2002 Conference speakers.
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2002 Conference speakers. |
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 Paul
Simon
Senator Simon will speak about his book on the global water crisis, "Tapped Out" Paul Simon, after a career in state and national politics, is now a professor at Southern Illinois University, where he teaches political science and journalism. In addition, he is the founder and director of the Public Policy Institute at the Carbondale campus. Senator Simon was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1974, after serving as a state representative, state senator and lieutenant governor. He served Illinois' 22nd and 24th Congressional Districts for ten years, and during that time, played a leading role in drafting and enacting major legislation in a wide range of issues including education, disability policy, and foreign affairs. In 1984, Simon was elected to the U.S. Senate. In the 104th Congress, he served on the Budget, Labor and Human Resources, Judiciary and Indian Affairs Committees. In 1987-88, he sought the Democratic nomination for President. During his years as a public official, Paul Simon was known as an effective legislator and for his exceptional constituent service. Senator Simon holds 49 honorary degrees and has written 18 books. He has been a member of the Southern Illinois University Board of Trustees since 1997. Peter Warshall has spent thirty years working to improve community governance, the balancing of conservation and development (especially water resources, ranching and forestry, and biodiversity), as well as teaching, guiding and writing on natural and cultural history. Trained as both biologist and anthropologist, Peter has taken a broad view of the complexity of cultural change. While others may work as a scientist or activist or artist, Peter has tried to bridge these realms as scientist/activist/essayist. He works on all socio-economic levels and with highly diverse peoples and ecosystems, believing that important beneficial change can come from many unexpected human sources. He enjoys public service and served in public (elected) office for eight years. Peter is presently on the Working Group for the Margaret Mead Centennial Committee, the All Species Foundation, and is a participant in the Common Ground Roundtable, a voluntary organization of family ranchers and conservationists in New Mexico and Arizona who are brainstorming the future of both the cattle industry and preservation of wildlands. He helped the Tohono O'odham people defend their land and water rights, the San Carlos Apache of Arizona protect one of their sacred mountains, and many conservationist groups protect various sky island ecosystems. As a consultant, he worked in the hunger camps in Ethiopia for the United Nations High Commission for Refugees; in ten other African nations under contracts with U.S. AID and other international organizations on biodiversity and natural resource management. He has consulted with corporations such as General Mills, Volvo, Chlorox, Trans Hygga, and SAS Airlines on improving their environmental practices and long-term visions of what kind of world they want to create. He owns and runs his own small consulting group on natural resources and communities (Peter Warshall and Associates) and is a network member of the Global Business Network. The Centrality of Water: Many of his water resource and biodiversity projects in Africa and North America center in the arid regions (Ethiopia, Sudan, Chad, Niger, Mali, Senegal, Gambia, California, Arizona, Cuba, Tohono O'odham nation). After helping to organize the bird rescue in the l971 San Francisco oil spill, Peter was elected official to public office in a small town in California. His town and regional waterworks included administering projects on watershed management, constructed wetlands, water rights, in-stream flows, water conservation, home-site sewage systems, water quality risk assessment, and drinking water supply. He helped design one of the first zero-discharge constructed-wetland sewage systems that also met the town's green belt needs and is now famous for its diversity of birds and quiet beauty. As head of the town's planning council, he helped organize the land use zoning for the town. He wrote the first utilities district ordinance for the operation of home-site sewage systems, wrote the first graywater ordinance adopted by a municipal government, and is now writing custom-designed handbooks for home-site and small volume sewage and reuse systems for the City of Malibu. As guest editor of the CoEvolution Quarterly in l976, he published the magazine that is said to have helped start the local watershed governance and watershed protection movement. Wildlife: Peter teaches natural history with a special enthusiasm for ornithology, pollination ecology, primatology, and the evolution of the planet's visual and vocal ecologies. He is considered an expert on the federally endangered Mt. Graham red squirrel, the "sky island" archipelago of mountains in Arizona and Mexico, and the biodiversity of various Sahelian nations. He is chairmen of Scientists for the Preservation of Mt. Graham, a group of over 300 scientists dedicated to basing endangered species policies on good biology. He helped Ancient Forests International survey old growth alerce forests in the coastal temperate rainforests of Chile. He worked on a joint-project sponsored by both Rain Forest Action Network and Mitsubishi to understand the future of wood supply for global and regional markets and how to reconcile the wood products industry with forest biodiversity protection. His recent interests include the global and local implications of cattle raising in both the Sahel and America's southwest, and how local producers can become biodiversity protectors. He has begun work on the impact of the global grain trade, especially its links to livestock, river basins, human health, and ecosystem protection. Dr. Warshall has a multi-disciplinary education in biology, anthropology, and literature. He speaks fluent French and some Spanish. He received his BA in biology with a minor in French literature and a PhD in Biological Anthropology (Harvard). His thesis was on kinship and group cohesion among rhesus macaques. As a Fulbright scholar, he studied cultural anthropology under Professor Claude Levi-Strauss at L'Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (Paris) specializing in Native American history and mythology. At the same time, he studied mammalogy with Professor Francois