M.C.P. '76

Larry Orman received his MCP from the Department of City and Regional Planning in 1976. From there he went to work as Executive Director of a little-known Bay Area open space advocacy organization known as People for Open Space (POS). Co-founded by land use planning pioneer Jack Kent in 1958—the same Jack Kent who also founded DCRP—POS was looking for a way to expand its identity beyond being just another Bay Area environmental group. Over the course of the next 20 years, pushed by Larry Orman’s understanding of information and analysis, by his vision and political saavy, and most of all, by his calm dedication and perseverance, POS and its successor organization, the Greenbelt Alliance, would become the Bay Area premier environmental organization.

Greenbelt Alliance publications went beyond analysis and advocacy to the point of framing the entire development and conservation debate—authoring reports and mapping the precise locations where the Bay Area’s greenbelt was most at risk from unplanned-urban growth. At the time, all of these reports were controversial, but they were also influential. To the degree that sustainable metropolitan development planning is now the norm in California, it is because of these documents, and because of the vision and leadership of Greenbelt Alliance’s Executive Director, Larry Orman.

In 1995, after nearly 20 years at the helm of the Greenbelt Alliance, Larry stepped down to found a new non-profit organization, GreenInfo Network. Having witnessed the power of maps and GIS to empower ordinary citizens as planners and to link the local to the regional, Larry set out to bring that power to wider range of community-based organizations. Beginning with just two staff and occasional volunteers in its first year, today, GreenInfo Network includes ten staff in offices in San Francisco and Los Angeles. GreenInfo has undertaken dozens of community and environmental planning projects, including:

• Identifying priority conservation areas throughout California for the Save the Redwoods League.
• Identifying critical urban parks and recreation needs for Southern California’s increasingly diverse population.
• Providing continued technical support to the Bay Area Open Space Council.
• Working with the Transportation and Land Use Coalition to improve the social and environmental benefits of public investments in roads, transit and other facilities.
• Providing technical support to the California Resources Agency’s Legacy Project, and to Land Trust of Napa County in the identification of critical natural lands and open space for conservation and acquisition.

Over the years, Larry has been an example and mentor to many of CED’s most distinguished graduates, and he continues in that role today. More than just creating incisive reports and beautiful maps—Larry Orman has demonstrated the power of information in the service of advocacy to protect our unique natural heritage and remake our communities for the better.