/NPDES Program implementing the Federal and Navajo Nation Clean Water Acts for the past 20 years. Through these experiences Melinda has learned that honoring and protecting our water is vital to our existence. She is dedicated to planting the rain, restoring our land and caring for our eldest relative, the Earth.

Roundtable Facilitator

Latrice Tatsey (In-niisk-ka-mah-kii) was raised on her families cattle ranching operation on the Blackfeet Nation in northwest Montana. Latrice graduated from Montana State University with her bachelor’s degree in Natural Resource and Rangeland Ecology and completed her mater’s degree in Land Resources and Environmental Sciences. Latrice has previously worked for Piikani Lodge Health Institute where she worked with cattle producers on grazing practices that are influenced by cultural science and cultural relationships with the land. Her goal is to continue helping tribal producers improve their operations while focusing on relationships based practices that improve the health and well-being of the land.

Plenary Speaker

Buffalo Restoration at Blackfeet Nation

Jesse Smith is the Director of Land Stewardship at White Buffalo Land Trust, a non-profit dedicated to advancing regenerative agriculture. Raised on California’s Central Coast, he focuses on fostering diverse partnerships for multi-stakeholder projects. Jesse is particularly interested in multi-strata agroforestry, hydrological restoration, and specialized agroforestry crops such as agave, elderberry, and mushroom farming. He actively works to restore ecological balance in food, fiber, and medicine production, emphasizing soil health, water cycles, and biodiversity. In his role, Jesse manages the Center of Regenerative Agriculture at Jalama Canyon Ranch, a 1,000-acre site that integrates farming, ranching, and conservation. He oversees vineyard operations, livestock care, and restoration activities. Jesse Smith’s leadership and dedication to regenerative agriculture are driving transformative changes. Through collaboration and commitment, he inspires others and advances the principles of regenerative land stewardship.

Plenary Speaker

Place-Based Regeneration: An Agricultural Process

“Place-Based Regeneration: An Agricultural Process” is grounded in the work of White Buffalo Land Trust at the 1,000-acre Center for Regenerative Agriculture at Jalama Canyon Ranch. Located in California’s Central Coastal ecoregion, we explore our work through hands-on experiences with livestock management, perennial agroforestry, and watershed restoration. This presentation delves into the unique characteristics of our place, the time in which we work, and the fabric of our community. We examine the specific opportunities and challenges we’ve encountered, and how these shape our practices, desired outcomes, and monitoring methods. By sharing the principles that have guided our work and the insights we’ve gained, we aim to deepen the understanding of regenerative processes that lead to soil health, enhanced water cycles, promoted biodiversity, and improved human and community well-being.