Michael Millican Joins DPR as First Sustainable Pest Management Assistant Director and Special Advisor

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Michael Millican Joins DPR as First Sustainable Pest Management Assistant Director and Special Advisor

Millican will lead the Department of Pesticide Regulation's support for accelerating a systemwide transition to sustainable pest management across California

Today, DPR announced the addition of a new leader to advance the department's work to foster and accelerate a transition to sustainable pest management across California's agricultural, urban and wildland settings. Michael Millican joins the department's executive leadership team this week as its first Sustainable Pest Management (SPM) Assistant Director and Special Advisor.

"Michael brings creative, innovative and forward-thinking integrated pest management experience and a passion for leading our department's efforts to support an accelerated systemwide transition to sustainable pest management," said DPR Director Julie Henderson. "Those efforts include facilitating the development of government, academic, NGO and private sector partnerships and enhancing our research and outreach grant programs to drive development and adoption of safer, sustainable pest management."

SPM is a holistic, whole-system approach that builds on the decades-long practice of integrated pest management (IPM) to include the wider context of the three sustainability pillars: human health and social equity, environmental protections, and economic vitality.

Prior to DPR, Millican served as the IPM Program Administrator at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, where he developed and managed a comprehensive IPM program to manage museum pests impacting The Met's collection, buildings, and landscapes. Millican previously served in multiple IPM and pest control roles at the New York City Department of Health and Hygiene, including as the IPM Coordinator for the Department's Pest Asthma Study, where he managed programs to oversee IPM interventions in the homes of children with asthma and co-authored peer reviewed research in the Journal of Asthma. As an IPM Specialist, Community Coordinator for the NYC Healthy Homes Program, he designed pest prevention and pest management best management trainings for new construction, renovating, or existing buildings. In addition, he co-authored the NYC Integrated Pest Management Toolkit for Building Owners, Managers, and Staff . He also worked as an independent information and industry consultant specializing in IPM services in California, including work with the San Francisco Department of the Environment, the San Francisco Department of Health, and a San Francisco-based pest control company that was a recipient of DPR's 2008 IPM Innovator Award, now called the IPM Achievement Awards.

Millican has a Bachelor of Arts in both Philosophy and Literature from University of California, Santa Cruz. He also completed interdisciplinary post graduate studies in Comparative Literature, Humanities and Social Thought at New York University.

"I am honored to be part of fostering sustainable pest management in California and to support leading, innovative efforts across the state to make pest management safe, sustainable and effective for all Californians," said Millican. "I am looking forward to meeting with growers and the agricultural community, urban pest managers, community members, researchers, and public and private sector partners and California Native American Tribes through consultation to advance sustainable pest management."

ABOUT THE DEPARTMENT OF PESTICIDE REGULATION

The California Department of Pesticide Regulation protects human health and the environment by fostering sustainable pest management and carrying out a robust regulatory program.

DPR's work includes conducting scientific evaluations of pesticides to assess and mitigate potential harm to human health or the environment prior to and following registration, registering all pesticides prior to sale or use in California, monitoring for pesticides in the air and water, and enforcing pesticide laws and regulations in coordination with 55 County Agricultural Commissioners and their combined 500 field inspectors across the state's 58 counties. DPR invests in innovative research, outreach, and education to encourage the development and adoption of integrated pest management tools and practices and conducts outreach to ensure pesticide workers, farmworkers and local communities have access to pesticide safety information. More information about DPR.

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