Phil Hunsicker worked as a Peace Corps fisheries volunteer in the Central African Republic
Philip works proactively to influence public and policy debates on related issues in the Collar Counties and North Central Lakes Region. He has a Bachelor of Science in Biology from the University of Miami and a Masters in International Management and Administration from the School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont. Philip brings over 20 years of experience in community-based natural resource management to our team.
Contact Phil:
Phone:
(218) 825- 9215
Email:
phunsicker@1000fom.org
Mailing
Address:
15243 Garrett Lane
Brainerd, MN 56401
Read more about Philip. . .
1000 Friends of Minnesota’s newest employee, Philip Hunsicker, knows that his real-life parents are a small-town doctor and a housewife, but he sometimes wonders if maybe, just maybe, he is actually the secret love-child of Ernest Hemingway and Dian Fossey. That illogical theory would logically explain his two all-consuming passions for writing and protecting the natural environment, but it wouldn’t explain why Phil’s novel continues to be rejected by publishers. Whether Phil’s parents are Ernie and Di or Doc and Joyce, he plans on using his passions, along with a sense of humor, an adventurous spirit and just plain common sense, to promote Smart Growth as the North Central Lakes and Collar Counties Organizer for 1000 Friends of Minnesota.
Phil began his career choice in the field of community-based conservation back in 1977 as a Peace Corps fisheries volunteer in the Central African Republic. Didn’t Ernie and Di have a thing for Africa, too? Phil loved Africa as much as Ernie and Di, but the parasites there loved him back, so after three years, he moved to Sitka, Alaska for better health care, better fishing and better pay working as a fishery biologist, first with the U.S. Forest Service, and later with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (Alaska’s version of the DNR). After seven years, two boats, and a satiated appetite for fresh-caught seafood, Phil’s itchy feet headed off to graduate school in Vermont. Phil was forced to follow. There is no evidence that Ernie or Di ever visited the Green Mountain State, but the same can be said about Doc and Joyce. At the School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont, Phil received his Master’s degree in International Management with a specialization in international development and conservation. Duly acknowledged as a master of something, Phil set out to prove it, or disprove it, whichever the case might be.
It has been said that those who can’t do, teach. And those who can’t teach, consult. Since 1990, Phil has been working as an independent consultant. His clients have included the World Wildlife Fund, the U.S. Peace Corps, Minnesota Public Radio, and the Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance, to name a few. As a consultant, he has managed all aspects of a multiple-use forest reserve and national park, has trained Peace Corps environmental education volunteers, has created community associations to promote conservation and rational rural development, has written and illustrated a children’s book, has helped to create a conservation curriculum now used in schools in Africa as well as here in the U.S., has coached his son’s hockey teams, and in his spare time, has written the next great American novel entitled, The Old Crocodile-Man Theory. It will make you laugh; it will make you cry; it will make you pay $24.95 if he ever finds a publisher who likes it as much as he does. He’s convinced Ernie would have liked it.
Phil is excited to be representing the interests of 1000 Friends of Minnesota in the North Central Lakes and Collar Counties Regions. He and his wife, Denise (another vagabond who has worked all over the world), and their son Josh (who was born in Africa and is currently studying to be a pilot at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida) recently bought their first home in Brainerd on Red Sand Lake, thereby beating the Vegas odds that the Hunsicker family would never put down roots. Phil had been searching for a meaningful way to make an impact on the local conservation movement, and organizing individuals and groups to promote Smart Growth principles in the region is a perfect fit. Growth is inevitable. Smart growth isn’t unless organizations like 1000 Friends of Minnesota make it a priority. Phil is proud to be part of the solution. Doc and Joyce are proud of their son. And Phil suspects that Ernie and Di are, too.
