I just saw this story in the LATimes. Jan was a true leader in the cause of protecting our coastal waters. I had the opportunity to meet Jan during his efforts with the Ocean Outfall Group when I was a member of the Garden Grove Sanitary District Advisory Commission. While we did not always agree, his contributions to our community of Orange County are lasting and irreplaceable.
Jan Vandersloot, a leading Orange Countyenvironmental activist whose causes included the preservation of the Bolsa Chica wetlands, has died. He was 64.
Vandersloot died Wednesday at his home in Newport Beach, said his son, Jon, who found his father in his home office. “He gave everything he had ’til his last breath,” Jon Vandersloot said. The cause of death has not been determined.
Vandersloot, a dermatologist with a practice in Huntington Beach, was one of the founders of the Bolsa Chica Land Trust, which was formed in 1992 to preserve the Bolsa Chica wetlands by acquiring and restoring the area. He also was a board member and a founder of the Ocean Outfall Group, which has pushed the Orange County Sanitation District to clean up waste water pumped offshore in Huntington Beach and has expanded its efforts to other counties in the state.
Vandersloot had attended a meeting of the state Coastal Commission on Wednesday. “He was the heart and soul of the environmental movement in Orange County,” said Larry Porter, a board member of the Ocean Outfall Group. “He was one of those magnificent fellows who was so much bigger than life. It’s a huge loss, incalculable.”
Read the rest of the LATimes story here.
He was a good man. Very sad.
I had the pleasure of working with Jan. He and a handful of others are responsible for much of the attention that is paid to environmental issues in the OC. He will be missed.