Dr. Robert Ballard - has been delving into the farthest reaches of the sea for more than 40 years and is recognized as one of the premier spokespersons for marine research. Among the most accomplished and renowned of the world’s deep-sea explorers and oceanographers, Dr. Ballard is best known for his historic discovery of the RMS Titanic, found more than 12,000 feet beneath the North Atlantic.  A legendary explorer, scientist, best-selling author and lecturer, Dr. Ballard has led a life as exciting and intriguing as his deep-sea explorations. He has conducted more than 100 deep-sea expeditions, and his other discoveries include the German battleship Bismarck, USS Yorktown lost during the Battle of Midway, President Kennedy’s PT-109 and the luxury liner Lusitania. (More Info)

Martin Parry - Co-Chair, Working Group II, IPCC

Bio: Dr Parry was Co-Chair of Working of Group II (Impacts and Adaptation) of the Fourth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He is Visiting Professor at Imperial College London. Formerly he was Professor of Geography at the Universities of Oxford, University College London and Birmingham, UK; and Professor of Environmental Science at the University of East Anglia. He has published about 140 scientific papers and 5 books on climate change impacts.
 

Other Events

Karen White - USF St. Petersburg Regional Chancellor, brings with her more than a decade of metropolitan university experience to the university. Since her appointment in 2003, USFSP evolved to an autonomous undergraduate and graduate institution.

Prior to USF St. Petersburg, Dr. White served as the Dean of the College of Fine Arts and Professor of Music at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, Executive Assistant to the Chancellor of the University of Maryland System, a consultant to the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges on urban and metropolitan university issues, Assistant to the President at Wright State University, and Professor of Music at Southeastern Louisiana University.
 

Jeff Lyash - is president and chief executive officer, Progress Energy Florida. He previously served as senior vice president - Energy Delivery, Progress Energy Florida. In that role, he  managed the four operations and customer service regions and the Distribution Operations & Support function in Florida.
Lyash joined Progress Energy in 1993 and spent his first eight years with the company at the Brunswick Nuclear Plant. His last position at Brunswick was as director of site operations. He has been vice president - Transmission since January 2002. Between 1984 and 1993, Lyash worked with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in a number of capacities. When he left the NRC, Lyash was a senior resident inspector at the Peach Bottom Nuclear Station in Pennsylvania. Lyash has a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Drexel University.

Noel Brown - Board Chair, IOI-USA, Founder of Friends of the United Nations.

Bio: Dr. Noel Brown is the former Director of the United Nations Environment Programme, North American Regional office. Dr. Brown holds a B.A. in Political Science and Economics from Seattle University, an M.A. in International Law and Organization from Georgetown University and Ph. D. in International Relations from Yale University. He also holds a diploma in International Law from The Hague Academy of International Law.

Over the past two decades, Dr. Brown represented the United Nations Environment Program at a number of the major international conferences and negotiations on environment and development issues and on international law, including the historic Earth Summit in Rio, 1992. He has initiated numerous innovations in the service of the earth’s environmental protection and sustainable development. He is a founding member of the Aspen Global Change Institute, the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives, and Indigenous Development International. 

Dr. Brown currently serves as President of the Friends of the United Nations, a non governmental organization dedicated to advancing the cause of the United Nations by mobilizing public support on its behalf and directing public attention to its major programmes and achievements. He is a fellow of the World Academy of Arts and Sciences, Chairman of the International Institute for Peace through Tourism and Chairman of the Rene Dubos Center for Human Environments. (More Info)
 

Mayor Michael Finnerty, St. Pete Beach

Bio: Mayor of St. Pete Beach
 

John H. Dunnigan - is the Assistant Administrator for NOAA’s Ocean Service.  He has broad experience in marine science and policy and in the service of marine resource conservation. (More info)

Plenary: Tuesday, November 18

Saskia Sassen - Helen Robert Lynd Professor of Sociology, Columbia University, editor of UN-Habitat report on settlements

