About Us - Board Members

OFFICERS

President: Paul Muller

Secretary: Dayna Whitmer

Treasurer: Renee Amochaev

MEMBERS

John Bateson was executive director of the Contra Costa Crisis Center, a nationally certified suicide prevention center in the San Francisco Bay Area, for 16 years. He is the author of The Final Leap: Suicide on the Golden Gate Bridge (University of California Press, 2012) and four other books, including Suicide: Understanding and Ending a National Tragedy (John Hopkins University Press, 2024).

Rebecca Bernert, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the behavioral sciences department at Stanford University. She is a clinically trained psychologist who specializes in suicidal behavior, and manages several federal grants that focus on suicide prevention in the military and other target populations.

Ken Holmes is the retired coroner of Marin County. During his 36-year career, he investigated thousands of deaths, and his office was responsible for handling the majority of suicides from the Golden Gate Bridge.

David Hull is a founding member of Bridge Rail Foundation and past president. He is retired from the National Park Service where for 38 years he was the principal librarian of the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park. His daughter, Kathy, jumped from the Golden Gate Bridge in 2003.

Kay James is a community volunteer who is active with the League of Women Voters and other causes in the Bay Area. Her son, Michael Bishop, jumped from the Golden Gate Bridge in 2011.

Paul Muller is a founding member of Bridge Rail Foundation and the current president. He owns a small business, Muller and Smith, and at one time was a consultant for the Psychiatric Foundation of Northern California when it was active in advocating for a barrier on the Golden Gate Bridge.

Dayna Whitmer retired as manager of the EEG and sleep labs at the VA Northern California Healthcare Outpatient Clinic. She is the co-author of a report that appeared in Crisis, the journal for the International Suicide Prevention Association (IASP) titled “Analysis of the Cost Effectiveness of a Suicide Barrier on the Golden Gate Bridge”; a review between the value of a statistical life (VSL) with the cost of the suicide deterrent system. It clearly showed the result of lives saved would be under 7% of the minimal USDOT VSL, even at 2024 costs. Her son, Matthew, is a suspected suicide by a jump from the bridge in 2007. His body has never been recovered.