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Our Organization’s Structure

Coastside State Parks is governed by a Board of Directors. Since our association has no paid staff for executive or administrative tasks, our volunteer directors perform these duties themselves as officers of the board and through work on our committees. Committees include Finance, Governance, Park Stores, and Program & Development. This last committee also performs marketing and communication tasks. In addition, CSPA volunteers provide valuable assistance by serving on certain committees, particularly the Park Stores Committee.

To maintain close coordination, California State Parks appoints a member of its staff to serve as liaison between itself and each of its cooperating associations. CSPA’s Cooperating Association Liaison (CAL) is Ranger Barbara Morris  of the San Mateo Coast Sector, Santa Cruz District. The liaison for the Park Stores Committee is Docent Coordinator, Susan Blake.

CSPA’s only paid staff members are the manager and assistant who oversee CSPA’s three park stores. Both positions are part-time. Sales staff in the stores are State Park volunteers.

Meet our Board

Bill Murray, Board President

Bill Murray is a Bay Area native and has been a Coastside resident since 1999. Attracted to the San Mateo County coast by the surf and open spaces, he and his family have spent the last two decades exploring local State Parks, hidden beaches and the numerous trails between Montara and Santa Cruz.

Bill is a University of California, Santa Cruz graduate with a post-graduate degree in visual arts and natural science illustration. He is a proud alum of the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) and enjoyed architecture coursework at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design. Starting in graphic design in 1997, Bill focused on illustration, data visualization and editorial design for the Embarcadero Publishing Company. Moving to the Coastside, Bill worked as Design Director and then Publisher of the Half Moon Bay Review before switching gears to Public Relations. He served as chairman of the Bike Pedestrian Advisory Committee for Half Moon Bay from 2015-2019.

He enjoys surfing his local Montara break, bike commuting on the Coastal Trail, snow sports and extensive backpacking trips to the Sierra Nevada. The chance to help our local State Park system thrive is what brought him to the CSPA board in 2022.

Ellen Moore, Vice President

Ellen Moore was elected to CSPA’s Board in May 2023.  She resides in Moss Beach and recently retired from a career in pharmaceutical research.  Ellen has a Pharmacy degree from The University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill and practiced pharmacy prior to entering the field of research.

The outdoors has always fed Ellen’s spirit and she has explored the many beaches and trails in San Mateo County and California since her move to the west coast in 1999.  She is passionate about protecting these natural resources and sharing the unique beauty of the California Coastal area with locals and visitors.

Janet Oulton. Treasurer
Año Nuevo Docent

Janet Oulton, Treasurer

Janet Oulton retired in 2004 after sixteen years running her own IT consulting business and a cumulative thirty years in a variety of industries. Clients included electronic manufacturers, clothing companies, biomedical companies and medical claims processing. While the industries were different, the focus was always on the business operations.

Upon retiring, she trained as a docent at Año Nuevo, and has continued volunteering there. In 2012 she also became a docent at Pigeon Point Light Station.

Wondering if she could contribute some of her accumulated business experience to the non-profit that supports the Coastside state parks, she joined the Board of CSPA in 2012 where she helps out with the bookstore management, event ticketing and the bookkeeping.  She was president of the board from 2016 to 2021.

Tom Taber, Board Secretary

Tom Taber, Secretary

Tom Taber is a San Mateo County native who has been exploring the Bay Area's mountains and seashore all his life. He is the author and publisher of The Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Book and has been a part-time instructor at the College of San Mateo and De Anza College since 1982.

Tom started a graphic design business in 1979 and was a sales manager for several graphics companies before retiring in 2007. He has a B.A. degree in history from the University of California, Davis.

Jim Allen, Board Member
Año Nuevo Docent

Jim Allen

Jim Allen is a docent naturalist for Año Nuevo State Park where he educates and entertains global visitors.  As an avid photographer, his landscape and floral photographs are frequently published in Filoli House and Historical Garden literature. His photographs of kittens, on the Silicon Valley Humane Society website, have facilitated the adoption of over 1500 kitties.    

Jim received his BS in Chemistry and an MS in Environmental Science and worked in the environmental field for many years. He is the retired Chief Privacy Officer for a Silicon Valley high tech company. His passion for the environment has taken Jim and his wife on a journey to visit 46 of our 62 National Parks….so far.  When he is not glued to Photoshop on his computer, he is broadcasting live on his antique HAM radio equipment.  He and his wife, Megan, and his cat, Marley, live in Los Altos. 

Jim Joined the CSPA Board in May of 2017.

