California coastal advocate Joe Bodovitz dies at 93

Joe Bodovitz, a public servant considered a pioneer in California coastal conservancy, has died. He was 93.

He died of natural causes at a retirement community in San Francisco, his daughter, Kathy Goldgeier, said. He lived in Mill Valley for over 50 years.

Mr. Bodovitz was an early advocate, a mentor and, beyond all else, a foundational forerunner for a specific kind of California policy: coastal protectionism.

His career had a number of notable firsts, as executive director of the newly founded San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC) and California Coastal Commission. He also served as deputy director of San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association, executive director of the California Utilities Commission and trustee of the Mill Valley School Board.

“He was a great public servant and he really cherished his involvement in the community both locally in Mill Valley, in Marin and at the state level,” said Goldgeier, 62 of Rockville, Maryland. “He was the right guy in the right place at a pivotal time for the San Francisco Bay and the California coast.”

Mr. Bodovitz is held with the highest regard among advocates, eco-bureaucrats and conservationists as a founding father of state environmental policy.

Larry Goldzband, executive director of BCDC, said in a phone interview that he would gather for an annual meal with the organization’s former directors – Mr. Bodovitz, Will Travis, Mike Wilmar – at Max’s Opera Plaza in San Francisco.

“I would sit and listen to them talk. It was the best way to learn,” Goldzband said. “Joe Bodovitz did more than anyone in the state of California to create coastal zone management. Nobody has done more than Joe Bodovitz.”

Mr. Bodovitz was born Oklahoma City in 1930. He studied English literature at Northwestern University and served in the U.S. Navy during the Korean War. He completed a graduate degree in journalism at Columbia University. He married Shirley Leon in 1957.

Mr. Bodovitz began his career as a journalist at the San Francisco Examiner. In 1964, he changed careers to work for San Francisco Planning and Urban Research (SPUR). There he served as deputy director and began work on bay-related conservation and advocacy issues.

“Joe’s career and life exemplified SPUR: do quality research, educate the public, advocate for change with our elected leaders — and never give up,” Jim Chappell, former executive director of SPUR, wrote in an online dedication. “While we will all miss Joe, his legacy of environmentalism and regional planning endures throughout California.”

While there, the team drafted the original plan that led to the halt of a maligned bay-area bridge plan, the foundation of BCDC, and the publishing of the San Francisco Bay Plan in 1969.

David Lewis, the current executive director of Save the Bay, a nonprofit based in Oakland, said Mr. Bodovitz and his work with the various organizations is the reason why state residents have a public bay and coast to enjoy.

“There is probably almost no one in history that was more important to protecting the bay and the coast that we still have today and most Californians don’t know that,” Lewis said.

In 1972, Mr. Bodovitz was hired as the first executive director of the California Coastal Commission, a state agency that manages the state’s 1,100-mile coastline following voter approval of Proposition 20.

Don Neuwirth of San Francisco recalled working under him in the nascent stages of the organization. Mr. Bodovitz was seen as a statesman for the environment and a leader among dozens of younger employees, Neuwirth said.

“He just had this incredible intellect but it was matched by this really amazing temperament,” Neuwirth said. “His legacy is that he was so open to being a mentor on most minute questions that we had for him or the most grandiose concepts and direction. He was a remarkably accessible man. And even when challenged by people who were really serious, he was unflappable.”

Mr. Bodovitz later led the California Public Utilities Commission as executive director, beginning in 1979 and until 1986. Mr. Bodovitz has also served as head of the California Environmental Trust and as project director for BayVision 2020, an organization that recommended strategies for organizing the area’s governmental agencies. Their work is considered foundational for Plan Bay Area 2040, which comprises much of the original vision of BCDC and other groups.

Mr. Bodovitz is survived his daughter Katherine Goldgeier and her husband Jim; his daughter Sandra Feder and her husband Dan Feder; his son Steven Bodovitz and his wife Aubrey Gilbert; and his grandchildren, Jeffrey Goldgeier, Brian Goldgeier, Rachel Feder, Abby Feder, Ellie Feder, Sadie Bodovitz, and Lucy Bodovitz.