Board of Directors

Mark B. Lapping, President
Mark B. Lapping in the Distinguished University Professor and Executive Director of the Edmund S. Muskie School at the University of Southern Maine in Portland. Previously he served the University as its Provost/Vice President for Academic Affairs from 1994-2000 and 2007-2009. Prior to that he was the founding Dean of the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University where he was also the Associate Director of the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station. He also served as the founding Director of the School of Rural Planning and Development at Ontario’s University of Guelph and as Associate Director of the Environmental Program at the University of Vermont. He has served on the Board of the National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture and many other farming-related bodies. He is the author/co-author of 10 books and many journal articles, reviews and monographs.

Roger Allbee
Roger Allbee grew up on a small hillside farm in southern Vermont. He served as the Vermont Secretary of Agriculture and the State Executive Director of the Farm Service Agency. His accomplishments are extensive and vary from serving as a Senior International Business Consultant for agricultural trade policy to serving as a professional staff member of the U.S. House Committee on Agriculture. His previous experience includes Vice President of the former Farm Credit Banks in Springfield, Massachusetts and as an Extension specialist at Cornell University.

Patrick Field
Patrick Field is the managing director of North American Programs at CBI and Associate Director of the MIT-Harvard Public Disputes Program.

Patrick has helped thousands of stakeholders reach agreement on natural resource, land use, water, and air issues across the United States and Canada. Patrick is listed on the roster of conflict resolution professionals of the U.S. Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution and the Massachusetts Office of Dispute Resolution. He holds an M.C.P. in Urban Planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is co-author of the award-winning book, Dealing with an Angry Public, as well as numerous journal articles and research papers.

Sarah Flack
Sarah Flack is on the Board of Directors of EMC and an adviser to VTAMP. She has farmed for many years in Fairfield, Vermont. She has also been a farm manager on a dairy farm and has a wide range of practical farm experience in both animal and horticultural production. She has an MS degree in Plant and Soil Science from the University of Vermont, and works extensively with farmers in Vermont and throughout the US on innovative methods for managing agricultural resources in a sustainable manner.

Jack Kartez
Jack Kartez is a professor of Planning, Development and the Environment at the Muskie School of Public Service, University of Southern Maine. Professor Kartez teaches Planning Theory & History, Land Use Modeling with GIS, Citizen Involvement & Dispute Resolution, and Local Environmental Planning. Extensively published, he has served two terms each on the editorial boards of the Journal of the American Planning Association and the Journal of Planning Literature. He takes a special interest in incorporating principles of dispute resolution as alternatives to nonproductive conflict in community planning and environmental issues.

Dr. Kartez provides training in consensus building and leadership to many of the Muskie School’s external constituencies through programs such as the joint Muskie/Maine Municipal Association Leadership Program and the Smart Growth Education Initiative of the New England Environmental Finance Center, for which he is Associate Director.

Neal Rodar
Neal Rodar has over 16 years of experience in professional mediation. He was Director of the Woodbury Dispute Resolution Center for ten years. Neal’s Board and Committee memberships include the Professional Responsibility Board of the Vermont Supreme Court, the Vermont Board of Bar Examiners, the Environmental Mediation Center, the Oversight Committee of the Vermont Family Court Mediation Program, and the Vermont Environmental Court Mediation Program. Neal has worked extensively developing mediation programs with State Governments and serves as Mediator-in-Residence at the Woodbury Institute at Champlain College in their Masters in Mediation and Applied Conflict Studies program.

Dick Uncles
Dick worked for the New Hampshire Department of Agriculture, Markets, and Food for 31 years and was the Director of the Division of Regulatory Services for over twenty of those years. Dick has a BA in history from Keene State College and an associates degree from UNH’s Thompson School in Plant Science. After retiring from NHDAMF, Dick founded Strictly Peppers, a horticultural venture that grows speciality peppers utilizing row covers and mulching to extend the growing season. Strictly Peppers’ products are sold in farmers’ markets and to restaurants. Dick lives in Chester, New Hampshire.