December, 2021
We are delighted to welcome Regan Botsford and Katy Thostenson to the Friends of Lake Wingra Board of Directors! Regan and Katy bring a wealth of talent and energy to the board, and they are excited to help us promote a healthy Lake Wingra through an active watershed community. Please read a little about Regan and Katy below.
Regan joined the Board of Directors in December 2021. She and her family recently relocated to Madison after spending twenty years in the Bay Area. During her time in California, Regan worked as a development officer for the Sierra Club, UC Berkeley, UCSF and Stanford supporting programs ranging from environmental impact to medicine. Regan enjoys philanthropy and connecting donor intent with purpose, and the relationships created on both sides. Regan and her family can be found around Lake Wingra nearly every day. In the summer, they enjoy swimming, kayaking and exploring around the lake. In the winter, they love to ice skate on the lagoon. Regan was drawn to the Friends of Lake Wingra to help preserve and protect this beautiful natural resource, and to help advocate for its future.
Katy joined the Board of Directors in December 2021. She’s a lifelong resident of the Great Lakes states and first moved to Madison in 2013 for her MS degree in Conservation Biology and Sustainable Development at UW-Madison. She has taken her skills in social science research, evaluation and natural resources outreach to support a variety of grants and programs over the years, and she is currently the program manager for Water Action Volunteers, a UW-Madison Extension and Wisconsin DNR statewide citizen science stream monitoring program. Katy enjoys searching for birds and buzzing pollinators in natural areas around Madison, and strives to plant as many native and, ideally, edible plants as she can in her yard.