Michael Shirley, PhD

Deputy Director for the Florida Department of Environmental Management (FDEP) Office of Resilience and Coastal Protection and Administrator of the Florida Coastal Zone Management Program.

Mike has over 30 years of experience in the field of applied coastal habitat management. From 2007 to 2021, Mike held the position of Director at the Guana Tolomato Matanzas National Estuarine Research Reserve (GTM Research Reserve) in St. Augustine Florida. Mike has also held positions at Save the Bay Inc. (Rhode Island), the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (Edgewater, Maryland), EPA’s Gulf Ecology Division Laboratory (Pensacola, Florida), and the Rookery Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (Naples, Florida). He has a PhD in marine science with a minor in environmental toxicology from North Carolina State University, a Master of Science in biology from the University of West Florida, and a Bachelor of Science in zoology from the University of Rhode Island.