Board of Directors

Cliff P. Polk Jr. (President) is a founder and president of Rocky Mountain Financial Group in Denver. The firm provides estate and business planning services to business owners, a majority of which are agricultural producers. He is personally involved with agricultural property on the North Platte River.

Kathay Rennels (Vice-President) was elected Larimer County Commissioner in 1998 and re-elected in 2002 and 2006. Kathay has been a life-long rancher and served as the President of the Larimer County Cattlewomen's Association. She is a current member of Colorado Counties, Inc. Board of Directors and and advisor for the CSU Cooperative Extension Service.

Brent Orr (Secretary) operates a farm in Yuma County near Wray. Brent has formed the Wray Farmer Owned Wind Farm Group among landowners seeking to develop wind energy projects. He is also working as a consultant for a wind developer.

Mike Hall (Treasurer) is a member of Hall and Hall, a regional agricultural and rural real estate services firm established in 1946 in Denver, Colorado. Mike is an Accredited Rural Appraiser, licensed real estate Broker and rural landowner. Hall and Hall is involved on daily basis with rural landowners and policy makers throughout the Rocky Mountain and High Plains states.

Mark Sponsler is Executive Director of Colorado Corn Growers and is also General Chairman of the Colorado Farm Show. Raised on a farm in southern Iowa, Mark came to Colorado in 1981, working in the fertilizer and chemical industry for the first 12 years after graduating from Iowa State University. He then worked nine years as an agronomist for Coors Brewing Company before coming to Colorado Corn Growers in 2003 to manage a precision-ag technology subsidiary called FarmProfit.

Barbara Walker is Executive Director of the Independent Bankers of Colorado. For the past decade she has led the state’s largest banker trade association which exclusively represents the interests of community banks. Previously, Barbara served from 1991 to 1996 as Colorado’s first woman state banking commissioner. She also served as a First Assistant Attorney General for the State of Colorado from 1986 to 1990, and worked earlier in her career in the private sector at two Denver law firms.

Reeves Brown and wife Betsy have owned and operated the 700-cow 3-R Ranch in western Pueblo County since 1981. They have a passion for conservation and are in the process of placing a phased conservation easement on their ranch. Reeves and Betsy were honored twice in 2001, receiving a Recognition Award for holistic management from the Colorado Division of Wildlife and received the Outstanding Commercial Producer Award from the Colorado Cattlemen's Association.

Penny Lewis operates a cow/calf operation in the Kremmling area and is President of the Colorado Agricultural Commission and a member of the Colorado Cattlemen's Agricultural Land Trust Board of Directors. She is a former member of the Grand County Board of County Commissioners.

Dan Pike is Executive Director of Colorado Open Lands, an innovative statewide land trust founded in 1981. Previously, Dan was founding partner of Western Lands Group specializing in land exchanges and other complex land transactions. He was the first state director of the The Nature Conservancy.

Staff

John Covert, Executive Director
John grew up on an Idaho farm where his family's farm produces a variety of seed crops. He has a degree in architecture and graduate work in urban planning. He has been a planner, assistant city manager, lobbyist, consultant, and community activist. Prior to developing a small consulting firm, John was an assistant city manager in Colorado Springs responsible for intergovernmental relations. Most recently, he has worked with agricultural and rural economic development interests promoting sensible land use policies and renewable energy development.

Rebecca D. Cantwell, Communications Director
Rebecca has worked as a reporter and editor for daily newspapers in Denver, Colorado Springs and Longmont, playing a role in covering most of the state’s big stories in the past two decades and gaining extensive knowledge of Colorado.