Staff - Don Lee Camp and Retreat Center

Kate Metts
Director
Phone: 252-249-1106 x 23
Email: kate@donleecenter.org

Kate Cooper Metts has been the director of Don Lee Camp & Retreat Center since Summer 2015. Those 10 years have been quite eventful at camp, including the devastating Hurricane Florence in 2018 and a worldwide pandemic beginning in the summer of 2020. During this time, the summer camp ministry, environmental education programs and weekend retreats programs have flourished despite the challenges. Enrollment and staffing are back to pre-pandemic levels and she is thankful for God's ongoing provision and protection of this ministry.

She is a life-long fan of Camp Don Lee and a cradle United Methodist, attending Don Lee as a camper for several years beginning in the third grade. The first week she attended camp, it rained every day! All the "liquid sunshine" did not dim her enthusiasm for camp and all the fun and friends at camp. She later worked on summer staff as a camp counselor in college. At camp, she learned how to sail, cook over a fire, made some wonderful friends, learned valuable leadership skills and grew in her faith. Her career and marriage put her in Georgia for almost 30 years, but when their son was old enough for camp, they packed him up for a week at Camp Don Lee.

In 2020, a summer that most camps did not operate, Kate led the full time team and summer staff in offering overnight summer camp for eight weeks for multi-week, older campers and also offered "Camp Don Lee at Camp Rockfish" (sister camp) for some one week groups, all without Covid-19 surfacing. Hurricane Florence caused tremendous damage to our beloved camp including flooding, toppling 80 trees and damaging and/or destroying 27 buildings. It was not only devastating to the property, but also to the hearts and souls of so many who have known Camp Don Lee to be “a place that God has blessed.” Clean up, repairs and new construction took time and after about a year of recovery, just as camp was regaining its footing, the pandemic hit.

Under her leadership, funds have been raised, new partnerships forged and many new facilities have been added, including the Anna Watson Blair Medical Center, six climate-controlled cabins that include showers and restrooms inside the cabins, a new East Bath House, our Environmental Education Center building and upgrades to necessary infrastructure on site. The latest cabin, the Friends of Camp Don Lee Cabin, was dedicated in May and represents the generosity of about 340 individual donors. These facility improvements are designed to serve campers and guests now and in the future. Kate has served as an associate visitor and is a lead visitor for the American Camp Association Standards Accreditation Program. In this role, she is an educational resource and helps to evaluate camps going through the accreditation process. She also is a member of the United Methodist Camp & Retreat Ministries national organization. She is a long-time children's Sunday School teacher and Sunday School coordinator. She has worked previously in education, news reporting, sales and marketing. She has a BA in Journalism from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and has completed some post-baccalaureate work in the School of Education at Augusta College (now Augusta University).

She is grateful to be building on the outstanding programming developed over 75 years by the many dedicated and talented leaders who have led this ministry, sharing the love of Jesus Christ through the wind and the water at Camp Don Lee.

Katie Lilly
Assistant Director
Phone: 252-249-1106 x 27
Email: katie@donleecenter.org

Katie stepped into the role of A.D. after leading the EE program here at Don Lee from November of 2017 through December of 2024. While never a camper, Katie did work in the spring and summer seasons of 2016 and 2017. Additionally, Katie is the current President of the board of NC Association of EE Centers. Her favorite camp activity is N’ishing- specifically with the marine science campers!

Julia Royall Johnson
Administrative & Program Specialist
Phone: 252-249-1106 x 21
Email: julia@donleecenter.or

Julia was summer staff in 2017 and then the Youth Director at Ann Street UMC. Now back at Don Lee one of Julia’s main responsibilities is to help parents and families sign up for summer camp! She also runs our social media and is always posting awesome photos of camp and staff shout-outs. Her favorite activity is to swim in our unique pool pond, she loves to see the turtles and fish in there and the overall experience of our pond is so fun!

Charlie Johnson
Program Specialist - Retreats
Phone: 252-249-1106
Email: charlie@donleecenter.org

Charlie was a LIT here at Don Lee in 2018 before joining summer staff. After graduating college Charlie joined our leadership team in 2023 as Male Head Counselor and in 2024 was our Summer Camp Coordinator. He now connects churches and other groups to camp through our Retreats program and keeps the camp store stocked! His favorite thing about camp is singing camp songs in the dining hall or around the campfire!

Reverend Caitlin Delamar
Faith Formation Coordinator
Phone: 252-249-1106
Email: caitlin@donleecenter.org

Reverend Caitlin Delamar has her masters from Duke Divinity school and was CDL’s Duke Divinity intern in the summer of 2014. She spends each summer working with our campers to help grow their faith and for our multi-week campers to develop their own worship services! She also helps lead retreats such as Confirmation and Middle School Girls. Her favorite part of camp is Sunday Worship in the summer!

Captain Tanner Lilly
Waterfront Coordinator
Phone: 252-249-1106 ext. 34
Email: tanner@donleecenter.org

Tanner was a long time camper before he first started working at Don Lee in the summer of 2015. Since that summer, Tanner worked as a seasonal staff member for the EE Program, Retreat and Summer, he officially joined the Full-Time team in 2020. He is responsible for all water activities here at Don Lee and is a Coast Guard certified Captain, an ARC Lifeguard Instructor and volunteer firefighter. Tanner’s favorite part of CDL is all the wildlife!

Kathryn Wynne
Communications and Recruitment Coordinator
Phone: 252-249-1106 x 22
Email: kathryn@donleecenter.or

Kathryn joined the Don Lee Full-Time team in the summer of 2021 having first worked here as a counselor in 2017 and as Outreach Coordinator on the summer leadership team in 2018. She plays a huge role in hiring and developing our summer staff as well as training our LIT’s for our day camp program, Voyages. She loves Morning Watch at Vesper Dell and when the kitchen staff make chocolate chip cookies!

Mo Greene
Kitchen Manager
Email: mo@donleecenter.org

Mo has worked at Camp for over 10 years and she has given our Dining Hall an excellent reputation for the best camp food ever! Her team works non-stop to keep our school groups, retreat groups and summer campers fed and they do an amazing job! She even has her own catering business, Mama’s Home SoulFood. Her favorite thing about camp is watching Mrs. Sam dance to the campers singing in the Dining Hall !