Jim is OLP's "official water guy". His areas of expertise, research and interests over the past thirty years have been in intergovernmental relations, especially the intersection of economic and environmental interests in the areas of land use, coastal management and marine policy. As a renown expert on marine policy, Jim travels frequently to the seagoing nations of South Korea and Taiwan, Singapore and China where he has engaged academicians and trade professionals on issues of environmental politics, port economics and marine transportation for more than twenty years.
He currently publishes on seaport policy and marine transportation as the industry confronts issues of infrastructure concentration, economic development and environmental externalities in an era of rapid change. James is a faculty member in the fields of marine and urban policy at the University of Southern California. He serves as the Director of Marine Science and Policy Outreach for the Sea Grant Program, a unit of USC’s Wrigley Institute for Environmental Studies.
Prior to joining USC Environmental Studies Program and the USC Price School of Public Policy as an adjunct Professor, Jim served as the Chief of Planning for the Los Angeles County Department of Beaches and Harbors in California during the 1990’s.
University of Southern California, Ph.D., Urban & Regional Planning