The North Coast Resource Conservation & Development Council

Oona Heacock is the Executive Director at the North Coast Resource Conservation & Development Council (Council). She first joined the Council in 2014 as a volunteer Water Conservationist to assist with community drought resiliency efforts and then joined the Council as their staff Water Conservationist in 2015, advancing to Assistant Executive Director in 2018, and appointed Executive Director January 1, 2019.  

Ms. Heacock holds a B.S. degree in Geology and is currently completing her Master’s degree in Public Administration at Sonoma State University. She is an active board member of the National Association of RC&D Councils and a member of the 350 Sonoma Zero Waste Committee.  She has also been an active volunteer at Sun Ridge School in Sebastopol and was a founding member of the school’s Parent Education and Diversity Committees.   

As a conservationist by practice and geologist by trade she has felt fortunate to be involved in work throughout her career which combines her passion to address our most pressing conservation challenges while empowering youth and our communities to foster sustainable and regenerative practices for the future. She has worked with hundreds of youth and community volunteers over the past five years working at the Council and has planted thousands of square feet of new pollinator habitat along our local farms, built many rooftop rainwater collection and storage systems at schools and community gardens, implemented dozens of composting programs at local schools to reduce their food scrap garbage, and assisted with fire and community resiliency efforts since October 2017.

Ms. Heacock grew up along the beautiful foothills of the Mayacamas in Rincon Valley and now lives with her husband and two daughters at a small ranch just outside of Sebastopol.

The North Coast Resource Conservation & Development Council, in partnership with 180 Studios, is providing an opportunity for local youth in South West Santa Rosa to participate in learning about pollinator habitat needs by planting habitat forage “Bee Patch” to be drip irrigated by a rooftop rainwater collection and storage system and nourished with a vermicomposting system. This habitat will turn barren land at the front of the 180 Studios Community Makers Space into a diverse ecosystem.