About

Our Purpose 

The Queen Anne Community Council is a 501(c)(4) organization whose membership includes all residents and business and property owners, as well as people who work and attend school in Queen Anne.  Since the 1940's, the Council has advocated on behalf of the community on issues of interest and concern to our neighborhood. The council is governed by a board of trustees, who are elected by the community at an annual meeting.  Everyone is welcome and encouraged to attend our monthly council meetings, committee, and project meetings to have your voice heard.  

A neighborhood advocacy group, providing a connection point for information to and from our community.

Members of the Board of Trustees

Ben Bennett, Treasurer

Board member since 2019

Ben is council treasurer and has been a home owner on Queen Anne for the past 22yrs. His wife is a born and raised Seattle native and has two boys. Ben is a born and raised army brat, starting kindergarten in Fort Lewis, Washington and finishing high school at Timberline (where he was student body treasurer) in Lacey and did his graduate school at the University of Washington. He is semi-retired after many years as a business owner in the technology field. Lately, you can find him backcountry skiing, trail running, or chopping wood for their home in the scenic Alpental valley outside of Seattle.

Between his military upbringing and the legacy of his 5th great-grandfather who was a personal body guard to George Washington, he feels a responsibility to ensure a secure and working civic body.

Beth Bunnell, Vice Chair

Board member since 2015

Beth is the Council's Vice Chair and is deeply committed to community volunteer work, including thru Seattle's Union Gospel Mission Open Door Legal Clinic and the Queen Anne Food Bank.  She is the managing director of a consulting company that specializes in cross-border Asia-related transactions. She worked as a lawyer in Greater China for 20 years, serving both in private practice and as Asia Pacific general counsel for a Fortune 100 company.  Now happily living on the south side of Queen Anne, she and her family enjoy hiking, skiing, cooking and travelling. 

Erin Caldwell

Board member since 2023

Erin Caldwell is a technology lawyer and resident of Queen Anne since 2020.  When not working, she can be found taking ballet classes at PNB, writing op-eds, biking to breweries, and volunteering at community legal clinics. With respect to the neighborhood, she is particularly interested in public transportation,  community engagement, and local businesses.

Tyler Crone

Board member since 2023

Tyler Crone (she/her) has loved calling Queen Anne and the Pacific Northwest home since her first visit to Kerry Park in 2003. Tyler is excited to be a part of the Queen Anne Community Council to partner with neighbors, community organizations, small businesses, and our elected officials to work to solve the complex public health and community safety challenges we face as a city.

Tyler is a proud public school parent, and believes Queen Anne has to be the best dog walking neighborhood of all time. Tyler graduated from Brown University, has a master’s degree in public health from Columbia University, a law degree from Yale Law School, and completed a post-doc at the Yale University School of Medicine. Tyler’s career has been focused on creating healthy, safe, thriving communities around the world- and she is eager to be deepening this work here at home with the Queen Anne Community Council.

Caroline Davis, Secretary

Board member since 2021

Caroline is currently our council secretary an has lived on Queen Anne over 40 years. She moved to Seattle after graduating from law school and was raised in the Mid-West. She currently works part-time as a family law mediator and is an attorney licensed in Washington. Previously, Caroline served as the Executive Director for the Family Law CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) of King County for 10 years when it was founded as a non-profit program. She is a past President of the King County Bar Association and remains an active member. 

 

Caroline has volunteered with the Seattle Public Library system as a tutor for both children and adults. She is a block watch co-captain. In her free time, she enjoys gardening and learning how to paint in water colors. 


Laura Dutton

Board member since 2023

My name is Laura Dutton and my wife Catherine and I have lived in Queen Anne for the last seven years.  We own a condo at Park Terrace on West Olympic where I have been on the HOA board of directors for five years and the board president for almost four years.  We love our neighborhood and our home but struggle with the unique challenges associated with living in an older building and shared community housing.  It is challenging to keep up with the city’s efforts to modernize energy and utility usage as well as ensuring compliance with updates in codes and regulations.  

I am passionate about advocating for my neighbors and my home.  I strongly believe our neighborhood needs someone to represent the needs of Queen Anne’s historic, multi-unit condo homes as well as the owners/residents.  We need someone to advocate for the issues we face so that modernization efforts and mandatory upgrades are designed with an understanding of our homes.  I want to help our neighborhood and council understand our challenges and help work on sustainable solutions.  

Nicole Friedman, Executive Chair

Board member since 2020

Nicole moved to Queen Anne in 2020 and quickly fell in love with the neighborhood. She is the Chair of the Council and also serves as Chair of the Land Use Review Committee. 


In her day job she works in public policy at a health technology startup, working to make sure cancer patients have access to the tests they need. She enjoys bringing people with diverse perspectives and opinions together to try to reach solutions to complex problems. She lives with her husband and small baby in Queen Anne and looks forward to a long residence in our beautiful neighborhood.


Don Harper

Board member since 2001

Don was a stage manger and road manger for punk rock bands before he became a master electrician, building Harper Electric Inc. into a successful company and running it for 30 years. In retirement, he teaches electricians part-time at CITC. He lives on Queen Anne with his wife, a musician, where they raised their son and love volunteering in the community.

