Editor’s note: Let’s all welcome Bruce Haase, the new executive director of our Santa Barbara–Ventura chapter of the Sierra Club, the most enduring and influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. Bruce can be reached at Bruce.Haase@SierraClub.org
Hello Sierra Club Santa Barbara - Ventura members, supporters, and volunteers! My name is Bruce Haase, and I am humbled, honored, and excited to be named as your new Chapter Director. My love for the outdoors began by exploring the creek beds along Rock Creek Park in the suburbs of Washington D.C., and through weekend hiking trips to the Appalachian Mountains.
Following university, I joined the Peace Corps and served in southwest Uganda, where I worked to develop and deploy carbon-efficient cookstoves to schools and refugee camps in the region. My years in Uganda distilled within me the importance and power of grassroots community environmental activism.
After my Peace Corps service, I returned to the Washington D.C. area where I worked for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for nearly ten years. My work focused on financial and strategic planning, where I had a front-row seat to implement major environmental legislation, including the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
During that time, I completed an MA in International Affairs with a focus on global energy and environmental pol icy from George Washington University. Together, these
experiences gave me a holistic understanding of sustainability, environmental policy, and environmental justice from local to international levels.
My wife Lauryn and I moved to the Santa Barbara-Ventura chapter area four years ago because we wanted to immerse ourselves in a community that embraces and inspires environmental activism and progress, and I truly believe there is no better place in the country to be a vanguard for this movement.
After my EPA office closed in 2025,I worked for a year with the County of Santa Barbara Executive Office before I had the opportunity to return to the environmental field with the Sierra Club. Outside of work, you can find me exploring the craggy mountains and coastline of our amazing Chapter, traveling, trying to perfect my pizza-baking skills, and spending time with family and dear friends.
I am thrilled to be working with such an amazing array of local advocates to defend and protect the nature we all hold dear, to advance policies and positions locally, state-
wide, and nationally that build a more resilient and sustainable future, and to connect together outdoors to remind us all of the stewardship title we maintain.