Advisory Board

• Executive Director, North Carolina Coastal Federation
• Ocean, NC

Braxton Davis joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2024. He is the Executive Director of the North Carolina Coastal Federation, a nonprofit focused on protecting and promoting the health of the state’s coastline.

• Media Coordinator, Cape Hatteras Secondary School
• Buxton, NC

Evan Ferguson joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2021. She is the media coordinator for Cape Hatteras Secondary School, serves as a National Junior Honor Society Advisor, and leads the CHSS Materials Technology Advisory Committee. She previously served as a Career and Technical Education teacher at CHSS and has advised student environmental organizations.

She was one of the first recipients of NC Sea Grant’s Community Collaborative Research Grants; her project presented opportunities for adding cape shark to school lunch menus. Ferguson is also a popular speaker at the NC Coastal Conferences and a guest writer for Coastwatch magazine.

Ferguson grew up on Hatteras Island, NC and has a master’s in library science and a bachelor’s in communications from East Carolina University. She lives in Buxton, NC with her husband, a maritime engineer and commercial fisherman, and two sons.

• Ph.D. Candidate in Computer Science, NC State
• Raleigh, NC
• she/they

• NC/VA Manager for Climate Resilient Coasts and Watersheds, Environmental Defense Fund
• he/him/his

Adam Gold joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2023. He is the NC and VA manager for the Climate Resilient Coasts and Watersheds team at Environmental Defense Fund. In this role, he leads interdisciplinary research projects focused on flood mitigation and works to promote science-based policies that make communities more resilient to flooding.

Before joining EDF, Gold was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of North Carolina Institute for the Environment and a graduate student at UNC Chapel Hill. His research focused on coastal watershed hydrology, water quality, and recurrent flooding in North Carolina.

Gold holds a doctorate and master’s degree in ecology and a bachelor’s in environmental sciences, all from UNC Chapel Hill. Read about Adam’s work in Coastal Review and Star News Online as well as on EDF’s blog.

• Mayor, Town of Beaufort
• Beaufort, NC
• she/her/hers

Sharon Harker joined the North Carolina Sea Grant Advisory Board in 2021. She is mayor for the Town of Beaufort, in Carteret County, and previously served as a town commissioner. Harker has worked in health care for over 25 years and is an administrator and neurodiagnostic Clinical Educator at Carteret Health Care.

Living in a coastal community, Harker believes education and partnerships are critical components in protecting our coast. She previously chaired the North Carolina League of Municipalities’ Advancing Municipal Leaders advisory board.

Harker holds a bachelor’s in Theology, is a Licensed Polysomnographer with the NC Medical Board, and is a Licensed Respiratory Therapist. She lives in the beautiful coastal town of Beaufort, NC, where she met her husband, Perry, 40 years ago. Together, they raised three children and are the proud grandparents to two outstanding grandchildren.

• Director of Business Development, CliniSpan Health
• Durham, NC

VeQuain Joyner joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2021. He is the director of business development for CliniSpan Health, a software platform working to diversify clinical trial recruitment. Prior to that, Joyner was the unit director for the New Bern Boys & Girls Club, a program of the Boys & Girls Club of the Coastal Plain.

He also maximizes community and educational partnerships, including several Sea Grant projects in recent years that have looked at recovery and resilience for New Bern neighborhoods with repeated flooding. Joyner has had advanced training in risk management.

VeQuain is a graduate of UNC Chapel Hill and is a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity. After graduation, he continued to supervise a diverse intramurals program for students, faculty, and staff and had an early role with the Boys & Girls Club of Lenoir County.

• Senior Program Manager of Resilience & Climate Adaptation, Tetra Tech
• Durham, NC
• she/her/hers

Amanda Martin joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2021. She is the senior program manager for resilience & climate adaptation at Tetra Tech, a consulting and engineering firm in Durham.

Martin first joined the board not long after beginning her tenure as the state’s chief resilience officer, a role within the North Carolina Office of Recovery and Resiliency. Prior to that, she served as the director of the Southeast & Caribbean Disaster Recovery Partnership and principal planner for the state of Rhode Island.

Martin holds a doctorate in city and regional planning from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. She has a master’s in city planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a bachelor’s from Harvard University.

• Division of Coastal Management Director, NC Department of Environmental Quality
• Morehead City, NC

Tancred Miller joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2022. He is the director of the NC Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Coastal Management.

Earlier in his career, Miller was a conservation organizer with the Sierra Club in Raleigh. He then joined the NC DCM as the coastal and ocean policy manager, going on to become DCM’s policy and section chief where he led departmental efforts to respond to coastal communities impacted by climate change.

Miller has a master’s in environmental management from Duke University and a bachelor’s in business administration from Morehouse College. He resides in Morehead City, NC.

• Founder and Chef, Saltbox Seafood Joint
• Durham, NC

Ricky Moore joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2021. His decades of experience in the restaurant and hospitality industry led him to found Saltbox Seafood Joint in Durham, NC in 2012, where he is also its chef, with a focus on providing customers tasty meals and information about N.C. seafood. 

In 2019, Moore published the Saltbox Seafood Joint Cookbook. In addition to its numerous recipes, he shares his lifelong experiences in the seafood industry, from his time as a cook in the U.S. Army to serving as a chef in restaurants across the globe and finally settling back down in his home state before opening Saltbox Seafood Joint. He has been featured in Garden & Gun, Our State, and Travel + Leisure and been nominated for and received numerous awards.

Moore is a native of NC, born and raised in New Bern. He graduated from the Culinary Institute of America and was awarded the James Beard Award for Best Chef: Southeast in 2022.

• Executive Assistant to Councils, NC Division of Marine Fisheries
• Morehead City, NC

Trish Murphey first joined the North Carolina Sea Grant Advisory Board in 2015, serving two terms before rotating off in 2021. She is the executive assistant for councils for the NC Division of Marine Fisheries (DMF), representing the division director on the South Atlantic Fisheries Management Council, which manages ocean fisheries in the Exclusive Economic Zone from North Carolina to the Florida Keys. She is also vice-chair of the Council. 

Previously she was the watershed manager for the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership (APNEP) where she assisted with the implementation and development of the Coastal Habitat Protection Plan. Before APNEP, she was the Southern District Manager for DMF and oversaw the development of various fishery management plans. She also worked for the National Marine Fisheries Service in Beaufort, N.C., and for S.C. Division of Natural Resources.

Murphey earned a bachelor’s degree in marine sciences from Florida Institute of Technology.

• Chief Deputy Secretary, NC Department of Environmental Quality
• Raleigh, GA

John Nicholson joined the North Carolina Sea Grant’s advisory board in 2022 and works as the chief deputy secretary for the NC Department of Environmental Quality, returning to this role after previously serving in it from 2017-2022. In this role, he is actively engaged in coastal and marine fisheries issues impacting the state.

Prior to returning to DEQ, Nicholson was chief of staff in the Office of the Regional Administrator for the EPA’s Region 4 (Southeast) in Atlanta, which serves eight states (including North Carolina) and six tribal nations.

Nicholson is a retired colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps, having been active duty for twenty-eight years. Additionally, he served two North Carolina Governors as their military affairs advisor and on the board of directors for the NC Heroes Fund as their outreach coordinator, helping the organization communicate their efforts in assisting 9/11 veterans.

He holds master’s degrees in national security and strategic studies from the U.S. Naval War College and in military studies from the USMC Command and Staff College as well as a bachelor’s in political science from San Diego State University.