In memoriam: Rick Melnicoe

Rick Melnicoe, former director of the Western Integrated Pest Management Center, died from lung cancer on Feb. 22.

Melnicoe was the first director of the Western Integrated Pest Management Center, launching the project at UC Davis in the early 2000s when the regional IPM centers were just getting off the ground. He had served as western regional coordinator for the Pesticide Impact Assessment Program and assistant to the UC IPM director since 1991. He also oversaw the Office of Pesticide Information and Coordination.

In 2011, UC Davis awarded Melnicoe a Citation of Excellence for supervision. The nomination noted that as a model of a can-do attitude and approach, Melnicoe encouraged others to aim high and stretch.

“When he retired in 2012, the Western IPM Center was an important and valued partner in integrated pest management in the West and across the country, and much of that was due to Rick,” Steve Elliott, communication coordinator for the center, wrote in the Western IPM Center newsletter.

“You could count on him to try to move past difficult things and to get people to try to move forward together," said Jim VanKirk, former director of the Southern IPM Center. "If there were 300 million people like Rick in this country, we would be a lot better off.”

A celebration of Melnicoe's life will be held in June, according to his obituary in the Sacramento Bee.

Read more about Melnicoe in Elliott's blog post at http://ipmwest.blogspot.com/2018/02/remembering-former-center-director-rick.html

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