MDB Staff

MDB's staff is comprised of:

  • A former Assistant Administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response (OSWER).
  • A former US Department of Labor assistant secretary.
  • A former Deputy Director of the national EPA Superfund Program.
  • Several former EPA Senior Executive Service (SES) officials.
  • A former federal administrative officer trained in federal contract management.
  • A certified public health communications professional.
  • A staff with decades of strategic consulting experience.

MDB can call upon an extensive network of professional associates, built up over the past 20 years by our senior staff and utilizes local recruitment firms, when necessary, to find highly qualified talent.

 

MDB Senior Staff

Elmer Akin, DrPH has over 30 years of experience in technical research in the areas of microbiology, toxicology, and risk assessment. He served 14 years at EPA's Office of Research and Development Laboratory (Cincinnati, Ohio) in the Microbiology and Toxicology Division, which he directed. Dr. Akin then worked for 16 years as a technical risk assessor for the Region 4 RCRA and Superfund programs in the capacity of Chief, Office of Technical Services, Waste Management Division.

Maureen Avakian has more than 20 years of experience providing a broad range of communications support to environmental research organizations. Ms. Avakian has held science writer, data analysis, and management positions at firms conducting research in the areas of pesticide safety, air pollution monitoring and regulatory support, and human and environmental health. She has coordinated the development of website content and has written peer-reviewed journal articles, review documents, Plain English guidance documents, technical reports, Standard Operating Procedures for laboratory and data reporting procedures, and proceedings reports for technical meetings and peer review workshops.

Michael D. Baker founded MDB in 2000. Throughout his over 25-year career, Mr. Baker has provided strategic communications and management consulting services to many federal agencies, private foundations and Fortune 50 companies. Mr. Baker was the Managing Partner at The Widmeyer-Baker Group, a firm he helped to establish in 1987 and that grew to become Washington, DC's largest privately held communications firm.

Mike Carter is a recognized national expert in quality assurance systems and the collection and use of environmental data that supports critical decisions on compliance and environmental clean-up. Prior to Mr. Carter's employment at MDB, he spent 38 years with the federal government's EPA and the Departments of Defense and Energy, retiring in 2007. He also worked in the private sector in the capacity of Laboratory Technical Director in Saudi Arabia.

Michael Callahan is a former Senior Executive with the EPA. With more than 40 years experience with the federal government, he has spent the past 30 years in the fields of exposure and risk assessment. While at EPA, Mr. Callahan was a science program manager in three of the EPA's major programs: water, toxic substances, and research and development. Mr. Callahan also headed exposure assessment organizations in each program. His most recent EPA position, prior to his retirement, was as a senior science advisor to the Regional Administrator in Dallas, TX.

Bruce Engelbert, MPP has over 30 years of experience in hazardous waste, Superfund and emergency response issues at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Energy (DOE) and the President’s Council on Environmental Quality. At EPA, he served as the Chief of the Response Operations Branch where he led EPA’s emergency response activities across the U.S. He has served on EPA’s National Incident Coordination Team and the Federal Catastrophic Disaster Response Group where he helped coordinate responses to the Exxon Valdez oil spill and Loma Prieta earthquake. Mr. Engelbert is also a State of Virginia-certified mentor mediator and has mediated over 100 community, consumer and employment cases.

Tim Fields has almost 40 years of experience addressing environmental site assessment, cleanup, waste management and environmental justice issues, including 30 years at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). While at EPA, Mr. Fields served for 4 years as Assistant Administrator for the Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response (OSWER) where he directed an annual budget in excess of $2 billion and a staff of more than 4,000. He has chaired multiple EPA advisory panels, including the Federal Facilities Environmental Restoration Dialogue Committee (FFERDC), National Human Resources Council and OSWER Environmental Justice Task Force, where he lead the development of an environmental justice strategy for Superfund, solid and hazardous waste management, Brownfields and underground storage tank programs. He is experienced in developing and implementing RCRA and Superfund reform measures, and mediating complex environmental justice lawsuits. Mr. Fields has received multiple President Rank Awards for Meritorious and Distinguished Executive Service and has been recognized by Virginia Tech University as one of the “Top 100 Alumni of the Millennium.”

Linda Garczynski is a former member of EPA's Senior Executive Service and a 30-year veteran of EPA. She served in a variety of positions, including the Director of EPA's Office of Brownfields and Redevelopment since its inception in 1995. This program is the only EPA program ever to win the prestigious Harvard University Kennedy School of Government's Excellence in Government award.

Paige Peck is a former contracting official and resources management expert at EPA. She has over 33 years of experience at the Federal level in a wide spectrum of resources management functions. Her background includes over 25 years of work as a Contracting Officer and senior-level manager of contracting staff. She also served as Associate Director of the Resources Management Division in the Superfund Program before retiring in 2007.

Larry Reed has 30 years of experience in environmental policy, public health, and science policy. Prior to joining MDB, Mr. Reed served as Deputy Director and Acting Office Director to the EPA Superfund Program in Washington D.C. before retiring from the Senior Executive Service in 2004. Mr. Reed also served as manager in two EPA regional offices, and the Offices of Water Enforcement, Toxic Substances, Planning and Evaluation, and Research and Development.

Manfred Stanfield has more than 12 years of experience designing, developing, implementing and maintaining dynamic, enterprise-class web-based applications and AJAX applications that connect to Oracle, MySQL, and Microsoft SQL Server database engines. Mr. Stanfield is a Microsoft Certified System Engineer (MCSE) and Microsoft Certified Trainer (MCT) and has taught Microsoft Official Curricula for Windows NT/2000 System Administration, Core Technology, TCP/IP, and IIS for over 4 years. He has set up and administered Oracle, MySQL, Microsoft SQL, Windows servers, DNS, and email servers.

Deborah Weinstock is a national occupational and environmental safety and health leader with over 15 years of experience designing and directing public health campaigns. Prior to joining MDB, she was a safety and health specialist in the AFL-CIO Department of Occupational Safety and Health. Ms. Weinstock has experience overseeing programs and projects with a variety of government agencies and departments, including the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.