December 23, 2014-January 19, 2015 lbbusinessjournal.com

HealthWiseImpact

Of AddictionPage 18

The College

Of Business

Administration

At CSULB

It Was A

Very Good Year

See Pg. 4

Long Beach Business Journal2599 E. 28th Street, Suite 212Signal Hill, CA 90755-2139562/988-1222 • www.lbbusinessjournal.com

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Black GoldLong Beach Assessing The BudgetImpacts Of The Falling Price Of Oil

LookingAheadIt Was An Eventful Year, But A Better One Awaits � By GEORGE ECONOMIDES

Publisher’s Perspective

T his has certainly been aneventful year internation-

ally and across the United States.Long Beach also made its shareof news. From the rise of the Islamic

State of Syria to a pending shift in

Hospital ChiefLocal Resident Joel Yuhas NamedCEO Of St. Mary Medical Center

Dignity Health, which provides health care at more than 40 hospitals and carecenters in California, Arizona and Nevada, announced last week that Joel P.Yuhas has been named president and CEO of St. Mary Medical Center in LongBeach. (Photograph by the Business Journal’s Thomas McConville)

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Happy Holiday Wishes . . . From The Long Beach Business Journal Team. Our Next Issue Publishes January 20, 2015.

Our Offices Are Closed December 24-28 And December 30-January 1

� By DAVE WIELENGA

Contributing Writer

A wide-ranging search fornew leadership at Dignity

Health St. Mary Medical Center-Long Beach ultimately led backhome when Joel P. Yuhas, a resi-dent of Bixby Knolls and a for-mer St. Mary executive, wasselected president and chief exec-utive officer. His first day on thejob is January 5, 2015.“Joel was the unanimous

choice among representativesfrom all our key stakeholdergroups who participated in the

interview process,” said a writtenstatement from Steve R. Barron,the senior vice president for theSouthern California operations ofSt. Mary’s corporate parent,Dignity Health. “His impressiverecord of success and leadershipachievements in the health careindustry, along with his familiar-ity with St. Mary Medical Centerand Long Beach, made him theobvious selection.”Yuhas had been executive vice

president and chief operating

Section B Is A Focus On TheHospitality AndTourism IndustryPictured is John Jenkins, Jr.,

General Manager of The Queen Mary.

(Photograph by the BusinessJournal’s Thomas McConville)

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Going GreenFrom Disney To Louis Vuitton, The Lighting Design AllianceCreates Sustainable Illumination � By SAMANTHA MEHLINGER

Senior Writer

I n a renovated, former cos-metics manufacturing build-

ing on the border of Signal Hilland Long Beach is a companywith an international list ofclientele including the likes ofDisney, Louis Vuitton and BeatsBy Dre. The Lighting DesignAlliance, founded by CEOCharles “Chip” Israel in 1992,specializes in illuminatingeverything from single-familyhomes to the entire Venetianhotel and casino in Las Vegasand, whenever possible, does so

with energy-efficient, sustain-able lighting designs.Since the Lighting Design

Alliance was founded, the com-pany has grown from threeemployees to 30, Israel told theBusiness Journal. The alliancehandles about 300 projects peryear. “We fortunately have a verystrong design team here, andeverything we do is by repeatbusiness,” as well as word ofmouth, he noted. A portfolio ofthe company’s work featuresdizzyingly long lists of projects,not only throughout the UnitedStates but also in countries such

� By SAMANTHA MEHLINGER

Senior Writer

S ince Long Beach was firstimmortalized as an oil

town in famed author UptonSinclair’s novel Oil!, the city hasbeen known for its oil produc-tion, derived from the oil fieldlying beneath it. The sale of thatoil provides a steady stream ofcash into Long Beach’s TidelandsFund, which funds important city

services and capital projects. Butoil is a volatile commodity, and,as its production ramps up else-where in the country, its price hasdropped to nearly half of what thecity budgeted to receive for capi-tal projects, and $20 per barrelbelow what it budgeted for oper-ations, according to John Gross,the city’s director of financialmanagement.As of December 20, the price

Civic CenterArchitect GibbsSpeaks Out On Project� By DAVE WIELENGA

Contributing Writer

A few hours before the citycouncil made its

December 9 decision to junk thecivic center that has hovered andhunkered across six blocks ofDowntown Long Beach since1977, the man who once led theall-star team of architects that cre-ated the complex answered thetelephone in the same BixbyKnolls office where he drew theblueprints four decades ago.

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GOING GREEN12 Long Beach Business Journal December 23, 2014-January 19, 2015

as China, India, Italy,Lebanon and Qatar.The alliance has satellite

offices in Colorado, Texas,Dubai and Shanghai. Israeltravels about 20 days eachmonth due to the company’swide reach. “I was in Indialast night and I just gotback,” Israel said as he ledthe Business Journal on atour of the company’s head-quarters in Long Beach offTemple Avenue onDecember 15. “We’re doing

a nine million square-foot buildingthere,” he said, adding that the proj-ect is a $1 billion home for one ofthe wealthiest people in the world.The home is being built with someof the most up-to-date and sustain-able lighting available to serve as atechnological showcase, he noted.Back in the U.S., the alliance’s

headquarters, designed by Israel,serve as a model for sustainablelighting designs and as a portfolio

and showcase for the company’s clients.“The whole idea is to use as little electrical as possi-

ble,” Israel said as he explained the various types ofsustainable lighting elements in his company’s offices.To achieve that end, the building harnesses and reliesheavily upon what Israel called “the most logical andmost overlooked” source of illumination: daylight. The Lighting Design Alliance’s headquarters has 80

holes cut into the ceiling to allow natural light inthrough several different kinds of skylights. Variationsof a small type of skylight consisting of a metal cylin-drical tube that extends from the ceiling all the way tothe top of the roof are found throughout the buildingin places one would normally see recessed lights, suchas in front of bathroom mirrors and above desks.

