Call for Candidates for the Coalition of American Canyoneers Board of Directors

It’s election time at the Coalition of American Canyoneers. We encourage new candidates to come forth during this election cycle. The Coalition of American Canyoneers is an organization for the members by the members and is volunteer based. We meet once per month via phone and have up to two retreats per year with electronic communication in between. We are always in need of individuals that are interested in getting involved to help us promote canyon access, conservation, education, and safety.

There are five openings for a two year term. Currently the candidates are:

Hank Moon (incumbent)
Sonny Lawrence (incumbent)
Steve (Ram) Ramras (incumbent)
Rich Rudow (incumbent)
Dan Halim
Sarah Carmona

If you have questions or are interested in running for a Board of Directors’ position, please send a short bio and photo before July 28, 2018 to: board.election@americancanyoneers.org.

Candidate bios will be posted from July 29 through the election cycle on www.americancanyoneers.org and reminders will be sent to our members to vote. We will hold the election via email vote from July 30 – August 10, 2018. Elected individuals will be announced the week of August 13th.

Rich Rudow

I was 25 years old when I discovered Grand Canyon. The other day I woke up middle-aged and realized that I have now been playing in Grand Canyon for nearly half of my life! What started as a river trip in 1989 morphed into years of backpacking in progressively more remote areas, occasionally walking around these foreboding slot canyons.

By 1998, I started venturing into some of the more well-known Grand Canyon slots and discovered a rare and hidden beauty that both fueled my passion and introduced me to “canyoneering”. As I explored off established routes, it became increasingly clear Grand Canyon contained hundreds of slots in the difficult-to-reach limestone layers, many of which had not been descended before. In 2007, Todd Martin and I set out to descend as many as we could and have now descended more than 130 Grand Canyon slots. In 2012, I was named one of Outside Magazine’s Adventurers of the Year for both leading an audacious canyoneering river trip in February 2011 and descending a particularly difficult slot called Obsession. Dan Ransom’s film, Last Of The Great Unknown, profiles the Obsession descent and is featured in the 2012-2013 Telluride Mountain Film World Tour.

My experiences in Grand Canyon, and the inevitable interaction with the NPS land managers, made me realize our right to visit these marvelous places is not assured. Land managers are often wary of canyoneering because it’s new and they are unfamiliar with it. Rules and regulations arise from well-meaning assumptions, but these regulations can literally put us out of business. For me, this became a call to action. Land managers respond to organizations with strong memberships; The Coalition of American Canyoneers is our vehicle to convey our right to be in these stunning places.

I’m proud to serve on the Coalition of American Canyoneers board to help keep our playgrounds open as canyoneering enjoys a surge in popularity.

Sonny Lawrence

I started canyoneering in the early 1970’s as part of a Search and Rescue (SAR) team. We would insert ourselves at the top of canyons; our job being to search for lost souls who had gone missing. While waiting out a huge storm in the Zion Visitor Center in 1996, I came across a book on canyoneering, which revealed to me that other folks were doing this activity in an organized, recreational approach. Consequently, I formally began to explore canyons. Since then I have traveled to Nepal, New Zealand, Europe, Mexico, Costa Rica, Hawaii, and, of course, the southwestern U.S. to play in the canyons. A handful of these canyons were first descents.

Aside from actually descending canyons, I am very involved in the social canyoneering world and enjoy holding free workshops to teach canyoneering. I was on the board of the former American Canyoneering Association, participating at the local, national, and international level. I am the vice-president of a new organization, the International Amateur Association of Canyoning and attend an international rendezvous every year. My wife, Calius, and I are retired which allows us to share our time between search and rescue, mountaineering, and canyoning activities. Every now and then the laundry gets done.

I have been active in creating or participating in canyon cleanup projects in southern California and the Grand Canyon, as well as, protecting canyon access in the southwestern U.S.

