This year’s conference – “It’s Not Easy Being Green: Our Energy Future” – will focus on renewable and non-renewable sources of energy; how that energy is distributed and its relationship to economic development, environmental protection and social justice.

The keynote speakers at the conference will be former Florida Governor, Lieutenant Governor, U.S. Representative and State Legislator Buddy MacKay, and Princeton University Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Robert Socolow – an expert on global energy resources and climate change mitigation, and a pioneer in environmental studies.

The conference will feature a wide variety of panels dealing with various energy-related topics, including the 2010 Gulf oil spill and the licensing of new nuclear power plants in Florida. Guest panelists will range from representatives of government agencies and public interest organizations to international scholars and industry experts. Two Saturday morning workshops will focus on green jobs and what endangered species laws mean to the average homeowner.

The Public Interest Environmental Conference provides a forum for an exchange of ideas among private, government, and public interest lawyers; students and academics; environmental professionals, advocates and activists, and the interested public.

The early registration deadline is Feb. 20. Media are welcome to attend the conference, but must register to attend Friday’s banquet, which is filling up fast. Registration will also be accepted at the conference on Feb. 24 and Feb. 25. For more information, agenda and to register, visit http://www.law.ufl.edu/piec/.

The conference is free for all UF students, faculty, and staff.

Contact: Carli Koshal or Kate Causeman, 2011 PIEC Co-Chairs
ufpiec@gmail.com

The symposium – “Going Coastal: 21st Century Challenges to Our Fragile Coast” – will take place Friday, Feb. 11, at the Hilton University of Florida Conference Center in Gainesville from 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. The event is co-sponsored by the Florida Bar Environmental and Land Use Law Section and by The Florida Bar City, County and Local Government Section.

Presentations will focus on sea rise mitigation, oil spill litigation, drilling moratoria, the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Stop the Beach Renourishment, Inc. v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection, ocean acidification and judicial takings. The program will be of special interest to those in the legal field dealing with land use, environmental, energy and state and local government issues.

“The line-up for the tenth Nelson Symposium is impressive in its depth and breadth, which is appropriate, as the legal problems involved in protecting our coast demand the creativity and energy of the best and brightest of our profession,” said Richard E. Nelson Chair in Local Government Law Michael Allan Wolf of the University of Florida Levin College of Law.

This year’s speakers include Georgetown Law Professor Peter Byrne; Sarah Chasis, Natural Resources Defense Council; University of Miami Law Professor Cynthia Drew; Florida Solicitor General Scott Makar; Alida C. Hainkel, Jones Walker, New Orleans; University of Washington Law Professor William Rodgers; Stanford Law Professor Buzz Thompson; University of Florida Levin College of Law Professor Michael Allan Wolf; and two University of Florida law students, Tony Bajoczky and Celia Thacker.

The symposium is named to honor Richard E. Nelson, who served with distinction as Sarasota County attorney for 30 years, and his wife, Jane Nelson, two UF alumni who gave more than $1 million to establish the Richard E. Nelson Chair in Local Government Law, which is responsible for the annual event. Their support of the Levin College of Law’s Environmental and Land Use Program has been key to the program’s success and national recognition for excellence.

Registration is required to attend the event. Registration forms and further information can be found at http://www.law.ufl.edu/news/events/2011/nelson/.

Members of the media are invited to attend, but space is limited so please contact Matt Walker at mlwalker@law.ufl.edu or 352-273-0650 at the UF Law Communications Office to make arrangements.

Presented by the UF Levin College of Law and co-sponsored by The Florida Bar Environmental and Land Use Law Section and student government, this two-day conference titled, “Beyond Doom and Gloom: Illuminating a Sustainable Future for Florida,” will focus on long-range and innovative approaches to Florida’s environmental problems. Conference attendees can earn 13 Continuing Legal Education (CLE) credits and explore sustainability solutions from science, technology and progressive regulations, and economic and behavioral changes through communication and social marketing.

“This year’s conference offers a timely focus with an interesting set of themes including the role of social marketing, and panel discussions dealing with energy and climate change,” said Alyson Flournoy, director of the UF Levin College of Law Environmental and Land Use Law Program and one of the organizers of the conference.

“We’ve also expanded the workshop format to include skills training and the final plenary session will provide a unique interdisciplinary look into Florida’s future by historians, ecologists, planners and public-interest advocates.” Flournoy added that the Friday night keynote speaker Rena Steinzor, president of the Center for Progressive Reform, will offer insight into likely policy developments under the Obama administration.

Conference topics slated for discussion include, “Thinking Outside the Grid,” “Ports: Balancing the Economic and Environmental Impacts,” “Public Education: Understanding the Science of Environmental and Land Use Policies and Law,” “Hope Springs Eternal: Overcoming the Water Supply Issues,” “The Cost of a Human Life: Beyond Risk Assessment and Cost Benefit Analysis,” “Social Marketing: Green is the New Black?,” “The Long Slow Flood: Science, Policy and Adaption to Sea Level Rise,” “Credits and Trading: Air, Water and Land,” and “The Role of Journalism in Communicating Environmental Issues and Fostering Public Participation.” Workshops include, “Land Use 101: Understanding the Land Use Approval Process and How to Effectively Participate,” and “The Art and Skill of Communicating with Legislators.”

