Joe DeStefano II

Ancestors

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Biography

Joseph (Joe) DeStefano II was born in Long Beach, CA on August 9, 1970. Shortly after his birth, his family moved to the suburbs of Los Angeles, to the town of Yorba Linda, in northeast Orange County. After graduation from Esperanza High School, he went attended Loyola Marymount University on a Choral/Voice Scholarship, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Public Policy, minoring in music and theology. While at LMU, he was initiated as a brother of Phi Kappa Theta Fraternity and the Loyola Council of the Knights of Columbus, serving as an officer of both organizations. In addition, he was involved with College Republicans, the University Choruses, and a founding member of the the LMU Opera Workshop.

After college, Joe held a successful 20 year career in environmental regulatory affairs, specializing in regulatory compliance and protection for land use and natural resource development, especially compliance with the California Environmental Quality Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and both the Clean Water and Clean Air Acts. During his career he worked on projects across the United States, the middle east, and in the former Soviet Union. A specialist in air and water quality, Joe completed graduate work at the University of California, and earned a Master's Degree in Environmental Science and Engineering from LMU. For almost 10 years, Joe served the people of the County of San Diego as a Land Use Planning Manager and Environmental Specialist, and was a key member of the award-winning Multiple Species Conservation Planning (MSCP) Program. His projects received recognition from the EPA, the American Planning Association, the National Association of Environmental Professionals, and the Association of Environmental Professionals.

A lifelong practitioner of the martial arts, Joe earned black belt ranking in Kodokan Judo, Classical Japanese Jujutsu, Aikido, and Matsumura-seito Orthodox Shorin-ryu Karate. He is a life member of the United States Judo Association, and was a founding member of the United States Martial Arts Association. For more than a decade, he taught judo and self-defense at Jerry Warren's Samurai Academy in Placentia, CA (the oldest Karate school in Orange County), and coached the LMU Judo Kyokai from 1988-1992. It was his involvement in the East-Asian Martial Arts that led to his return to school to study Traditional Chinese Medicine. In 2009, he graduated, with honors, from Pacific College of Oriental Medicine with a Bachelor of Health Science, and earned a Master of Traditional Oriental Medicine Degree, summa cum laude from Emperor's College in 2014. He completed his residencies in integrative oncology and pain management at the Roy Disney Cancer Center at Providence-St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, and in pain management at the Venice Family Clinic and BeingAlive Los Angeles HIV Clinic. He is currently in private practice.

Sources

• First-hand information. Entered by Joseph DeStefano at registration.