2012 March: What's on Tap? Sustainability of Our Water & Health
Ken Landau
The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board is the State agency with primary responsibility for protecting surface and ground water quality from the impacts of waste discharges in the Central Valley of California. Ken Landau is an Assistant Executive Officer in the Water Board’s Rancho Cordova office, managing the surface water protection programs. Ken has been with the Central Valley Water Board since 1984, and was previously with the Colorado River Basin Water Board starting in 1975. He is a graduate of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo with a BS in Environmental Engineering, and College of the Deserts with an AA in Geology. He is a California Registered Civil Engineer.
Dr. Peter Green
Dr. Peter Green is from the University of California at Davis, and has been a researcher there in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering since 2000. His degrees are in Chemistry. His research projects range widely over a variety of water quality and air quality projects, with collaborators including ecologists and clinical researchers. Among his more important projects in recent years are several involving mercury in the environment, as well as in children, plus a series of studies on agricultural emissions which can be precursors to ground-level ozone -- part of what is sometimes called 'smog'. Ongoing research includes removal of arsenic from drinking water, remediation of mine drainage, and minimization of emissions from use of renewable resources.
Dr. Emily Marquez
Emily Marquez, Ph.D. recently earned her doctorate from Boston University. While in Boston, she studied snakes that she collected from fish farms in North Carolina and Canada, and did her graduate thesis work on gene expression in turtles exposed to contaminated soil from an EPA Superfund site. She also volunteered at the nonprofit organization Bikes Not Bombs, teaching bike mechanics to Boston youth. At UC Berkeley, she majored in Integrative Biology and History and did research in the laboratory of Dr. Tyrone Hayes, where she worked on frogs, snakes, turtles, and lizards. Dr. Marquez was just hired as a staff scientist at Pesticide Action Network North America.
Andria Ventura
Andria Ventura left a 13-year career in publishing in 1995 to work on environmental issues for the New Jersey Environmental Federation, Clean Water Action's New Jersey chapter. There she served first on the phone canvass and then became an organizer working on a wide array of issues, supplementing her work by joining her town's environmental commission. Andria joined the California staff in May 2003, after a two-year hiatus in Hawaii volunteering with the Waikiki Zoo's elephant program and working at the Oceanic Institute. She represents Clean Water Action on the Environmental Justice Coalition for Water's Program Advisory Committee and staffs our TMDL (Total Maximum Daily Load), drinking water contaminants, and chemical policy programs. Andria has a B.A. in history from U.C. Santa Barbara and did graduate work on immigration history at Utah State University.