BREEF's 8 Board members meet regularly in an advisory capacity, each member bringing invaluable experience and expertise towards meeting BREEF's objectives.

Past Chairman and Founder

Sir Nicholas was educated formally in England in the 1940’s and 50’s but his 'real education' came from British soldiers and tunnel miners, a French conservationist, a museum in Monaco; from Bahamian teachers and from observing coal reefs around the world. He have learnt three classic lessons. First that our interest in conservation stems from the wish to conserve our life support system, particularly our food supply. Second that by studying our fellow creatures who have also survived three billion years of evolution we can find all the answers we need to keep homo sapiens going for its natural span as a species.  Lastly the best thing we can each do for conservation is to obey the spirit of our laws.

Casuarina McKinney  was a volunteer at BREEF’s early teacher training workshops in 1999 and has been the Executive Director of BREEF since 2002. Before joining BREEF, Casuarina was the Science Research and Community Outreach Coordinator at the Cape Eleuthera Island School. Casuarina is a member of the National Wetlands Committee, and has compiled an assessment of the status of healthy and degraded wetlands in The Bahamas for the National Creeks and Wetlands Restoration Initiative. She has experience with coral reef and fisheries research in The Bahamas and elsewhere, and she has been a keen diver and fisher from a young age. Casuarina graduated with honors in Marine Biology and Environmental Policy from Duke University and is from Governor’s Harbour, Eleuthera.

Ann Colley is Executive Director of The Moore Charitable Foundation where she has worked for the past twelve years.  During her tenure, Colley has helped the foundation to develop its mission of supporting environmental causes.  The foundation currently works with about 50 environmental conservation advocacy and research organizations.  Before joining The Moore Charitable Foundation, she worked for six successful political campaigns including presidential, congressional and gubernatorial campaigns.  She worked for five years with the preeminent national dropout organization, Communities in Schools, providing fundraising and program design expertise. 

Colley currently serves of the national boards of the Land Trust Alliance and Waterkeeper Alliance as well as the boards of Group for the South Fork, Peconic Baykeeper, Bahamas Reef Environmental Education Foundation, Riverkeeper, and Operation Lifeline Iraq.  She was instrumental in securing seed funding for Waterkeeper Alliance and founding the Peconic Baykeeper program. She is a member of NRDC's New York Council and E2, NRDC's national community of professionals and business people who believe in protecting the environment while building economic prosperity.

Stuart Cove has been a long term supporter of marine conservation, helping to to bring awareness of the important role that a healthy marine environment plays in our tourism industry. He is a member of the Coastal Awareness Committee, and has made it possible for hundreds of young Bahamians to snorkel and experience the marine environment on the beautiful reefs of Western Newprovidence.

Charlie Dana is president of Newport Shipyard, a mega-yacht facility in New England. He is a past commodore of the New York Yacht Club and was a syndicate member of 5 America's Cup campaigns. He serves on the boards of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, the Newport Restoration Foundation (Doris Duke), the Dana Foundation, and locally, is deputy chair of the Lyford Cay Club and a member of the POA (property owners) board. Also, closer to home with BREEF'S mission, he is a former board member of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Charlie was born in New York in 1947, and graduated from the University of Denver in 1970.   

Bobbie Hallig: Retired co founder of International Television Trading Corp. of New York, Massachusetts and California.  Founding member of the Massachusetts chapter of The Nature Conservancy and presently serving a second term  on the MA board as trustee. Past TNC winner of The Oak Leaf award for volunteer leadership in 2001. Board member of The Berkshire Natural Resources Council and Project Native.  Part time  resident of the Bahamas since 1998 and lifetime member of The Bahamas National Trust. Member of The Rotary Club of Great Barrington and active in Rotary in various clubs in Nassau, Bahamas. 

Sonya Wisdom entered the teaching profession twenty-three years ago as a middle school science teacher.  After fifteen years as a classroom teacher in The U.S. and The Bahamas, she became a lecturer in the School of Education at the College of The Bahamas in 1998.   There she taught primarily science education courses in the Primary Bachelor of Education and Primary Advanced Placement Bachelor of Education degree programmes.  In 2003, she assumed the role of Graduate Programmes Officer at The College of The Bahamas.  She remains absolutely convinced that education is the correct profession for her. Sonya received a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry from Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia and a Master of Education degree in Science Education from The University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia.  She is presently a doctoral student in Curriculum and Instruction at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio. Her hobbies are reading, cross-stitching, and quilting.  She is married and has one son, Nicholas, who recently entered college – a true milestone event for him and his mother.

BREEF is a growing organization with two dynamic staff members

Executive Director - Casuarina McKinney

Ms. McKinney joined BREEF in 2002 as its first Executive Director, she works tirelessly to influence environmental policy in The Bahamas helping to ensure that our marine environment is used in a sustainable manner so that we ensure that we have fish for the future.

Office Manager/Environmental Educator - Charlene Carey

Mrs. Carey a former Science Teacher joined BREEF in July of 2006 and is working to develop educational tools for public education and school programmes. BREEF believes that an educated and aware public will call for action to sustain our marine resources.