[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 11]
[Senate]
[Pages 15384-15385]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

                                 ______
                                 

                              REMEMBERING

 Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask my colleagues to join me in 
honoring the memory of Luke Cole, a leading environmental attorney and 
founder and executive director of the Center on Race, Poverty and the 
Environment. Mr. Cole passed away on June 6th as the result of a car 
accident in Uganda. He was 46 years old.
  Luke Cole was born in North Adams, MA, on July 15, 1962. He spent 
parts of his childhood in New York and Santa Barbara, where his father 
was an art historian at the University of California at Santa Barbara. 
During this period, Mr. Cole often accompanied his father on research 
trips to Nigeria. He graduated from Stanford University and Harvard Law 
School.
  Mr. Cole decided against potentially more lucrative career paths in 
favor of one that allowed him to follow his heart and enable him to 
make an impact on issues that he cared about most deeply: social 
justice and the environment. As a result of Mr. Cole's determination 
and vision, what began with a desk and a phone at a friend's office 
became the San Francisco-based nonprofit law center, the Center on, 
Race, Poverty and the Environment. Today, the center has a staff of 20 
and offices throughout central California.
  Mr. Cole's accomplishments as the executive director of the Center on 
Race, Poverty and the Environment were numerous and significant. From 
the rural communities of California's San Joaquin Valley to a 4,000-
year-old Inupiat Eskimo village in Kivalina, AK, his legacy can be seen 
in the traditionally underserved communities that he worked so hard to 
save from the effects of harmful pollutants. His

[[Page 15385]]

unyielding commitment to environmental justice inspired and empowered 
many people from minority communities to take a more active role in 
combating environmental racism.
  In addition to his leadership of the Center on Race, Poverty and the 
Environment, Mr. Cole also served on the United States Environmental 
Protection Agency's National Justice Advisory Council and taught 
environmental justice seminars at Stanford Law School and UC Berkeley's 
Boalt Hall School of Law. A man of many interests, he was also a 
dedicated bird watcher and root beer connoisseur, and possessed an 
extensive collection of miniature spy cameras and bobblehead dolls. He 
will be missed.
  Mr. Cole is survived by his wife Nancy Shelby; father Herbert; mother 
Alexandra Cole, and stepmother Shelley Cole; two brothers Peter and 
Thomas; sister, Sarah; stepbrother Daryn; and son Zane.

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