Meet our Board

Jesse Turri, Board President
Jesse is a father, husband, designer, web developer, artist, activist, and writer living in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. His interests and work focus on the intersections of art, design, spirituality, religious naturalism, philosophy, and ecology and it seeks to investigate various types of oppression and injustice—including economic, racial, environmental, and non-human oppression—in order to uncover how these types of injustices interact and inform one another. Jesse has studied at the Pennsylvania College of Technology, earning undergraduate degrees in Printing and Publishing Technology and Graphic Design and he is currently pursuing a MFA in Communication Design at Kutztown University.

Barb Jarmoska, Treasurer
Barb Jarmoska is a teacher, retired business owner, wellness consultant, journalist, environmental activist and child advocate. She holds a bachelor’s in Special Education and a master’s in Early Childhood Education. As founder of Freshlife, host of the Road-2-Health radio show and managing editor of Options Magazine, Barb spent over 3 decades studying, practicing, and teaching principles of natural health. She lives in rural Lycoming County bordering the Loyalsock State Forest and within several miles of over 270 permitted unconventional Marcellus Shale gas wells. Barb has served on the Board of Directors of the Responsible Drilling Alliance for 7 years, where she focuses on health and environmental advocacy work with regards to drilling, fracking, and related industrial development. She also serves as the president of Project CoffeeHouse, a nonprofit child advocacy organization that sponsors the Summer Alive day camp program in Montgomery, PA. As a Summer Alive volunteer, Barb helps to develop and oversee programs designed to connect children to the natural world to foster a sense of wonder and community.
Contact Information:
Barbara Jarmoska
570.435.BARB (2272)
barbjarmoska@verizon.net

Dianne Peeling
Transplanted from Massachusetts, Dianne has called central Pennsylvania home for the last 48 years. A graduate of Drew University and Teachers’ College, Columbia, she has been a teacher of English in the Bronx and here in PA in two local districts, and most recently at Penn College of Technology. Dianne believes spending time on the water in any vessel without a motor is time well-spent – whether on the river, on local streams and lakes, or off the coast of Maine. Dianne enjoys and affirms the value of the Pennsylvania Wilds – an area rich with beautiful streams, the Susquehanna River and pristine mountains and forests. She joins with her fellow RDA members in a commitment to protect and preserve these natural treasures for generations to follow

Harvey Katz
Harvey holds a PhD in fisheries biology and has extensive research and environmental policy experience, gained through numerous professional positions. Harvey has also served as a professor of environmental science at six colleges and universities.
Parallel to his scientific career, Harvey served his country for 36 years in the National Guard, retiring in 1989 as a Lieutenant Colonel.
Harvey holds a pilot’s license and has a love of flying. Having logged over 1,100 in the air, including missions for the Civil Air Patrol, Harvey continues to fly to this day.
Harvey is an active volunteer for a significant number of NGOs and university-affiliate organizations, where he volunteers his extensive scientific expertise on forest management, water quality, fisheries biology, and municipal planning and zoning.
In 2012, Harvey became interested in the wetlands of Loyalsock State Forest (LSF). Harvey completed obtaining data on 115 bogs in the LSF in 2017. In addition to providing public presentations on this work at Bucknell University and elsewhere, he is currently writing the results of this research for scientific publication.
RDA is pleased to have access to Harvey’s vast scientific knowledge and appreciates his role as a scientific advisor and consultant on the organization’s board of directors.

Mark Szybist
Mark Szybist advocates for clean energy policies in Pennsylvania that will reduce global warming, create quality jobs, and ensure environmental justice. Currently he focuses on implementation of the Clean Power Plan, the reduction of methane emissions from oil and gas production activities, and the design of utility programs that incentivize energy efficiency and protect consumers. Prior to joining NRDC, Szybist served as a staff attorney for Citizens for Pennsylvania’s Future, where he focused on Marcellus Shale gas drilling litigation and policy. He has also worked as a consumer bankruptcy attorney and a technical writer. Szybist holds a bachelor’s degree in comparative literature from Princeton University and a law degree from the Temple University Beasley School of Law. He is based in NRDC’s Washington, D.C., office.