Bio: Saskia Sassen is the Lynd Professor of Sociology and Member, The Committee on Global Thought, Columbia University. Her new books are Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global Assemblages ( Princeton University Press 2006) and A Sociology of Globalization (W.W.Norton 2007). Other recent books are the 3rd. fully updated Cities in a World Economy (Sage 2006), the edited Deciphering the Global (Routledge 2007), and the co-edited Digital Formations: New Architectures for Global Order (Princeton University Press 2005). She wrote a lead essay in the 2006 Venice Biennale of Architecture Catalogue and has just completed for UNESCO a five-year project on sustainable human settlement with a network of researchers and activists in over 30 countries; it is published as one of the volumes of the Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (Oxford, UK: EOLSS Publishers) [www.eolss.net ]. The Global City came out in a new fully updated edition in 2001. Her books are translated into sixteen languages. She serves on several editorial boards and is an advisor to several international bodies. She is a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a member of the National Academy of Sciences Panel on Cities, and chaired the Information Technology and International Cooperation Committee of the Social Science Research Council (USA). She has written for The Guardian, The New York Times, Le Monde Diplomatique, the International Herald Tribune, Newsweek International, OpenDemocracy.net, Vanguardia, Clarin, the Financial Times, among others.
 

Carlos Fernandez - Jauregui - Director, United Nations Water Decade

Bio: Carlos Fernández-Jáuregui was born in Sucre, Bolivia, in 1950. He graduated as a civil engineer (hydraulics and hydrology) from the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés (UMSA), La Paz, Bolivia, in 1975 and obtained his Dipl. Ing. in surface hydrology from the Technische Universität (TU), Berlin, Germany, in 1979. He holds a Dr. Ing. degree (hydrology and water management) from TU-Berlin and a diploma from the American Institute of Hydrology, St. Paul, MN, USA. He has been a Full Professor (hydrology) at UMSA-La Paz/TU-Berlin since 1985.

In December 2001, Mr Carlos Fernández-Jáuregui was appointed as Deputy Coordinator of the UN system-wide World Water Assessment Programme (WWAP) Paris (France) and coordinated and supervised the preparation of the 1st and 2nd United Nations World Water Development Reports as well as several national-level case studies.

In September 2007, Mr Fernández-Jáuregui was appointed as Coordinator of the United Nations Office to Support the International Decade for Action 'Water for Life' 2005-2015 Madrid (Spain).  (More Info)
 

Wayne Joseph - Chair, Global Water Partnership, Caribbean Region

Bio: Mr. Wayne Joseph is the Chairman of the Global Water Partnership-Caribbean (GWP-C). He is the General Manager Operations of the Water and Sewerage Authority of Trinidad and Tobago, a place where he has worked for the last 20 years. He is also a Board Member of the Caribbean Water and Wastewater Association (CWWA and a Board Member of the Land Settlement Authority of Trinidad and Tobago. Mr. Joseph is a career water professional with extensive experience in the operations and maintenance of water and wastewater systems and is a member of the American Water works Association (AWWA). Mr. Joseph is a Canadian Trained Engineer and holds a B.Sc. in Water Resources Engineering from the University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada. He also holds a M.Sc. in Construction Engineering and Management from the University of the West Indies, St Augustine, Trinidad.
 

Alex Sink - Chief Financial Officer - State of Florida

Bio: Alex Sink was raised in Mount Airy, North Carolina. Sink is a graduate of Wake Forest University. After graduating with a degree in math, she taught in West Africa for three years.

Sink is a former president of Bank of America. She was appointed by former Governor Lawton Chiles to the Commission on Government Accountability to the People, and also served on Chiles’ Commission on Education. She was vice-chair of Florida TaxWatch. Sink has also served with the Florida Chapter of the Nature Conservancy, the Beth El Farm Workers Ministry, and as Chairman of the Board of the United Way of Hillsborough County.

Sink was the Democratic candidate for Florida's office of Chief Financial Officer in 2006. She defeated Republican Tom Lee 53.5 percent to 46.5 percent. Sink has also been considered a possible candidate for the U.S. Senate seat up for grabs in 2010, currently held by Republican Mel Martinez. A survey released by Public Policy Polling on July 1, 2008 gave Sink a 37 to 31 percent lead over Martinez in a hypothetical match-up.
 

Alex Domijan - Professor Ph.D., University of Texas-Arlington, 1986
Area: Electromagnetics and Energy Systems, Electronics, Signals and Systems.
Interests: Flexible reliable intelligent electric energy delivery systems, instrumentation, power electronics, power quality, energy efficiency studies, custom power, motor drives (More Info)

Plenary: Wednesday, November 19

Jeremy Harris - former mayor of Honolulu, HI, USA

Bio: Mayor Jeremy Harris served for more than ten years as the Mayor of the City and County of Honolulu, Hawaii, the 12^th largest city in the United States. He retired from politics in January of 2005. Prior to becoming Mayor, Harris was Honolulu’s longest serving Managing Director, a position he held for nine years.

