Focus on Ballona Wetlands Restoration – Part 2
featuring:
- Dr. Shelley Luce
Executive Director, Santa Monica Bay Restoration Commission
- Dr. Eric Strauss
Founding Director, LMU Center for Urban Resilience and Ecological Solutio
- Dr.
David Kay
Board President, Friends of Ballona Wetlands
As a follow up to our first meeting on the proposed restoration of the Ballona Wetlands Ecological Reserves, Westchester-Playa Democratic Club is pleased to present three (3) additional panelists to offer their insights surrounding the proposed restoration.
Following the Q & A period, members will have an opportunity to discuss, vote to support or not support Marcia Hanscom's resolution calling for the protection of plant and animal life at the Ballona Wetlands Ecological Reserve, “community- engaged” restoration, resending MOU agreement between state agencies and Annenberg Foundation, the Annenberg Foundation find an”off-site” location for the proposed project and for elected officials with stakeholder involvement planning for restoration at the Ballona Wetlands. Resolution can be found here: LINK
Let us know you’re coming. Please RSVP to:
Where:
IHOP Restaurant Bristol Hall Meeting Room
8600 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles, Ca. 90045
Presenter bios:
Dr. Shelley Luce
Dr. Luce is the Executive Director of the Santa Monica Bay Restoration Commission, a state commission facilitating collaborative work to protect and enhance regional coastal resources. She has fifteen years of professional experience designing and implementing complex environmental policy and programs. She oversees large-scale wetlands restoration projects and community-based greenway planning in urban Los Angeles; develops water supply and conservation programs; designs and oversees stormwater mitigation; and restores kelp forests and sustainable fisheries. Dr. Luce advises scientific panels and provides presentations and expert testimony on environmental issues. Dr. Luce is an adjunct professor in Civil Engineering at Loyola Marymount University, where she teaches, heads the LMU Center for Santa Monica Bay Studies, and supervises research. She is also the Chair of the Association of National Estuary Programs in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Eric Strauss
Dr. Eric Strauss serves Loyola Marymount University as President’s Professor of Biology, Executive Director of the Center for Urban Resilience (CURes) and Director of the graduate track in urban ecology. With collaborative research specialties in animal behavior, endangered species management, urban ecosystem dynamics and science education, Eric has extended the model for faculty scholarship by co-founding the Urban Ecology Institute in Boston while he served as a faculty member at Boston College and CURes in LA, both of which provide educational, research and restoration programs to underserved neighborhoods and their residents. In addition, Dr. Strauss is the Founding Editor of a web-based peer-reviewed journal, Cities and the Environment, which is funded in part by the USDA Forest Service. His research includes collaborative long term studies of coyotes, White tailed deer, crows, turtles and other vertebrates, with a specialty in understanding wildlife in urban areas and the appropriate management responses to wildlife problems and zoonotic disease. His work also includes investigating the role of green space and urban forests in supporting of healthy neighborhoods and how those features can be used to improve science education in underserved neighborhoods.
Dr. David Kay
Dr. David Kay (President) joined the Friends’ Board in March 08. He pursued a Doctorate in Environmental Science and Engineering at UCLA, which he received in 1988. Since 1984, at the Environmental Affairs Division of Southern California Edison, Dr. Kay has managed or contributed to a variety of projects under the umbrella of regulatory compliance with state and federal clean water and hazardous waste laws. Beginning in 1999 Dr. Kay managed the environmental mitigation projects required by the California Coastal Commission for Edison’s San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station. These projects include restoration of 150 acres of degraded wetlands at San Dieguito Lagoon near Del Mar, CA., construction of a 150-acre artificial kelp reef offshore from San Clemente, and funding for the Hubbs-Sea World fish hatchery in Carlsbad, CA. In 2006, Dr. Kay’s organization was expanded to manage environmental siting and licensing for all SCE generation and transmission projects, as well as environmental oversight of all operation and maintenance work in the Company. Dr. Kay and his wife Marla live in Playa Vista, CA.