Samuel Hilbert

Board member since 2023

Samuel Hilbert is a proud resident and business owner of Queen Anne. His passion for community has shown through his community engagement since he moved to the region nearly 20 years ago. Since opening Aluel Cellars’ Queen Anne location, he has been very focused on working to ensure that Queen Anne continues to thrive as not only a place to live but also a fantastic place to do business for years to come.

 He has previous experience as a board member of Seattle Urban Wineries and the Woodinville Chamber of Commerce. He also currently serves on the Advisory Board for the CHBA and is extremely active in both the Ballard Alliance and GSBA. He gives his time to many other community organizations and non-profits throughout Queen Anne and Seattle.

 He is extremely excited to continue to give to this community that he gets to call home everyday.

Laurie Jordan

Board member since 2023

Laurie joined the QACC Board of Trustees in 2023. After spending most of her professional career overseas, she retired in 2019 and moved to Queen Anne to be near her family. She quickly fell in love with our beautiful neighborhood (and with this wonderful part of the country!). 

Laurie believes Community Councils are one of the best ways to engage our neighborhoods and make sure our voices are heard by those in policy-making positions. And in turn, Councils can create an excellent conduit to keep information flowing throughout our neighborhoods and help build on the sense of community we all treasure. 

As a long-time Disney executive, Laurie is comfortable in many areas of organizational leadership, including strategic planning, finance, marketing, and change management. She is committed to using her executive experience and passion for our neighborhood to help make the Queen Anne Community Council as efficient, effective, and impactful as it can be. 

Sharon Levine

Board member since 1994

Sharon has lived and volunteered in Queen Anne for 30 years. She started with the QACC while working in sales for Time Warner, and continues in her retirement. 

An active member of the Parks and Transportation committees, Sharon has been a vocal advocate for off-leash dog parks throughout Seattle and within Queen Anne. She has a particular interest in land-use issues and attends many meetings on that topic so she can report her findings to the QACC Board.

Tyler Merrill

Board member since 2023

Tyler, a long time resident of Queen Anne, is a proud parent of a COE kindergartener and La Casita Feliz preschooler, a local business owner who is eager to bring his expertise to the Queen Anne Community Council Board. As the founder of a thriving law firm on Queen Anne, and a supporter of his wife's hair salon in Fremont, Salon Ritual, he understands the importance of community involvement and is committed to ensuring the neighborhood's prosperity for families like his own. 

With a passion for civic engagement and experience, such as his work with the non-profit Family Law CASA, and a desire to contribute to the betterment of Queen Anne, Tyler is ready to serve. 

Paula Mueller

Board member since 2020

Paula hails originally from Bloomington, Indiana and has been a Washington resident since 1968.  She has lived on Queen Anne since 1977, with her husband, Alan, daughter, Angela, and son, Simon.  She holds degrees in business, sociology, and paralegal studies from Indiana University, University of Washington, Edmonds College, and Seattle Central College.  In addition, she holds a professional designation as an Associate in Risk Management.  

Since retiring, Paula has been able to focus her energies on community activities, including the formation of the Queen Anne Block Captains Network, becoming engaged in emergency preparedness culminating in the organization of the Urban Survival Skills Fair for the Queen Anne community, and partnering with the Queen Anne Community Council in the creation of the Initiative on Community Engagement program.

Paula believes strongly that as residents we deserve to be better informed about what is happening in our local, city, county, and state governments, and that organizing programs and events to support better community education and information is critically important.  In addition, she is a strong proponent of creating ways that local residents can be more engaged in creating and supporting programs and solutions to the problems that impact our immediate community.  These are the core elements of the community work on which she has been and will continue to be focused.  

Jazmine Smith

Board member since 2019

Jazmine is an activist, advocate and educator who is currently working with Seattle Public Schools at an elementary school in Special Education.

She’s been committed to public service and community building engagement from a young age, serving in the Lynnwood Teen Advisory Group through high school and volunteering for the Center for Human Services after interning there with Teens in Public Service. Jazmine attended Western Washington University and earned a BA in Human Services and went on to serve in the Peace Corps as a Community Economic Development volunteer in Timor-Leste. After returning to Seattle, she’s been serving on the TIPS Alumni Association Board and volunteering with RESULTS. 

She is very excited to get involved on the local, neighborhood level and work on building a Queen Anne for all. Her favorite things to do in her free time include reading at our P-Patches, walking around the neighborhood, sipping coffee at our cafes, and traveling. 

She’s previously lived in North Queen Anne and now lives in Lower Queen Anne, and is excited to continue renting in this neighborhood for years to come. 

Marcus White

Board member since 2023

Marcus first moved to Queen Anne on March 1, 2019 while a member of the Community Involvement Commission.  As a result of being on the City Commission, he decided it is probably best to get involved with a neighborhood association, and got connected with the Queen Anne Community Council. While working on a city commission that encourages even-handed engagement and comprehensive civic participation, his community engagement efforts also include door-knocking to help candidates become councilmembers, in addition to attending a raft of community & professional events throughout the city. 

His hope is to help connect people to faces, spaces, and places that can help them. By God's grace, he finds himself on the Transportation and Public Safety committee. His primary goal for the  Transportation committee is to make Queen Anne a safer area to navigate in, and for the public safety committee to lessen crime on Queen Anne Avenue North.