After serving on the TWIN events committee for the past four years, Denise Daggett accepted the job as chair this year. “I’ve met some wonderful women who balance their professional life and their personal life,” Daggett says. “It’s like a sorority now.”

Daggett, a certified industrial hygienist, works as director of safety, health and environment at AMEC Earth & Environmental. The national, privately owned company consults with businesses to help them comply with federal and state environmental regulations.

“If you practice here, you can practice anywhere,” says Daggett, referring to California’s environmental atmosphere where legislation and regulation are “a bit more cutting edge” than the rest of the country. AMEC, in San Diego for 20 years with several different owners, provides services that include cleanups, assessments, animal counts, mapping-type work and environmental reports.

Daggett, 47, has worked for AMEC (the company’s fifth name since she’s been there) for 13 years. She earned her master’s degree from the University of Texas School of Public Health in Houston, in environmental science with a subspecialty in industrial hygiene. Her certification comes highly regarded, especially since the country has only about 7,000 such specialists. Both a native Southern Californian and a Bruin alumna from the University of California at Los Angeles, Daggett is happy with her choice of careers.

“It’s a good combination of science and working with people,” she says. A field that once attracted around three women to every 25 men is now closer to 50-50, Daggett believes.

One of AMEC’s recent projects included the very stressful cleanup at the sites of Sept. 11’s terrorist attacks. Daggett describes her visit to Ground Zero as “a very humbling experience.”

Daggett plans to marry her fiance, Greg Gehrich, this summer. She is a self-described amateur chef, but her claim to fame in her neighborhood isn’t the wafting scent of sautéed mushrooms. Instead, it is her love of basenjis, the barkless dogs of Africa. While the mid-sized, deer-like canines can squeal and yodel, they are so quiet that Daggett’s neighbors hardly notice them, even when they have numbered as many as 14 during puppy season.

— Alexis Pasqua