Association of Environmental Professionals | San Diego Chapter
WINTER 2020
The San Diego Chapter Awards and Scholarship Banuqet was held on October 24th at the Central Library. More than 100 attendees enjoyed a perfect San Diego October evening, cocktail mixer overlooking downtown, and appetizers and a buffet. Guest Speaker Chuck Lowery, former Oceanside City Council Member, Deputy Mayor, and Mayor, educated us on medical marijuana and the environment. All this led up to the evening’s main event, which celebrated and recognized the outstanding achievements of local students, agencies, firms, and professionals. Since its establishment in 2004, the San Diego Chapter Scholarship Fund has awarded more than $60,000 to deserving students in the environmental field. This year, we received 19 applications from talented and very well qualified undergraduate and graduate students attending local universities. Kyla Knauf and Federick Pinongcos were selected as the 2019 Student Scholarship recipients, each receiving $2,000 and memberships to AEP. Laurel Glass Lees, State Director-at-Large, presented awards to the winners selected from nominations of impressive quality by the volunteer jurors. The Contribution to the Environmental Profession award was presented to Diana Richardson, complete with personal commendations from former colleagues. In closing, some of our more competitive colleagues walked away with deeply fabulous silent auction prizes including tickets to local museums and attractions, yoga membership, and gift cards to restaurants and breweries. Thank you to our Awards and Scholarship Banquet committee, jurors, all those who helped make this event a success. See you for our 2020 event this fall!
MESSAGE FROM THE BOARD BY ERIN PHILLIPS, AECOM
ENVIRONMENTOR
THE
2020 AEP INSTITUTE Environmental Justice & CEQA Friday, June 26, 2020 | Preservation Park Oakland Click here for additional details and to register.
UPCOMING EVENTS
ADVANCED CEQA WORKSHOP Thursday, March 5 | Marina Village AEP is pleased to announce the upcoming 2020 Advanced CEQA Workshop to be held across the state in late February through early March. This workshop is designed to help consultants, regulators, applicants, and industry professionals stay current on legal trend, and hot topics affecting the application of the Law and Guidelines. The workshop is approved each year for AICP credits and MCLE credits. Topics will include: Case Law Update, Your Guide to the CEQA Guidelines, Standard of Review, and Joint CEQA/NEPA Documents. Click here for additional details and to register. 2020 AEP CONFERENCE April 19-22, 2020 Tenaya Lodge, Yosemite The Central Chapter will host the 2020 AEP Conference in beautiful Yosemite at the Tenaya Lodge. The theme of this conference is Planting the Seeds of Knowledge. As in the past, the 2020 conference will provide an opportunity for CEQA practitioners and technical experts to meet and discuss the hot topics of the day, with emphasis on water-related topics, CEQA best practices, environmental, regulatory, and political changes, and air quality, greenhouse gas, and climate change. Click here for more information and to register.
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2020 MEMBER MIXER Thursday, January 30, 2020, 5:30-7:30pm Kilowatt Brewing, 7576 Clairemont Mesa Blvd., San Diego, CA 92111 Let’s get charged up for 2020 with fantastic food and friendly faces! Join us at Kilowatt Brewing for a drink and small bites as we welcome the new year. Mix, mingle and play some games with us to win some awesome AEP swag! Members: $5, Non-members: $20 *One drink and appetizers are included in the price. Click here for additional details and to register. Announcing... the San Diego AEP Book Club! The Chapter Board of Directors is excited to announce a new service for our Chapter: the San Diego AEP Book Club! Beginning in 2020, we are thrilled to present a quarterly book club where our members will be able to nominate, select, and meet to discuss books of your choosing that relate to the environmental profession. And don’t worry, we won’t be too literal on how close that relation needs to be; we will avoid falling into the Environmental Studies 101 syllabus. Please don’t hesitate to contact Chapter Director Corinne Lytle Bonine or Katie Laybourn with any questions or to volunteer to assist with the development of this exciting new program. Additional details to follow.
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thank YOU to everyone that helped make the AWARDS & SCHOLARSHIP BANQUET happen!
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2019 AWARDS AND SCHOLARSHIP BANQUET
Thank you to our sponsors! Harris & Associates HELIX Environmental Port of San Diego AECOM ESA RECON Environmental Ascent Environmental Dudek Katz & Associates KTUA LLG Engineers Sophia Mitchell & Associates WOODARD & CURRAN Michael Baker International
Since its establishment in 2004, the San Diego Chapter Scholarship Fund has awarded more than $60,000 to deserving students in the environmental field. This year, we received 19 applications from talented and very well qualified undergraduate, graduate, and even a couple PhD students attending local universities. Our two $2,000 scholarship winners for 2019 are Kyla Knauf and Federick Pinongcos! Our Spring 2020 newsletter will feature a 'Meet the Scholarship Winners' piece, so stay tuned to learn more about these talented San Diego students.
