Learn about God through a terrorist’s eyes
By Daily Press staff
A local environmental watchdog dedicated to cleaning up Santa Monica Bay has a new leader.
The Santa Monica Baykeeper announced this week that Tracy Egoscue will be its new executive director. Egoscue has most recently served as a Deputy Attorney General in the Natural Resources section at the California Department of Justice. She will assume her new position at the Baykeeper on Sept. 15.
Egoscue’s legal experience encompasses the Federal Clean Water Act, the California Environmental Quality Act, endangered species, wetland impacts and mitigation issues and fisheries. At the Attorney General’s Office, her work involved various state agencies including the State Water Resources Control Board, Regional Water Quality Control Board and the Department of Fish and Game, among others.
Egoscue also has worked as the staff attorney and policy analyst for Save the Sound, Inc., a non-profit environmental organization in Connecticut. There, Egoscue worked with state and federal legislators on public policy benefiting the Long Island Sound.
“Being selected as the Santa Monica Baykeeper is the honor of a lifetime,” Egoscue said. “I look forward to continuing the tradition of fighting for water quality, and being the eyes and ears of the Santa Monica and San Pedro Bays.”
Egoscue got her law degree from George Washington University in Washington, D.C., and a bachelor’s degree from the University of California at Santa Barbara. She replaces Steve Fleischli, who was recently named executive director of the international Waterkeeper Alliance in New York.
Santa Monica Baykeeper is a community-based environmental organization whose mission is to protect and restore Santa Monica Bay, San Pedro Bay and adjacent waters through enforcement, field work and community action.
Best selling author Mark Juergensmeyer next week will discuss the events of Sept. 11 from the religious terrorist’s point of view.
“The Global Rise of Religious Violence” is the featured topic for this year’s annual Casassa Lecture at Loyola Marymount University on Sept. 17. The event is free and will be held from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. at LMU in the Ahmanson Auditorium, University Hall.
The author of “Global Religion: A Handbook,” “Gandhi’s Way,” and “Terror in the Mind of God,” Juergensmeyer interviewed convicted Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh during the course of his research, among others. He also has studied Sikh violence in India and Buddhist violence in Japan, including the 1995 Sarin gas attack in the Tokyo subway.
“Mark Juergensmeyer believes there are strands of violence in all (religious) traditions,” said John A. Coleman S.J., professor of social justice at LMU. “The notion of cosmic war between God and evil lends itself to translation into violence.”
In addition to serving as the director of Global and International Studies, Juergensmeyer is a professor of sociology and religious studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 10, 2003. Read the original PDF.