OUR TEAM
Will Coyne
Aly Schmidt
Amber Burkhart
WILL COYNE
Co-Founder
When the Washington Post is your hometown newspaper, there’s a good chance you’ll end up in politics, and that’s exactly what happened to Will Coyne. The son of a U.S. Department of Labor employee and an elementary school guidance counselor, Will grew up in Washington, D.C., where just about everyone takes an interest in national affairs, either directly or via osmosis.
Will left D.C. for Dartmouth College, where he earned a liberal arts degree before heading to Santa Barbara, California, to take a job as a policy analyst for a think tank. But because loves skiing, Will moved to Colorado. Here, in 2003, Will took a position as the legislative director for a Colorado conservation organization, becoming a leading advocate for conservation issues in the state capitol. He won multiple legislative victories on a variety of policy matters including leading Governor Bill Ritter’s first major policy initiative, a requirement that 20% of Colorado’s electricity come from renewable energy sources.
From there, Will broadened his perspective from environmental issues to Colorado policy matters as a whole, becoming chief of staff for two different Speakers of the House, managing the development and implementation of their policy agendas and overseeing public communications strategies. He also acted as the primary caucus liaison with the Senate leadership, the Governor’s office, the minority caucus, state departments and advocacy groups. As chief of staff, Will deepened his policy expertise and played a key role in passing dozens of significant bills related to health care, transportation, energy and fiscal policy.
In 2009, Will teamed up with former colleague Adam Eichberg to form Headwaters Strategies, where he continued to win major legislative battles on behalf of his clients. These include the creation of new tax incentives for clean-tech startups, a crackdown on predatory lenders, and the expansion of the mission of Colorado’s premier online university.
Will believes that Colorado is an interesting metaphor for the whole country. “We have a pretty big urban and rural divide, but our legislature and state government tend to see more bipartisan action than in Washington,” he points out. “Colorado’s success going forward is going to be about how we manage growth, how we welcome new people and new business, while at the same time keeping the things we all love.”
An avid skier, gardener, tennis player and mountain biker, Will appreciates everything Colorado offers. With two children — up-and-coming skiers themselves — he understands how important it is to protect Colorado for everyone.
ALY SCHMIDT
Principal
Aly Schmidt’s tiny hometown isn’t famous. Located in rural northern Colorado, it has a 124-year-old post office, about 4.275 residents, and Bruce’s Bar, which dishes out Rocky Mountain Oysters — a Colorado specialty. But growing up on a bucolic, two-acre property in Severance, surrounded by farms and oil wells, gave Aly a different perspective on Colorado. It’s a lifestyle that gets a lot less attention than the ski slopes, craft breweries and art museums that fill state tourism brochures, but it’s certainly no less important to the Colorado experience.
A political science major at Colorado State University, Aly interned with a Republican state house representative while she was still in college and got a job shortly thereafter as the in-house legislative lobbyist for the Colorado Hospital Association, advocating on behalf of Colorado’s more than 100 hospitals and health systems. In that role, she played a key part in passing the Hospital Provider Fee Enterprise as well as health care bills that addressed emergency mental health holds, workforce and price transparency.
She also managed day-to-day operations for the Colorado Hospital Association’s political action committee, Friends of Colorado Hospitals. There she led fundraising efforts and made strategic decisions about who and how to donate money to Colorado General Assembly candidates. Healthcare was a fascinating business to Aly because although people don’t think about it that often, it can really affect their lives, she says, and everyone has to deal with it at some point.
In her role with CHA, Aly occasionally battled Adam Eichberg and Will Coyne, who represented other interests. But over time, the three were able to craft solutions together in a way that impressed Eichberg and Coyne. So when it came time for Headwaters Strategies to hire a third member for their firm, they offered Aly the job. With her legislative strategy experience, Aly has brought a sophisticated approach to a wide variety of policy issues.
“We really work hard to find solutions that are bi-partisan,” Aly says. “In general, the people of Colorado share many of the same values regardless of their political affiliation, and I love being a part of that. We agree on many more issues than we disagree.”
When she’s not working long hours, Aly enjoys playing team sports in parks, playing with her two golden retrievers, hanging out on patios with her friends, and joking with her fellow lobbyists.
AMBER BURKHART
Although Amber has lived in Colorado off and on for over a decade, her roots lie in the Pacific Northwest. Growing up in Oregon, she spent her childhood exploring diverse natural landscapes in an old camper van with her family, dogs, and pet llama named Duke. The daughter of a travel videographer and park ranger, Amber grew up feeling (and still does feel) most at home in the outdoors.
Tempted by the adventure and beauty that Colorado has to offer, Amber left for Colorado College where she earned a degree in International Political Economy and minor in Global Health. During her time in undergrad, she conducted research in Kenya and India, which cemented her passion for improving the world through public policy.
Upon graduating, Amber moved to Denver and immediately jumped into the Colorado public policy sphere. Over the span of 8 years, she worked at ClinicNET, the Colorado Consumer Health Initiative, and the Colorado Hospital Association (with Aly!). During that time, Amber also completed a double executive master’s in health policy from the London School of Economics and the University of Chicago.
When an opportunity to work on federal level policy arose, Amber moved to Washington D.C. and worked at Arnold Ventures, a policy-oriented philanthropy, where she managed two health care portfolios covering payment reform and Medicare policy. After working at the federal level for two years, however, Amber’s deep love for Colorado brought her back. Amber and Aly always knew they wanted to work together again, especially after saving the world one rural hospital at a time at CHA. The two friends schemed for years until it all came together.
Outside of working to create policy that preserves Colorado’s natural beauty and healthy populace, you’ll find Amber spending time with her husband, friends, and beloved dogs on a trail somewhere in the mountains.