Sunlight enters the tube on the roof and bounces off the inner reflective sur-face, illuminating interior spaces. Lights are affixed to the inside of the fix-tures for night lighting. “The idea is we can bring light through multiple sto-ries,” Israel said of the fixtures, which he called solar tubes. Towards the back of the building, a large open office space is lit primarily

by many large skylights – some flush to the ceiling and others angled. Theangled skylights have motors attached to their windowpanes so that workerson the floor can open or close them to let heat escape rather than turning onair conditioning, Israel said. Other skylights have mirrors attached to themwhich rotate with the sun as it moves throughout the day, allowing sunlight tobounce inside. Installations of colored art glass below these skylights reflectcolors and patterns on the office walls at different angles as the sun moves,allowing the skylights to do double duty as illumination and art.Through conserving electricity in the day by illuminating the office with day-

light and reducing the need for indoor climate control, the Lighting DesignAlliance is able to operate with an energy load of about 0.1 watt per square foot,while most office buildings operate at one watt per square foot, Israel said.Using daylight works well for buildings that are one or two stories tall, but

after that it gets trickier, Israel noted. “If it’s a 30-story building, then some ofthese daylighting techniques would not work. However, we work with otherpeople and universities who are trying to bring light in horizontally,” he said.“It’s very easy to do that in the first 10 to 15 feet [from a daylight source], butwhat’s tough is 15 to 30 feet away from a window . . . There are techniqueswhere we can bounce light off of films on windows so it hits the ceiling andkicks in further,” he explained.While most of the Lighting Design Alliance’s building is illuminated by

daylight, it is also outfitted with light emitting diode (LED) lights, which aremore energy efficient than traditional incandescent bulbs. Incandescent bulbs“ooze light” in many directions and overheat easily, Israel said. LEDs do notcreate much heat and produce stronger light that is easier to focus on a certainpoint, such as a desk or an art piece. “The LEDs are a directional light source.In other words, they are like mini flashlights . . . so if you have a high ceilingand you want to shoot the light [on the ceiling] to the ground, the LEDs canbe much more efficient,” he explained. The Lighting Design Alliance is working to make LEDs even more efficient,

The Lighting Design Alliance Founder/CEO Chip Israel looks down from a bridge in a long hallway at his company’s officeson Temple Avenue in Long Beach. The skylights above him light the entire hallway. In the evening, multi-colored energy-effi-cient lighting installed in the skylights illuminates the area. The lights are able to change color at varying speeds, and arecontrolled by a panel in the hall. The firm designed the illumination for the new SLS Las Vegas (top photograph, providedby company), a hotel and casino built in the location of the former Sahara Hotel and Casino on the Vegas strip. In centerphotograph, also provided by The Lighting Design Alliance, the firm’s 22,000-square-foot offices are lit primarily by daylightfrom 80 skylights of varying types and sizes. Pictured, larger skylights illuminate a gaming area for the 35 company employ-ees. In bottom photograph, a skylight in the office is outfitted with motorized mirrors that follow the sun throughout the day,maximizing the amount of daylight streaming through the glass. Electric lights are located within the skylight for use duringnighttime. (Photographs by the Business Journal’s Thomas McConville)

The Lighting Design Alliance (Continued From Page 1)

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GOING GREENLong Beach Business Journal 13

both in terms of lighting performance andthe amount of material needed to make theirfixtures. A prototype of an LED lamp shin-ing light on a pool table at the LightingDesign Alliance is built to a much smallerprofile than usual, Israel pointed out. “Theone over the pool table is a fixture that isabout the thickness of a piece of cardboard,where before it used to be four to six inchestall,” he said. His company has proposed useof the lights at the nearby Los CerritosCenter mall.Much of the energy used to power lights

in alliance’s offices is harnessed throughthe use of solar cells. If it weren’t for theenergy needed to run the employees’ com-puters, Israel speculated the building wouldbe able to operate at net zero energy use.Helping to reduce the amount of energy

used are photocells – little sensors placedaround the building and in lights that auto-matically detect whether or not enoughdaylight is available to light an area. Whenthe sensors detect there is insufficient day-light, the electric lights turn on. Israelhopes to further develop the technology sothat every light fixture will come with asensor, rather than the sensors having to beinstalled later at more cost. In addition to the Lighting Design

Alliance’s many year-round projects, Israelsaid company representatives teach guestlectures at universities. The alliance alsooften hosts architectural and design firms,such as the American Institute ofArchitects, at its Long Beach office formeetings and special events. �

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