· Founders
Sidonie Christian is a resident of Camptonville.
Shirley DicKard RN is a founder and former Executive Director of the rural non-profit, Camptonville Community Partnership. Though retired, she is actively involved as Editor of The Camptonville Courier, a volunteer-produced community newspaper. She is also a writer, avid homestead gardener and cello student.
Mark Jokerst is a refugee from the Bay Area who settled in the Camptonville area in 1999 and now wears many hats in support of his family and community. An engineer of buildings, a water system operator, a carpenter and furniture maker, a retired fire chief, a teacher and trainer, a musician, gardener and a philosopher and historian.
Diane Pendola has been a contemplative presence in county jails and prisons since 1986 when she completed her Masters degree in theology. She has worked as a pastoral minister among incarcerated women for many years and is the creator of an in-prison transformational program based on her book The Lioness Tale.
Yakshi Vadeboncoeur moved to the Sierra foothills 30 years ago with her young family and late husband, Roger Rapp. During that time she has worked at the local elementary school in various capacities, among them librarian and Spanish teacher. Devoted to exploring the feminine face of God and manifestations of the Cosmotheandric vision in daily life, she uses spare moments to express the experience in poetry. And while tending the acre of land around her house, she endeavors to hear and absorb (and occasionally give voice to) the ecosophical whispers from the garden and surrounding forest.
Nancy Worcester is a retired fundraising professional living in San Rafael, California. She spent 16 years working at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur as Director of Development, and studying Gestalt Awareness Practice and other mind body practices before moving to the Bay Area. In 2016-17 she participated in a nine month LitUpp program at the Central California Women’s Facility (CCWF) led by inmates.