Robert Cross
Robbie grew up in rural NJ in the fifties and sixties gaining an interest in outdoor activities that included rock climbing. He attended Lycoming College, graduating in 1967 with a degree in sociology and spent a year in NYC working for the Department of Social Services. In 1968, Robbie returned to Williamsport, married and after several employment experiences, created and became the president of Nippenose Equipment Company, which sold equipment for rugged outdoor pursuits. Eventually, Nippenose morphed into a manufacturing and wholesale operation called Equinox, Ltd that is in operation today.
Robbie and his wife, Ardythe, were pleased to be one of the five founding families of West Branch School in Williamsport, a private alternative school now in its 5th decade. Currently, Robbie sits on the Board of Directors of several community organizations.
Robbie’s experiences in and love for the magnificent landscapes surrounding Williamsport convinced him that an effort to protect them from the incursions of the gas industry was essential. In 2008, he became one of the founding members of RDA.

Jonathan Butterfield
Jonathan Butterfield is a mostly retired Williamsport attorney who practiced general civil law with the firm of Murphy, Butterfield & Holland for more than 35 years. He has assisted and been a board member of numerous nonprofit groups, including RDA, Habitat for Humanity, North Penn Legal Services, Friends of the Library, the St. Luke Fund, and the Williamsport Community Concert Association.
Every week, he goes for an extensive hike with a group of friends, which sadly gives him abundant opportunity to observe the damage to our hills and valleys and streams wrought by the fracking industry.

Lena Yeagle
Lena Yeagle joined RDA’s board with the hope that she could help make a difference in an organization that is working with nature, instead of against it. Since 2019 she has been focused
on educating and immersing herself in the topics of soil health, regenerative agriculture, native plants, and various other ecologically and socially related interests.
Lena is excited about spreading the information she has learned to help people realize that whether they are farmers, people with land (from multiple acres to a flower pot), or anyone who
eats, they have the power and ability to make meaningful and positive differences through land management and buying choices as consumers.
She's also a professional artist and musician. In her free time, you might catch her using her art skills to create scenes that communicate ecological stories, such as how native plants are a necessary foundation in the complex interactions that support a healthy ecosystem, and ultimately the humans who depend on them. The powerful messages in Lena’s art are created on a variety of surfaces, including upcycled furniture.

Ralph Kisberg -- Consultant
Ralph is RDA’s energy policy consultant. He has worked in the oil and gas and renewable energy industries, and in the agriculture and land regeneration fields. From 1998-2008 he served as a land steward for the Native Sovereign Nation, the Pueblo of Sandia, managing of the community’s recreational and hunting ranch in Mora County, New Mexico for the last seven of those years. Upon returning to to live in his hometown of Williamsport after 32 years primarily in the Rocky Mountain region, he was leery of the gas industries rapidly growing impact on the beautiful place where he first learned to observe, explore, and love the natural world. He became one of the founding members of RDA in the spring of 2009 and after serving as RDA’s third Board President for two years, became a paid contractor with the organization in order to help further its goals full time.

Jon Bogle, Founder, Member Emeritus, Rest in Peace January 18, 1940 – March 22, 2024
All of us at RDA are deeply saddened by the passing of RDA’s founder and our dear friend, Jon Bogle.
RDA exists only because of Jon’s foresight and dedication. He was the driving force behind the grassroots organization founded in 2009 to balance the gas industry’s wild promises with facts and the truth about the massive industrial process of shale gas extraction known as “fracking.”
The Responsible Drilling Alliance organized as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, with Jon as the first president and his home in Williamsport serving as the site for those early RDA meetings. Jon was not only knowledgeable about energy issues and politically astute, he also had a keen sense of justice and brought it to bear in all of RDA's deliberations. He had great love for the PA Wilds, and his advocacy contributed to the preservation of critical public lands in Pennsylvania.
Jon put RDA on the international news map with his trenchant critique of Emerging Giant, a propaganda piece funded by the Marcellus Shale Coalition and written by Penn State University staff. The work was published as scientific research, bearing the Penn State seal on every page. Jon's press release under RDA's name exposed the work’s deep flaws and caused a stir acrossAmerica and around the world, leading to a retraction by the Dean of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences at PSU. The University seal was removed from the paper, and Jon’s work was instrumental in the eventual departure of the two professors responsible for the unrealistically rosy economic forecasts the study contained.
Jon will be long remembered for his leadership, dedication, and host of contributions to RDA. Included among those was his invaluable work with RDA in preserving critical public-land wild areas in PA, including Rock Run.
It is with deep gratitude and heavy hearts that we say goodbye to our trail-blazing leader and beloved friend.
Ralph Kisberg
Robbie Cross
Harvey Katz
Barb Jarmoska
Diane Peeling
Mark Szybist
Eliza Whyman
Jonathan Butterfield
Jesse Turri
Lena Yeagle
Norman Lunger
Sheila Lunger