2019 SCHOLARSHIP WINNERS KYLA KNAUF AND FEDERICK PINONGCOS
OUTSTANDING ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNICAL REPORT port of San Diego Sea Level Rise Vulnerability Assessment & Coastal Resiliency Report (Port of San Diego) outstanding public involvement San Diego Ocean Planning Partnership Preliminary Assessment Report (California State Lands Commission and the Port of San Diego)
OUTSTANDING ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS, EIR/EIS UCSD 2018 Long Range Development Plan Final EIR (University of California, San Diego With support from Baranek Consulting Group and AECOM)
OUTSTANDING PLANNING DOCUMENT, PLAN, POLICY, OR ORDINANCE Mission Trails Regional Park Master Plan Update (The City of San Diego Planning Department and Parks and Recreation Department With support from KTU&A, Inc.) OUTSTANDING ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS, MND or EA East Coachella Valley Water Supply Project MNDs (Coachella Valley Water District With support from Woodard & Curran)
2019 AWARD winners
Diana Gauss Richardson began her career as a seasonal park ranger at Cabrillo National Monument in San Diego, and North Cascades National Park in Washington, where she worked as an Interpretive Ranger, teaching visitors about the unique resources in these beautiful places. Her Master’s degree, which involved evaluating policies that protect open spaces in urban environments, led to working for an environmental consulting firm in 1978 and, subsequently, a 15-year career in environmental and land use policy and management. She worked in both the private and public sectors, and was a member of AEP. During this time, Diana missed the teaching aspect that she loved from working for the National Park Service, and began to teach part time at community colleges in the San Diego area, and eventually began to teach an environmental course in the Geography Department at SDSU. In 1993, Diana focused her career on teaching in the Geography Department, and over time became the Undergraduate Advisor and Internship Coordinator for the department. Her courses related to land use planning and management, recreational land uses (including National Parks, and an annual field trip to Yosemite National Park!), environmental conservation and sustainability, and regional courses. Diana was also an active participant in SDSU life and programs, including, among other things, coordinating the on-campus student AEP chapter. In her Land Use Analysis course, she required attendance at the annual AEP CEQA Workshop, and, together with Kirstin Skadberg, created the annual CEQA Practicum for students. Diana retired in July 2018, but, in retired life, she continues to encourage her mentees (from SDSUs Mentor program) toward membership in AEP. She strongly believes in the mission of AEP and has seen firsthand the success in this industry that her students have achieved after joining this excellent professional organization.
2019 Outstanding Contribution to the Environmental Profession DIANA RICHARDSON
2019 Photography Contest Winner: RED WAVES BY KELSEY HAWKINS, HARRIS & ASSOCIATES
2019 AEP/APA Holiday party at cutwater spirits
Thank you to our sponsors, volunteers, and attendees. We donated over 50 pounds of canned and dried foods with AECOM donating the greatest number of items!
MOBILE WORKSHOP RECAP BY KATIE LAYBOURN, HARRIS & ASSOCIATES
The San Diego AEP Chapter Mobile Workshop was held at the Carlsbad Desalination Plant on Tuesday, September 17th. Attendees were taken on a tour of the facilities and learned about the history, process, and future of desalination as a sustainable water source. The desalination plant began construction in December 2012 and began delivering water three years later in December 2015. Water for the plant is piped from the adjacent Agua Hedionda lagoon, which used to be a degraded water body, but with the help of the desalination plant and recent aquaculture efforts, it is now a clean, vibrant habitat for seabirds, fish, and other wildlife. During the tour, participants learned about how the desalination plant was permitted and approved with a robust mitigation program to reduce potential impacts to aquatic organisms by the intake and output pipes. The intake pipe is fitted with a state-of-the-art filter that prevents even the very smallest organisms from being sucked up into the intake pipe. The desalination plant uses a process called reverse osmosis, which includes running the saline water through a series of filters placed along a salinity gradient, which forces the salt particles to separate from the water molecules. Very cool stuff! Another extremely interesting fact presented during the tour is that the desalination via reverse osmosis process that the Carlsbad Desalination Plant uses was invented in San Diego in the 1960s. Major themes of the tour were sustainability, resiliency, and climate change adaptation. The Carlsbad Desalination Plant currently provides nearly 50 million gallons of fresh drinking water every day to San Diego County, serving approximately 400,000 people and one-third of the fresh water use in the County. The ability to generate a source of fresh drinking water right here in southern California is one step the San Diego County Water Authority is taking to establish fresh-water independence and move toward ending our reliance on imported water from Northern California and the Colorado River. The success of the Carlsbad Desalination Plant opens the door for the expansion of this technology throughout California and the world.
