SACRAMENTO, 6 August 2009 – President Pro Tem of the California State Senator Steinberg today announced the appointment of Robert “Bob” Johnston of Truckee, California, to the Board of Directors of the Sierra Nevada Conservancy. Robert Johnston is an Emeritus Professor in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy at the University of California at Davis and a Faculty Researcher at the Institute of Transportation Studies there. He taught land use planning, energy policy, geographic information systems, and impact assessment courses for 34 years.
“Thank you to Senator Steinberg for making this appointment. Bob Johnston served as my professor in 1978, and I have continued to stay in touch with him over the years through his involvement with Sierra land use issues,” notes Elizabeth “Izzy” Martin, CEO of The Sierra Fund. “I encouraged him to apply for this position because of his expertise in transportation and land use, and his commitment to the Sierra Nevada.”
Johnston has a long history of working to protect and restore the people and places of the Sierra Nevada. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Sierra Nevada Alliance. He recently chaired a citizen’s committee in Loyalton that revised their general plan. He is currently a member of the Truckee Town Planning Commission, where he resides.
Johnston sits on the Transportation Research Board’s committee on transportation and land development and his major research project currently is the development of a statewide economic model of land use and transportation. He recently developed a model for projecting energy use and greenhouse gases from general plans, and he regularly advises State agencies on greenhouse gas policy. His GIS‑based urban growth model, UPlan, is being applied to eight San Joaquin Valley counties in their Blueprint planning process.
Johnston will be seated on the Board at the Sierra Nevada Conservancy’s next meeting September 24, 2009 at Squaw Valley in the Central Sierra.
