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Gina Bartlett

Director, CBI West and Senior Mediator

Gina Bartlett is a Senior Mediator at the Consensus Building Institute and leads CBI’s California practice as Director of CBI West. Gina has more than 20 years of experience in consensus building and collaborative planning on complex public policy and organizational issues. She has extensive experience facilitating organizational strategy and governance, as well as mediating high-stakes, multi-party negotiations. Gina previously served as Associate Director at the Center for Collaborative Policy at California State University. 

Areas of Focus

Gina provides strategic direction, skilled facilitation, and mediation to organize the collective insights of leaders to build consensus on policy and organizational direction.

She has successfully mediated some of California’s most vexing natural resource issues, in several cases helping parties to resolve issues litigated multiple times. Gina has helped leaders with diverse perspectives collaborate on a range of policy areas: water, natural resources, climate adaptation, land management, scientific and technical issues, energy, and education. In her high-level policy work, she employs citizen engagement and communication tools to strengthen outcomes and build widespread support. She has recently been deeply engaged in building consensus to manage Lake Tahoe’s shoreline, addressing nearly 30 years of conflict and litigation, and negotiating governance for newly formed groundwater sustainability agencies in California.

Gina works with organizations on strategic planning and governance, facilitating dialogue among decision makers to craft the strategic direction and focus of the organization and to design the structure necessary for implementation. In the last several years, she has worked on organizational initiatives with the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Agency, Cleveland Indians Baseball Team Business Leadership Team, FairTrade USA, and the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission. 

Exemplary Projects

  • Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Agency Strategic Plan
  • San Francisco Bay Area Regional Agencies Collaborative Organizational Plan
  • Groundwater Sustainability Agency Governance and Formation in Salinas Valley and Sonoma County
  • Mono Basin Mediation on Feasibility of Scientific Recommendations for Los Angeles Department of Water & Power License Renewal
  • Browns Canyon, Colorado, National Monument Stakeholder Identification and Assessment 

Clients

The following is a partial list of clients:

International Organizations

  • FairTrade USA
  • Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission
  • Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)

Federal Agencies

  • U.S. Forest Service
  • U.S. Department of Interior, Bureau of Land Management

State Agencies

  • State of California Department of Water Resources
  • California State Water Resources Control Board
  • Bay Conservation and Development Commission

Regional

  • Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission
  • Los Angeles Department of Water & Power
  • Sacramento Water Forum
  • Sonoma County Water Agency
  • Tahoe Regional Planning Agency

Local Agencies

  • City of Salinas
  • City of San Francisco
  • Piedmont Unified School District

Nonprofit Organizations

  • Colorado River Sustainability Campaign
  • Forest Foundation
  • Oakland Chamber of Commerce
  • Water Foundation

Companies

  • Cleveland Indians

Education and Affiliations

Gina is a senior mediator on the rosters of the U.S. EPA and the U.S. Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution. She holds an M.S. in conflict analysis and resolution from George Mason University and a B.A. with honors in political science and international relations from the University of Illinois.

Books and Articles