Rest of the Conference . . .

. . . What a week.

it's difficult to know where to start, or how to organize the following post given the mass amount of great sessions, people, ideas and conversations that I encountered in Redondo Beach. But I'll just start with things chronologically and see if that works . . . one of the great things about blogging is the ability jot it down when it happens (or soon thereafter) and have the links and info for later. One of the lousy things is that you wait a bit too long and you lose some of the timeliness of your impressions or ideas . . .
. . . and to be certain, there were a whole host of great sessions that I didn't manage to attend. What I would like to do, somewhere w/in the blog or on the site is link to the TCS page with the schedule and maybe add some hyperlinks to some of my favored people, organizations and agencies.

Day One
. . . the opening plenary featured not only Dr. Geraldine Katz. There were several other great speakers each describing projects in their respective areas, and what they were trying to do to realize the idea of "green ports". I am no expert in port planning, development or management. But I do realize that these areas have a profound influence on the conditions of our coasts, and due to the economic force within them, have a tremendous opportunity to influence coastal sustainability.

• Steven Goldbeck from the (take a deep breath) San Francisco Bay Conservation & Development Commission (BCDC) talked about the use of dredge spoils for somewhat more progressive or productive ends.
• Vivien Li of the Boston Harbor Association described the many initiatives in Boston.

• Heather Hartz, director of Environmental Affairs at the Virginia Port Authority followed . . . for my taste their website doesn't do their environmental efforts justice. ISO 14001,ULSD, as well as a host of other programs are definitely raising the bar and making that complex a greener part of the Virginia coast. By contrast, they have a great camera page . . . which begs the question, what other ways could institutions like VPA use the web to convey important environmental information.
  
• and last but certainly not least (quite the contrary) was Patricia Castellano, highlighting the work of the Coalition for Clean & Safe Ports, a piece in the larger puzzle that is the LA Alliance for New Economy. I think it's sometimes too easy to forget that beyond the very real ecological and economic problems faced on our coastlines, there is a very troubling human dimension to our coasts' mismanagement or poor planning. Patricia did a great job in reminding us that true sustainability includes not only the conservation of habitat or species, of economic vitality, but of lives and livelihoods as well.

. . . then we had lunch.