RAE ZIMMERMAN
RAE ZIMMERMAN is Professor of Planning and Public Administration at New York University's Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, where she directs the Urban Planning Program and the new NSF-funded Institute for Civil Infrastructure Systems (ICIS). In 1997, she was President of the Society for Risk Analysis, an over 2,400 member international, interdisciplinary professional society of scientists, engineers, and social scientists. At NYU she teaches graduate level courses in environmental planning and management, environmental impact assessment, urban infrastructure, and risk assessment and risk management. She directs multi-disciplinary research in environmental and hazardous waste management, risk communication, and risk assessment applications to groundwater,
chemicals, coal gas sites, transportation and other infrastructure. Recent research includes a U.S. EPA funded project on farmers' attitudes toward agricultural practices protective of water quality and research on social and economic characteristics of communities with inactive hazardous waste
sites. A major interest is industrial and transportation performance, and she is directing a large, interdisciplinary environmental and transportation infrastructure performance project funded by the National Science Foundation. Professionally, she has been involved in risk assessments associated with large infrastructure facilities for water treatment, transportation, and waste disposal. Current professional positions and appointments include: Member of the U.S. EPA Board of Scientific Counselors and Member of the NYS Comparative Risk Committee. Former positions include: Member of the National Science Foundation Decision Risk and Management Science review panel, the NYS Air Toxics Workgroup, the Risk Science Institute meta-analysis group, the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis risk management reform group, the U.S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment Advisory Panel for "Research on Risk Assessment Methodology for Chemical Carcinogens" study (1992-1993), the Advisory Committee on Safe Drinking Water of the New York State Department of Health (1984-1991), American Arbitration Association's Panel of Arbitrators, and Environmental Institute for Waste Management Studies (EIWMS) of the University of Alabama (1984-1990). She authored Governmental Management of Chemical Risk (1990) and recent publications are on meta-analysis for benzene, dioxins, and formaldehyde (Policy Studies J., 1995) and environmental epidemiology guidelines (Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology, co-author, 1995); impacts of the 1993 Mississippi Floods (The Sciences, 1994); environmental equity (Fordham Urban Law J.,1994; Risk Analysis, 1993; chapters in Fundamentals of Risk Analysis and Risk Management, 1997 and Better Environmental Decisions, 1998 forthcoming); global warming impacts on infrastructure (NY Academy of Sciences, 1996), and risk methodology (co-author, risks of extreme events). Earlier publications include chapters in books such as Dimensions of Hazardous
Waste Politics and Policy (Greenwood, 1988), Public Health and the Environment (Guilford, 1987), Risk Evaluation and Management (Plenum, 1986), Risk Analysis in the Private Sector (Plenum, 1985), and Low Probability/High Consequence Risk Analysis (Plenum, 1984). She has been a consultant to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund program (Region II office) conducting studies of environmental equity around hazardous waste sites. Prior to that, she was with the Agency in water resources management and then was a consultant on environmental impact
assessment until 1977. Education: A.B., Chemistry, U. of California (Berkeley); Master of City Planning, U. of Pennsylvania; Ph.D., Planning, Columbia University.
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