ALTERECHO

Rich Howard is a senior scientist and property redevelopment and reuse specialist at AlterEcho. He has more than 30 years of experience in a career spanning service in the U.S. Peace Corps, academia and environmental consulting. He applies his skills as a soil scientist and expert site investigation manager to lead large-scale property investigation, remediation and redevelopment projects for clients.

Rich has lead programs for the EPA, U.S. Air Force and Habitat for Humanity--the latter for which he prepared an industrial property for redevelopment for affordable single-family homes. He has also served as Project Manager for multiple property transaction environmental assessments of commercial and industrial facilities for future residential and industrial use in California, Arizona, Nevada, Michigan, and Minnesota. The properties ranged in scope from undeveloped land to a major Las Vegas hotel/casino, to an aerospace facility with more than 1.2 million square feet of building space.

When Rich is not involved in managing our West Coast activities and preparing sites for redevelopment, he loves to be outdoors exploring the beauty of nature in Northern California and around the world.

• What do you do for AlterEcho? I oversee our U.S. Pacific Region, and serve as an in-house "Soil Scientist."
• What's your background? I've supervised several large, complex environmental impact investigations, and was a Soil Scientist for USDA. I'm also a registered environmental assessor (# 59 in California) with a background in property transaction environmental assessments.
• What's on your iPod or CD changer right now? Lots of world music - Habib Koite and Juan Luis Guerra are favorites.
• What do you think is the most urgent environmental issue today? An adequate supply of clean water around the world.
• What's your happy place? The African savannah.
• What's one thing that your colleagues would be surprised to learn about you? I practice and teach insight meditation.