Steve “Ram” Ramras

I want to be involved in this organization because I owe the community a great debt and I would like to pay it back. All the friends I have made in the last several years. All the new techniques developed and amazing places discovered and shared with me. So here I am ready to support access so as to ensure we can enjoy our public lands.

I will work directly toward conservation goals. I want to ensure my children and our children’s children will have pristine wilderness to recreate in. This organization will work hard to offer education resources, so we can protect the land through “leave no trace” methods. Safety is also a goal, and will hopefully also be a byproduct of the education. We aim to support search and rescue groups and with some help from us, enable them to be less busy. This will also help protect our access. See how it all goes around in a big circle?

I was born in the South Bronx, New York City. I am the only member of my family who has ever taken a hike or slept on the ground. As an 8-year-old, I stumbled upon mountain climbing books in the NYC Library. I declared to all that would listen, “I am going to do those things when I grow up!” While my “growing up” is debatable, I have certainly had a life of wondrous adventure. I hope my good fortune can be balanced by service back to the community.

Hank Moon

Childhood camping with my father: Shenandoah Valley, Smoky Mountains…rock and water, snakes and turtles, Ranger Rick magazine. All strengthened my passion for the outdoors and ultimately led to working with PMI. Living in Chattanooga, I squeezed in a B.A. in Mathematics between trips underground to the deep caves and pits in the area.

By 1998 I was working with Petzl America and when the company decided to move to Utah from Georgia, I got on board immediately. I had heard of mysterious desert drainways called slot canyons and by chance discovered Pine Creek Canyon in Zion. Having spotted it from the canyon overlook trail, we scurried down the slot to the first rappel and saw water pooled far below. Ooops, no wetsuits in the car. Four months later I returned to do Pine Creek and became thoroughly hooked on Zion’s twisty topography.

I’m looking forward to continue working with the CAC board and membership to help develop the organization into a lasting entity that will serve the canyoneering community.

Dan Halim

I started canyoning about five years ago because of Luca Chiarabini and the San Diego Grotto. With his guidance, training, and rigorous canyon schedule, I went from a complete canyon newbie to a beginner canyoneer, meeting a few people, learning a variety of techniques, and experiencing a range of canyons and situations. Since then, I’ve trained several canyoneers and have lead trips of my own, taking new people out to show them the wonders of nature and canyoning in general, and the camaraderie and responsibility that comes with it. Luca’s generosity and willingness to freely share knowledge set a great example, and I’ve always been happy to share my knowledge, seek new information and expertise, and help those in need.

As the sport has grown, we’ve suffered growing pains. But with those growing pains, I hope to continue to honor the legacy of those who came before me and those who have given everything so that we might be better and safer as a community moving forward. Working with the Coalition of American Canyoneers would be a way for me to give back; it’s a way to ensure not just access to canyons, but access to people, information, and techniques to be safer and better canyoneers. It’s a way to help conserve not just canyons and the environment, but also life, the lessons that have been learned and forged by sacrifice. It’s also a way to promote education and safety, so that we, and those who come after us, can continue to safely enjoy the sport, the world, and the people we share it with. I look forward to working with the Coalition of American Canyoneers to advance our sport and our community.

Sarah Carmona

I didn’t grow up spending much time outside. In 2012, I started canyoning under the guidance of Luca Chiarabini and immediately fell in love with the sport. I even wrote a final paper about canyoning in college! Since then, I have run primarily Class C canyons throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico, Costa Rica and soon, Switzerland. I have also participated in the Coalition of American Canyoneers volunteer efforts, such as graffiti removal in Eaton Canyon.

I’m not the most experienced canyoneer, but I do have a passion for the canyon community. As a member of the Coalition of American Canyoneers, I want to strengthen our community by building a stronger communications network. By connecting canyoneers from different regions of the US, we can all experience canyons in a safer, more informed way. I embrace the Coalition of American Canyoneers’ values and would like to do my part in giving back to the community.