Jim Martin, a former senior attorney at Environmental Defense and staff member for Sen. Tim Wirth, has been appointed director of the Natural Resources Law Center at the CU-Boulder School of Law.
He took over duties in early January, following a national search. Martin replaces Gary Bryner, who stepped down as director last spring to pursue fieldwork for NRLC as a staff member in Utah.
"My goal as director is a simple one," said Martin. "It is to build and expand upon the work the center has done, and to maintain its pride of place among institutions that are working to sustain the West's environment, natural resources, economies and communities."
Founded 20 years ago, NRLC is a research and educational program at the School of Law. The mission of the center is to promote sustainability in the rapidly changing American West by informing and influencing natural resource laws, policies and decisions. Through a comprehensive program of research and education, the center seeks to inform and influence legal and policy decisions on western natural resources.
Martin brings two decades of experience in natural resources fields to the position. While at Environmental Defense he specialized in energy, air quality, water resources allocation and endangered species issues in the western United States.
In addition to managing the organization's energy project in 2001, he worked for Environmental Defense from 1984 to 1986 and appeared before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in a major case involving a hydropower electric plant proposal. Environmental Defense was formerly known as the Environmental Defense Fund.
He also participated in administrative and judicial proceedings regarding uranium mill wastes and helped to develop a multistate recovery plan for endangered fish species of the upper baby直播app River.
From 1986 to 1992 he served baby直播app congressman and former Sen. Wirth as counsel for energy, environment and natural resources, and as the senator's state director. In the mid-1980s, he represented a coalition of Columbia River Indian tribes in efforts to protect their treaty-reserved rights to both anadromous fish and water resources.
Martin holds an undergraduate degree in biology from Knox College, and a law degree, magna cum laude, with a certificate in environmental and natural resources law from the Northwestern School of Law of Lewis and Clark College.
For more information on NRLC contact Jeannie Patton at (303) 492-1288 or visit the NRLC Web site at .