Bourliere at L'Ecole de Medecine. His training and experience include natural history, natural resource management (especially watersheds, wastewater, and wildlife), conservation biology, biodiversity assessments, environmental impact analysis, and conflict resolution and consensus building between divergent economic and cultural special interest groups. Peter now runs his own small consulting firm and was an adjunct research scientist with the Office of Arid Lands Studies (University of Arizona). Peter is presently the editor of Whole Earth, the magazine of the Whole Earth Catalog. In addition to technical, peer-reviewed, and report writing, Peter has written for the general public since the early 1970s as an editor of the Whole Earth Catalog and Coevolution Quarterly (now Whole Earth) and his articles have appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, Orion, River Voices, SPIN, and Animal Kingdom. He has published a guide to household water conservation and reuse (Septic Tank Practices) and essays in Mind in the Waters, a celebration of whales and dolphins. Pliny Fisk's experience is in ecological planning, a new type of building design referred to as eco-dynamic architecture, ecological systems thinking and visualization. His Advanced Green Building Demonstration office/home has created what some refer to as the design icon for the next century. Pliny's firm, the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems creates designs that possess a rare combination of being whimsical and scientific, futuristic yet practical. His creation of a design methodology actually seems to bridge between Ian McHarg in ecological planning with that of Christopher Alexander in architecture and community development. In this methodology he combines a new method of analyzing eco-systems in their relationship to a energy/material balancing strategy on the land that is reminiscent of approaches in the field of industrial ecology. On a national basis the national material flow model created by Pliny and his associates referred to as BaselineGreen establishes the environmental and economic baseline from which green specification decisions should be made and is specific to various regions or cities in the U.S. Sim Van der Rynn Sim Van der Ryn is a recognized pioneer and expert in sustainable architecture and planning practices. Through his varied experience as principal of several design firms, Professor of Architecture at the University of California Berkeley and California State Architect, he has provided countless examples of state-of-the art ecological design and has been a catalyst toward the current ground swell of interest and support for these practices. As President and Chief Designer at Van der Ryn Architects in Sausalito, he is currently designing a new generation of environmentally friendly buildings. The American Institute of Architecture designated his Real Goods Solar Living Center in Hopland, California as one of the nation's top 10 projects for Earth Day 1999. His current design for the West End Golden Gate Park Pavilion Community Center is the pilot project for the City of San Francisco's Green Building Program. Van der Ryn is author of several seminal books in the fast growing field of "green architecture" including Sustainable Communities (Sierra Club, 1986) and Ecological Design. Lauren
Springer - Lauren is the author of two books: Passionate Gardening: Good
Advice for Challenging Climates and The Undaunted Garden: Planting for
Weather-Resilient Beauty. Lauren Springer worked in public gardens on
both sides of the Atlantic before receiving her master’s degree in
horticulture from Penn State. An award-winning writer and photographer,
she is a contributing editor for Horticulture and Country Living Gardener
magazines, and author of The Undaunted Garden, named one of the 75 best
American gardening books of the last century by the American Horticultural
Society. Her latest book, Passionate Gardening: Good Advice for Challenging
Climates, co-authored with Rob Proctor, received the 2001 AHS Book Award.
Lauren’s private garden has been featured on television and in many
publications, including The New York Times, Sunset Western Landscaping
Book, and The Collector’s Garden. At the Denver Botanic Gardens,
she designed the Watersmart, Romantic, and Fragrance Gardens, and the
South African Plaza. Lauren is a popular speaker in the United States
and Canada.. Sim Van der Ryn is a recognized pioneer and expert in sustainable architecture and planning practices. Through his varied experience as principal of several design firms, Professor of Architecture at the University of California Berkeley and California State Architect, he has provided countless examples of state-of-the art ecological design and has been a catalyst toward the current ground swell of interest and support for these practices. As President and Chief Designer at Van der Ryn Architects in Sausalito, he is currently designing a new generation of environmentally friendly buildings. The American Institute of Architecture designated his Real Goods Solar Living Center in Hopland, California as one of the nation's top 10 projects for Earth Day 1999. His current design for the West End Golden Gate Park Pavilion Community Center is the pilot project for the City of San Francisco's Green Building Program. Van der Ryn is author of several seminal books in the fast growing field of "green architecture" including Sustainable Communities (Sierra Club, 1986) and Ecological Design. Lauren is the author of two books: Passionate Gardening: Good Advice for Challenging Climates and The Undaunted Garden: Planting for Weather-Resilient Beauty. Lauren Springer worked in public gardens on both sides of the Atlantic before receiving her master’s degree in horticulture from Penn State. An award-winning writer and photographer, she is a contributing editor for Horticulture and Country Living Gardener magazines, and author of The Undaunted Garden, named one of the 75 best American gardening books of the last century by the American Horticultural Society. Her latest book, Passionate Gardening: Good Advice for Challenging Climates, co-authored with Rob Proctor, received the 2001 AHS Book Award. Lauren’s private garden has been featured on television and in many publications, including The New York Times, Sunset Western Landscaping Book, and The Collector’s Garden. At the Denver Botanic Gardens, she designed the Watersmart, Romantic, and Fragrance Gardens, and the South African Plaza. Lauren is a popular speaker in the United States and Canada. |