CEQA ESSENTIALS WORKSHOP
SUMMER/FALL RECAP
STUDENT SPEED NETWORKING
meet a board member: EMILY PACHOLSKI, KLEINFELDER
Emily Pacholski serves as the treasurer for the San Diego Chapter. Originally from the Bay Area, Emily attended the University of San Diego where she graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies and a minor in Business Administration. She began her career working in hazardous materials sampling and site assessment, and currently works at Kleinfelder on a variety of environmental planning, assessment, and compliance projects. Outside of work, she enjoys volunteering with the San Diego River Park Foundation and manages their native plant garden in Mission Valley. You’ve recently taken a new position on the board. What made you want to get more involved and take a leadership position with AEP? I had attended several AEP events in the past and found them both fun and informative. As a student, I also attended several networking events, resume workshops, and the CEQA Practicum, which were very helpful as I began my career. Serving on the board this past year has been a great experience! AEP provides so many fantastic events for its members, and I appreciate the opportunity to play a role in supporting our organization. What advice would you give a recent graduate or young professional in the environmental industry? Try to talk to as many people as you can! There are so many opportunities and specialties within the environmental field that you might run across a career path you didn’t even know existed. The best thing you can do as a young professional is to attend as many networking and educational events as possible. What have you enjoyed most about working in the environmental field? I am very passionate about the work we do as it relates to the protection of people and the environment - whether it is sampling hazardous materials to determine potential exposure and human health risk, assessing the potential environmental impacts of a proposed project, or ensuring permit compliance to protect sensitive biological resources. I love getting out in the field, having the opportunity to talk to a variety of people, and being able to learn from a wonderful group of professionals!
UCSD EXTENSION COURSES California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) 1/13/2020 - 3/2/2020 (in-class) 1/27/2020 - 3/7/2020 (online) Advanced CEQA (online) 1/13/2020 - 3/14/2020 Writing Effective CEQA Documents (online) 1/27/2020 - 3/7/2020 Introduction to NEPA (online) 1/13/2020 - 3/14/2020 Introduction to Sustainability (online) 1/13/2020 - 3/14/2020 Behavior Change Strategies for Sustainability (online) 1/13/2020 - 3/14/2020 Resource Management (online) 1/21/2020 - 3/21/2020 Measuring Sustainable Impact (online) 1/21/2020 - 3/21/2020
Announcements
ROCKS BIOLOGICAL CONSULTING IS HIRING Rocks Biological Consulting (RBC) is seeking a part-time regulatory assistant to support our growing regulatory team. RBC’s regulatory team conducts field jurisdictional delineations (i.e., wetland delineations) and prepares jurisdictional delineation reports, permit applications, and various documents in support of and in compliance with Section 404 and 401 of the Clean Water Act, Porter-Cologne Water Quality Act, California Fish and Game Code Section 1602, and the California Coastal Act. The successful applicant will primarily assist other regulatory staff in preparing permitting application materials and conducting jurisdictional delineation site visits to assess the presence of jurisdictional aquatic resources (e.g., stream, wetlands). This is an excellent opportunity for a candidate that is looking to expand their aquatic resource permitting knowledge and gain valuable field experience with highly experienced staff. The ideal candidate will have exceptionally strong attention to detail and organizational skills; excellent writing, data management, planning, and interpersonal skills; and an educational background in environmental science, biology, or a closely related field. Interested applicants should submit a resume with a brief cover letter to marina@rocksbio.com. A full job posting can be found here.
SAN DIEGO RIVER PARK FOUNDATION INTERMEDIATE BIRD IDENTIFICATION COURSE The San Diego River Park Foundation is pleased to announce its 2020 Intermediate Bird Identification Course. Saturday mornings from 9:00 a.m. to noon: Feb. 22, 29, and March 14 and 28, 2020 at the Tecolote Nature Center. There will be field trips on March 7 and 21. This course is designed for persons who already have some familiarity with the field identification of San Diego County birds, and who would like to gain additional skills to enhance the enjoyment of their birding hobby, or who could use the skills in their job. Cost of the course is $110. Click here for more information and to register.
Thomas Strand, Corinne Lytle Bonine, Lisa Maier, Matt Stewart Janelle Firoozi, Emily Pacholski, Katie Laybourn, Erin Phillips, Kelsey Hawkins
San Diego AEP, Thank you for another great year! As always, let us know if you have any suggestions or are interested in getting involved. We hope you had a happy holiday season! San Diego Chapter Board
SDAEPBoard@califaep.org President Katie Laybourn Harris & Associates katie.laybourn@weareharris.com Co-Vice Presidents of Programs Janelle Firoozi ESA jfiroozi@esassoc.com Lisa Maier ESA LMaier@esassoc.com Vice President of Membership Thomas Strand T&B Planning, Inc. tstrand@tbplanning.com Treasurer Emily Pacholski Kleinfelder epacholski@kleinfelder.com Secretary Matt Stewart ICF matt.stewart@icf.com Student Membership and Outreach Director Kelsey Hawkins Harris & Associates kelsey.hawkins@weareharris.com Chapter Director Corinne Lytle Bonine Chambers Group clytle-bonine@chambersgroupinc.com Newsletter Editor Erin Phillips AECOM erin.phillips@aecom.com
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Contact the Newsletter Editor at: sdaepnews@gmail.com
Chapter Contacts
www.aepsd.org
2020 chapter BOARD