Brian Houseal became the Executive Director of the Adirondack Council in 2002. Houseal holds a BA degree from Colgate University, and completed graduate degrees in Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning at Syracuse University and the College of Environmental Science and Forestry at the State University of New York, Syracuse campus.
Houseal has extensive international conservation experience throughout Latin America and the Caribbean region, where a variety of organizations have supported his work, including: the US Peace Corps, UNESCO, US Agency for International Development, and the World Wildlife Fund. Before coming to the Adirondack Council, Houseal worked for 15 years as a Vice President of The Nature Conservancy’s International Program, where he directed the Mexico Program. One of his major achievements while at the Conservancy was to design and direct the ‘Parks in Peril Program’, which has successfully protected over 65 million acres of critically threatened parks and reserves throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.
Brian is a past Board member of the Adirondack Economic Development Corporation, and serves on committees for the Lake Champlain Basin Program, and Northern Forest Center, among others.
Brian and his wife Katherine have been seasonal visitors to the Adirondacks for over 30 years, and are now full-time residents of Westport, a village in the eastern part of the Park on Lake Champlain. He has great admiration for Adirondack wilderness because he can still get lost in it, and often does.