Pam is currently working as a consultant with Coalitions & Collaboratives, a Colorado non-profit, helping to manage their Action for Implementation and Mitigation (AIM-P) Partnership program. She is also an active member of a Community Mitigation Assistance Team (CMAT), working with communities across the U.S. to share best practices and bolster their capacity for moving mitigation efforts forward.
Pam was a founding member of Fire Adapted Colorado, a state-wide network that strives to bring practitioners together to share and learn from one another and create a fire adapted culture in Colorado. She continues to serve as a Board member after a 2½-year stint as Board Chair.
In December 2017, Pam retired from FireWise of Southwest Colorado (now Wildfire Adapted Partnership), where she had served as Executive Director since 2008. During her tenure, FireWise, which serves a five-county region, added FireWise Coordinators in Montezuma, Archuleta, and La Plata counties and continued to grow its unique Neighborhood Ambassador Program; added numerous partnerships; completed over 20 subdivision-level Community Wildfire Protection Plans, helped 15 communities attain Firewise Communities USA status, and instituted several incentive programs to assist residents in their mitigation efforts.
In her first career, Pam worked for the U.S. Forest Service; her last position on the San Juan National Forest in Durango was as the Public Affairs Specialist for the fire and fuels program, from which she took an early retirement in 2007 after 23 years of service. As a Type 1 Public Information Officer, she has worked wildfire and hurricane assignments across the U.S. It was this PIO work – working with communities and educating residents — that inspired Pam to launch her second career in wildfire mitigation.