Peter M. Douglas

Peter M. Douglas (August 22, 1942 – April 1, 2012) was an environmental activist, UCLA law graduate, and principal author of Proposition 20, an initiative in 1972 that created the California Coastal Commission. He served as its executive director for 26 years. He was also co-author of the 1976 Coastal Act.

Early life

Douglas was born Peter Michael Ehlers in Berlin on August 22, 1942. At the age of two his family's home was destroyed by Allied planes during the bombing of Berlin. After WWII he immigrated to the United States in 1950 with his mother and sister, and changed his last name upon becoming an American citizen.

In 2006, two years after recovering from Stage 4 cancer, Douglas told the New York Times he set a match to a pile of dead leaves he had poured gasoline onto, igniting an explosion that sent him flying. He recovered from the serious burns that resulted. One of his most lasting statements about the coast is. "The coast is never saved, it is always being saved."

Death Douglas died of lung and throat cancer on April 1, 2012, at the home of his sister in La Quinta, California.