Lois M. Takahashi, a professor of Urban Planning and Asian American studies and a noted scholar on service delivery to vulnerable populations, will serve as interim dean of the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Scott Waugh announced today.

Takahashi assumes the leadership role from Franklin D. Gilliam, Jr., who was named chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in May.

A member of the UCLA faculty since 2001, Takahashi is professor of urban planning and of Asian American studies. In addition to her current service as associate dean of research at UCLA Luskin and as associate director of the University of California Asian American and Pacific Islander Policy Multicampus Research Program, she has also served as chair of the Department of Urban Planning (2011-13) and chair of the UCLA Asian American Studies Center’s Faculty Advisory Committee (2010-13).

Outside UCLA, Takahashi is the vice president/president-elect of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning, a board member of the Western Center on Law & Poverty and a member of the editorial boards of three journals: Journal of Planning Education and Research, Journal of the American Planning Association, and AIDS Education and Prevention. A National Institutes of Health-funded scholar, her research focuses on public and social service delivery to vulnerable populations in the U.S. and Southeast Asian cities, HIV/AIDS, homelessness and environmental governance. She has published more than 60 articles and chapters, and she is the author of Homelessness, AIDS, and Stigmatization: The NIMBY Syndrome in the United States at the End of the Twentieth Century and a co-author of Rethinking Environmental Management in the Pacific Rim: Exploring Local Participation in Bangkok, Thailand.

Takahashi received a Ph.D. in urban planning from the University of Southern California, an M.S. in public management and policy/architecture from Carnegie Mellon University and an A.B. in architecture from UC Berkeley.

In the coming months, Provost Waugh will form a committee to search for candidates to permanently serve as dean of UCLA Luskin.