Fred Bockmann, Board Member
Año Nuevo Docent

Fred Bockmann

Fred Bockmann taught elementary school in central Illinois for 10 years. In the mid 1970s, as a hobby he built a computer and began using it in his classroom. Then, from 1980 - 1982, he was Director of an Illinois State Board of Education research program exploring ways computers could be used in education. He joined Apple Computer, Inc. in 1982 and had roles in engineering, sales, and training. Apple relocated Fred and his wife to California in 1997.

When Fred retired in 2007, he joined the docent program at Año Nuevo State Park. After 25 years working for Apple Inc., he was ready to leave the world of cubicles behind, and learn about elephant seals, native Americans, geology, botany, and more of his adopted home state of California. In his retirement, he is an active volunteer at the Media Center, Palo Alto CA’s public access television studio, and spends time as an archivist  at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA.

Fred enjoys travel, reading, photography, videography, and hiking, and has been known to, at the drop of a hat, take a road trip to explore new areas of the country.  Fred joined CSPA’s board in January 2015 and was Vice President from 2017 to 2021.

Chuck Edgemon, Board Member,
Año Nuevo Docent
Monterey Historic Parks Docent
Bodie State Park Docent

Chuck Edgemon

Chuck is a new board member and a retired State Park Ranger who spends his life in the greater outdoors. He’s also a life long equestrian. He started his long park career designing and building neighbor parks in Santa Cruz. He was the first staff member for the Land Trust of Santa Cruz. He worked as a ranger at Ano Nuevo for thirty years. During his time at Ano Nuevo, he was in charge of the Horse Patrol program, was the Docent coordinator for three years and started the Outreach program for underserved students thirty-five years ago. 

Chuck was in the United States Army and graduated from San Francisco State with a BA in Liberal Arts. He presently volunteers as a docent at Ano Nuevo, Monterey Historic Parks and Bodie State Park. He thinks a life of serving the American public and the natural world, is the best life one can image.

He lives in Monterey and the eastern side of the Sierras with his partner, Wendy. 

Pam Koch
Año Nuevo Docent

Pamela Koch

Pam Koch was elected to CSPA’s Board of Directors in November 2014. She has been a volunteer docent at Año Nuevo since 2008. She also serves on the Board of Sempervirens Fund.

Pam is a former hospital administrator in Philadelphia and Boston and a health policy analyst working on Capitol Hill and in the federal DHHS Secretary's Office. She holds an MBA with a Concentration in Health Care Management from the Graduate School of Management at Boston University. She has a history of volunteerism and advocacy for under-resourced youth in the Bay Area and currently serves as a Court-appointed Special Advocate in San Mateo County. She also serves on the Board of the Redwood Meadows Ranch HOA in Bonny Doon.

Since moving to the Bay Area in 1990, she has fallen in love with the dramatic Pacific Coast line and the majestic redwood forest that rises above it. She is an avid hiker throughout the region. Pam is dedicated to supporting the stunning and richly diverse 15 Coastside State Parks in San Mateo County.

Coel Miller

Coel joined the board in May of 2024. Born and raised in Half Moon Bay, Coel was drawn to the ocean through the Junior Lifeguard program. At age 16, he became a lifeguard for California State Parks and served 8 years before he went on to run HMB Junior Lifeguards in 2022. In 2023, Coel joined the San Mateo County Harbor District as a Deputy Harbormaster. Coel also holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of San Diego. During his free time, Coel enjoys surfing, hiking, gardening, and cooking. He joined CSPA to share his appreciation for nature with the local community and visitors. 

Jeff Regan, Board Member

Jeff Regan

After two decades of RV camping at Half Moon Bay State beach and photographing sunsets and the Milky Way at Coastside State Parks, Jeff and his wife knew the coast was the place to retire. He owned a broadcast and Cine camera rental house on the Peninsula and was a video director of photography for 38 years after attending the College of San Mateo. 

Jeff’s landscape photography has been featured on many social media photo hubs, in calendars, art galleries, and his photos have won several local photo contests. He uses his photos to fundraise for Coastside nonprofits and joined the CSPA board as a way to honor and support the State Parks he loves to capture. He especially loves shooting at Pigeon Point Light Station and Montara State Beach.

Erik Watts

Erik joined the CSPA Board in May 2023. He has lived on the coastside since 1991. Erik is an avid hiker and surfer and has walked, hiked or surfed all of the 15 CSPA supported State Parks.

Erik graduated from Art Center College of Design with a BA in Graphic Design. He is a self-employed business owner and creative director of Erik Watts Design Office and has over 30 years of experience specializing in brand and identity design.