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Wood County native involved in ocean conservation

Hogan works on ocean conservation

PARKERSBURG — A Wood County native involved in international issues affecting oceans cites his tenure in Wood County Schools as the reason why he works at the U.S. State Department.

Dave Hogan became deputy director of the Office of Marine Conservation and was involved in the 2016 Our Oceans international conference in September in Washington, D.C., to address global initiatives impacting marine life and subsequently life on Planet Earth.

While at Parkersburg High School, where he was a student until his junior year in 1986, Hogan participated in the North American Invitational Model United Nations at Georgetown University through a program at the high school led by Carolyn Case.

“That lit the fire under me to pursue this,” said Hogan, the son of Dave Sr. and Carole Hogan, who was born and raised in Vienna. Dave Sr. worked at the DeMuth Division of Brockway Glass.

“I can’t say enough about that program, which led me to my career at state,” Hogan said. “In addition to the model UN, through that program I and other PHS students had some great opportunities, including conducting research in the UN document collection at OU (Ohio University) in Athens and attending a seminar by Henry Kissinger at OSU (Ohio State University) in Columbus. In retrospect, this was absolutely key to my developing an interest in international relations and foreign policy.”

Hogan and his family moved to New Jersey in the summer of 1986. He graduated in 1991 from the University of Scranton (Pa.) with a degree in international relations. He then went to work in the State Department in the passport agency.

“That was my foot-in-the-door job,” he said.

He worked in the passport office for 18 months, then interviewed for the job at the Office of Marine Conservation where he was involved in the third Our Oceans conference. Speakers included actor Leonardo DiCaprio, Secretary of State John Kerry and President Obama, among other world leaders, and the more than 130 new initiatives on marine conservation and protection worth more than $5.24 billion and the protection of about 1.5 million square miles of the ocean were announced.

The first conference was held in 2014 in Washington and the second in 2015 in Valparaiso, Chile.

“This (2016) was probably the biggest of the three,” he said.

The Office of Marine Conservation deals with large scale commercial fisheries on the high seas and international treaties and contracts and how to preserve and conserve marine life to sustain life on Earth, Hogan said.

“It’s something I’ve been interested in for quite a long time,” he said.

Hogan attributes the education and support he received in Wood County for his career choices and successes. He also attended Greenmont Elementary and Jackson Junior High schools.

Hogan and his wife, LeAnn, have one son, Henry, 5.

Hogan is responsible for a range of issues related to international conservation and management of living marine resources. He was a U.S. representative to the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission and the associated Agreement on the International Dolphin Conservation Program, the annual negotiation of the UN General Assembly sustainable fisheries resolution, the Committee on Fisheries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and other forums on international fisheries.

Hogan played a leadership role and has been chairman of various international negotiations and bodies, including the tuna commission and negotiations on technical matters convened under the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.

“To the degree it may be useful and relevant, one of the most important issues in ocean conservation, and one that we have focused on at the Our Ocean Conference, is marine pollution,” he said.

“As a city that has a major waterway at its heart and has relied on plastic manufacturing and petrochemicals as an economic engine for decades, Parkersburg and cities like it have a very significant role to play in ensuring pollution, debris and plastics don’t end up in the ocean,” Hogan said. “My experiences and the perspective I gained growing up essentially on the banks of the Ohio River three decades ago remain valuable to me in my work on foreign policy on behalf of the United States.”

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