Under Mayor Harris’ leadership Honolulu achieved worldwide recognition.

* 1^st Place Gold Award/Large Cities International Award for Livable Cities 2004

* Best City Government Website in the United States, 2003

* Special Achievement Award in Geographic Information System Technology, 2003

* #1 City in U.S. - Use of Technology in Delivering Government Services, 2002

* America’s Best Transit System, American Public Transportation Assoc., 2000 & 1994

 During his three terms as Mayor, Honolulu was recognized as one of the best managed cities in the United States. In addition to the hundreds of awards the City received during his tenure, Mayor Harris also earned national and international acclaim. Awards include:

* Keystone Award, American Architectural Foundation, 2005

* Outstanding Achievement Award for Sustainability, U.S. Conference of Mayors, 2004

* Lifetime Achievement Award in GIS Systems, ESRI, 2004

* Lifetime Achievement Award for Support of Information Technology, CDG, 2004

* City Livability Award for Exemplary Leadership, U.S. Conference of Mayors, 2003

* Distinguished Leadership Award in Planning, American Planning Association, 2002

Mayor Harris is the only individual to receive the award of Public Administrator of the Year for two consecutive years from the Hawaii branch of the American Association of Public Administrators. He has served as the Public Director on the National Board of Directors of the American Institute of Architects. Mayor Harris is currently a senior visiting faculty member at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, a member of the Sustainability Roundtable of the National Academy of Science in Washington D.C., and the Irving Distinguished Professor in the College of Architecture and Planning at Ball State University. Mayor Harris holds degrees in Biological Science specializing in Marine Biology and a Masters of Science degree in Population and Environmental Biology, specializing in urban ecosystems, from the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of a new book, The Renaissance of Honolulu, The Sustainable Rebirth of an American City. (More Info)
 

Mayor Rick Baker, St. Petersburg, FL

Bio: Baker has a long background in management and law. Baker received a B.S. in management, M.B.A. and Juris Doctor with honors from Florida State University. He later studied comparative law at Oxford University. Baker has practiced corporate and business law for 20 years, serving as president of Fisher and Sauls, P.A., a St. Petersburg law firm.

Prior to his election as mayor, Baker served as the chairman of the St. Petersburg Chamber of Commerce. He is also the author of Mangroves to Major League, a historical account of the development of the city of St. Petersburg.

Baker's re-election platform, called the "Baker Plan," focused on five areas: education; economic development, particularly in Midtown St. Petersburg; public safety; neighborhood associations; and improving the efficiency of city services.

Bakers' achievements as mayor have been noted nationally, with some describing St. Petersburg as a model city in programs such as education and inner city revitalization. The Partners for Livable Communities, for example, recently designated St. Petersburg as one of "America's Most Livable Communities."

Bakers' term expires on January 2, 2010.
 

Mayor Pam Iorio, Mayor of Tampa

Bio: Pam Iorio (born April 27, 1959 in Waterville, Maine) is the 57th and current (as of 2008) mayor of Tampa, Florida. She moved with her family to Temple Terrace as an infant and also attended school in Temple Terrace . She is the second female mayor of Tampa.

Her first term dealt largely with renovating the downtown area, as well as creating economic confidence for poorer citizens of the city. Iorio is also a big supporter of the arts, and she wishes to make Tampa a major arts center in the South. Iorio has also been credited with a sharp drop in drug trafficking in the city limits. In her second term, Iorio will continue to be a supporter for a light rail mass transit system for the city.

In 1985, at the age of 26, she became the youngest person ever elected to the Hillsborough County Commission. For a decade before her successful run for mayor, she served as Supervisor of Elections for Hillsborough County. During the 2000 presidential election recount, she was the president of the State Association of County Elections Supervisors.

She earned her bachelor's degree from American University and followed up with her master's at the University of South Florida, while she was Supervisor of Elections.
 

Mayor Dennis O'Keefe

Bio: Dennis O’Keefe was born and raised in St. John’s. He attended St. Bonaventure’s College and graduated from Memorial University of Newfoundland in 1967 with a B.A. (History) and a B.Ed. Following post-graduate studies at Memorial he received a Master’s Degree (History) in 1978. 

