Board

The Nautilus Institute Board of Directors

Tom Miller is senior partner in the law firm of Miller Washington & Kim. Specializing in providing legal services to Asian refugee communities from Viet-Nam, Laos & Cambodia, Miller was the first U.S. attorney to open a post-war office in Viet-Nam.  Miller is co-founder and president of Green Cities Fund, Inc., a non-profit organization which established the Vietnam Green Building Council, Parwaz, the first Afghan-run microfinance organization and is developing environmental projects in Cuba with the Antonio Nunez Jimenez Foundation.  During the Vietnam War, he established the Center for Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery to treat war-injured children with Abraham Lincoln Brigade ambulance driver and plastic surgeon Arthur Barsky.  Along with Joe Biden he was named “Outstanding Young Man of the Year” by the United States Jaycees and he received the Global Citizen Award from the United Nations Association.  Miller has also served as a consultant for the late Senator Robert Kennedy, UNICEF, the Peace Corps, and various public interest research organizations. Presently Miller serves as pro bono legal counsel to non-profit institutions including Global Exchange, MapLight.org, the Cuban-American Alliance Education Fund and La Pena Cultural Center. He has had articles published in The San Francisco Chronicle, The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune Syndicate, and The Christian Science Monitor. He is a graduate of Yale University, Stanford Law School, and Columbia University’s Parker School of Foreign & Comparative Law and a member of the New York (inactive) and California Bars.

 Kristin Burgess is a Management Analyst for the Oakland Police Department, where she provides analytical support to the Executive Management. Kristin received her B.S. in Biological Sciences from the University of California at Davis and her Masters in Public Administration from San Francisco State University. During the last ten years, she has worked primarily in the public and nonprofit sectors, gaining experience in administration, management, and research and policy analysis. She worked with the Nautilus Institute for three years as the Special Projects Coordinator and as the Executive Assistant to the Executive Director. While she was with Nautilus, she coordinated fundraising efforts and assisted with organizational development. Kristin also worked with the City of Berkeley to develop an equal benefits ordinance, which was adopted by the City Council in 2001.

 Peter Hayes is Executive Director of the Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainable Development, a non-governmental policy-oriented research and advocacy group. Peter graduated with degree in History from the University of Melbourne. He has a doctorate from the Energy and Resources Group at the University of California at Berkeley. Professionally active as an environment and energy consultant in developing countries (working for United Nations Environment Programme, Asian Development Bank, World Bank, Canadian International Development Research Council, US Agency for International Development, United Nations Development Programme), he also writes widely about security affairs in the Asian-Pacific region. He was first executive director of the Environment Liaison Centre in Nairobi, Kenya in 1974-76. He was Deputy Director of the Commission for the Future (Australian Government) from 1989-1991. He has visited the DPRK seven times. He is a member of the Pacific Council on International Policy, the Western partner of the Council on Foreign Relations; and the US Committee of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific. He was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2000.

 Chris Thorsen specializes in developing the abilities of senior leaders and their executive teams to achieve a radical shift in the way they do business – without slowing their pace. This is achieved by coaching to the flow of their real work in regular meeting forums and in one-on-one sessions as well as in strategic retreats in which they establish performance and development commitments, develop key leadership and team skills and review progress and mission critical priorities.