Phil was an environmental justice activist working to protect endangered lands and cultures, wilderness, endangered species and human rights.
He was involved with the fifteen-year successful campaign to stop the proposal for a radioactive waste dump at Ward Valley and was co-founder of the Bay Area Nuclear Waste Coalition.
In 1995, the Bay Area Nuclear Waste Coalition successfully sued the federal government in the 9th District Court in Desert Tortoise, et al vs. Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt and established 6.5 million acres of critical habitat for the endangered Desert Tortoise.
Phil advocated for changes in local and national policy regarding nuclear power, nuclear waste management, nuclear weapons proliferation, energy policy and the management of our public lands. He was appointed by former California governor Gray Davis to serve on the Atkinson Commission to advise the state on radioactive waste management and was responsible for the passage of the 2002 California Radioactive Waste Control Act.
Other activism includes: solidarity with the Western Shoshone in opposition to nuclear weapons proliferation and testing at the Nevada Test Site and the proposed Yucca Mountain high-level nuclear waste dump; collaboration with indigenous peoples on the protection of sacred sites and ancestral lands from toxic waste dumps and incinerators, extraction of resources, motorized recreation and other threats to culture and the environment; protection for endangered species and wilderness areas; and opposition to war and imperialism.
Phil was the author of the 2005 “Imperial Health Project,” a report on respiratory disease among farm workers in Imperial County and participatory action research prepared for California Communities Against Toxics.
Phil served as an international observer and human rights advocate in Brazil, Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador.
Phil served on the boards of the Agape Foundation for Nonviolent Social Change; the Institute for Deep Ecology; the Escalante Wilderness Coalition; and is a member of the Alliance for Responsible Recreation and the Sierra Club California/Nevada Desert Committee.
In 2009, Phil was awarded the Anthony Grassroots Prize from the Rose Foundation for Communities and the Environment.