Dennis had a 30-year career as an educator. He was a teacher/Department Head at Brother Rice High School, St. Patrick’s Hall and Beaconsfield High School in St. John’s. He is a consumer activist having established the Consumer Group for Fair Gas Prices and Consumer Power.

His political career began in 1997 when he was elected as Councillor-at-large. In 2005 he was elected Deputy-Mayor which position he held for three years before resigning to run in a by-election for the position of Mayor. Dennis won the by-election and was sworn in as Mayor of the City of St. John’s on June 9, 2008. He is active in the development of the Cruise Ship Industry in this Province. Currently he is the Chair of the Cruise St. John’s Committee and the Cruise Association of Newfoundland and Labrador.

He is married to the former Grace Lahey and they have two children Carolyn and Denise and son-in-law, Greg.
 

Plenary: Thursday, November 20

Roberto Rosselli -“ Manager of System Information, Venice Water Authority

Michael Orbach - Professor of the Pratice of Marine Affairs and Policy, Duke University Marine Lab.

Bio: Michael K. Orbach is Professor of Marine Affairs and Policy and Director of the Coastal Environmental Management Program in the School of the Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University. His BA is in Economics from the University of California at Irvine, and his MA and PhD are in Cultural Anthropology from the University of California at San Diego. From 1976-79 he was Social Anthropologist and Social Science Advisor with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Washington, D.C. From 1979-82 he was Associate Director of the Center for Coastal Marine Studies at the University of California at Santa Cruz. From 1983-93 he was Professor of Anthropology in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology and Senior Scientist with the Institute for Coastal and Marine Resources at East Carolina University. He joined Duke, with offices at the Duke Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, North Carolina, in 1993, and was Director of the Marine Laboratory from 1998 to 2006. Mike has performed research and has been involved in coastal and marine policy on all coasts of the U.S. and in Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, Southeast Asia, Alaska and the Pacific, and has published widely on social science and policy in coastal and marine environments. (More Info)
 

Robert Miles - Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Hunt Energy Enterprises

Bio: Robert Miles, Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR), joined Hunt Energy Enterprises in 2008. He is responsible for formulating investment theses in various energy sectors and developing business plans for high-potential startups.

Prior to joining Hunt, Miles was founder and CEO of 10C Technologies, a manufacturer of universal battery chargers. He has led several early stage companies from concept to full commercialization as CEO or senior executive. Previously, he was a partner at Koch Ventures and Koch Genesis, where he led three successful startups in areas of energy technologies, materials, and oil and gas. He was an EIR at Sevin Rosen and an engagement manager at McKinsey & Company, consulting for several Fortune 500 energy companies on operations, risk management, and capital efficiency.

Miles has a PhD in Applied Physics from CalTech and served as a Nuclear Engineer onboard Navy surface ships. He has a bachelor degree in Physics from the US Naval Academy.
 

Paul Holthus - Executive Director, World Ocean Council

Bio: Paul is founding Executive Director of the World Ocean Council which brings together ocean business and industry to catalyze global leadership and pre-competitive collaboration in addressing shared marine environmental issues in support of improved business operations - creating a global inter-industry network of “Corporate Ocean Responsibility”. As a consultant on sustainable development and environmental management, Paul works with industry associations, UN agencies, international NGOs and foundations on sustainability, especially in the areas of oil/gas, fisheries, aquaculture, standards and certification.

Warren Evans – Director of the World Bank Environment Department.

His main responsibilities include overseeing the implementation of the Bank’s Environment Strategy, in particular, for mainstreaming environmental objectives in lending and non-lending operations; providing leadership to the global environment agenda with internal constituents and external stakeholders including the expansion and strengthening of global environmental partnerships; and is a key spokesperson for the Bank on environmental issues.

Mr. Evans, a US national, joined the World Bank in July 2003. From 1988 to 2003, he held technical and managerial positions at the Asian Development Bank (ADB) based in Manila, Philippines - his last ADB position was the Director for the Environment and Social Safeguards Division. Prior to that, Mr. Evans work on environmental issues in developing countries included serving as advisor to the Thai National Environment Board from 1978-1981 and as Managing Director of an international environmental consulting firm based in Asia from 1982-1987.

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