Robert Hartsell, trial counsel for the Everglades Law Center Inc. and a past PIEC participant, encourages those interested in, and working on environmental issues to attend the PIEC. “This conference exposes the practitioner to fresh thinking and an opportunity to collaborate with the best and brightest on the cutting edge environmental issues.”

February 20 is the postmark deadline for PIEC pre registration at $85. Onsite registration is $100. The registration fee includes CLEs and all program activities. Banquet registration is $35. The conference is free for all UF students, faculty and staff. A discounted registration fee of $45 is available for non-UF students, as well as scholarships. Visit the PIEC Web site to view the room assignments, scholarship form and conference brochure, which includes program and registration information.

Contact: Leslie Rogoff, 813-810-5542; Lrogoff@ufl.edu

To prepare a new generation of environmental lawyers to meet these challenges, the University of Florida Levin College of Law now offers a Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Environmental and Land Use Law. Although other law schools offer LL.M. degrees in environmental law and related areas, UF’s program is the first to combine environmental and land use law in a one-year, post-juris doctor degree.

“The environmental problems we’re facing are so fundamental and serious that the laws and policies we will need to adopt are inevitably going to go beyond the bounds of what we have traditionally thought of as environmental law,” said Alyson Flournoy, UF professor of law, research foundation professor and director of the college’s Environmental and Land Use Law Program.

Flournoy notes that many corporate lawyers who don’t think of themselves as environmental attorneys will need to understand environmental law issues to practice in emerging fields of environmental law. She points to the growing importance of carbon markets and efforts to value and  protect ecosystem services as examples of the changing legal landscape that may prompt traditional corporate lawyers to seek a broader understanding of environmental and land use law.

“We need a new generation of environmental lawyers who focus on drafting instruments and contracts that satisfy both environmental and business concerns,” she said.  “We are finally coming to grips with the fact that ‘business as usual’ is unsustainable.  Corporations, governments and nongovernmental organizations will need to hire new lawyers who blend traditional skills with a broader knowledge of environmental laws and policy.”

Flournoy said the LL.M. program will educate students on the historical and legal underpinnings of environmental and land use law policies, and will encourage them to think creatively to innovate solutions to pressing environmental and related social issues. A major strength of the program is the diversity of faculty, which has expertise in a wide array of fields covering environmental law, water law, international trade, land use law, natural resources law and others.

In addition, the LL.M. program is unique in that six of the 26 required credit hours must be from relevant courses that have substantial non-law content — either offered outside the Levin College of Law or jointly by the law school and another department. This exposes students to disciplines related to environmental and land use law practice, such as wildlife ecology, environmental engineering, urban and regional planning, and sustainable development.

LL.M. candidates also must complete a written project in connection with a seminar or the college’s Conservation Clinic. The Conservation Clinic focuses on non-litigation policy and transactional projects, providing a hands-on learning laboratory for the college’s LL.M. students. A summer environmental law study abroad program in Costa Rica is also offered.

“Florida’s new LL.M. program is at the cutting edge of environmental legal education, combining different specialties from within the practice of law, like land use and environmental law, and adding to that a non-law, interdisciplinary component that includes science and engineering coursework,” said Wendy A. Wagner, the Joe. A. Worsham Centennial Professor of Law at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law and a leading authority on the use of science by environmental policy-makers.

The University of Florida Levin College of Law LL.M. in Environmental and Land Use Law Program is now accepting applications for the class entering in fall 2008. For application instructions and detailed program information, contact Lena Hinson at 352-273-0777 or hinson@law.ufl.edu, or visit www.law.ufl.edu/elulp/llm.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. —A small-town schoolteacher who became an environmental crusader – and took on one of the world’s largest oil companies – will tell her story to University of Florida students, faculty and others this month.

Margie Eugene Richard, who won the 2004 Goldman Prize for Environmental Justice for her fight against the Shell Chemicals plant in her hometown of Norco, La., will be the keynote speaker at the Public Interest Environmental Conference at UF’s Levin College of Law, to be held Feb. 24-26.

“A pervasive theme this year is the social justice aspects of environmental issues,” said conference organizer Adam Regar, a student at the law school. “Margie Richard, the first African-American to win the Goldman Prize, is a great example of someone engaged in the fight for environmental justice.”

The student-run conference, now in its 11th year, will bring together environmental activists, lawyers, and scientists from around the world to discuss Florida’s most pressing environmental problems and the legal issues they create. This year’s conference, titled “Hurricanes, Humans, and Habitat: Reclaiming, Rethinking and Rebuilding Our Environment,” covers a wide range of issues – from the state of the world’s oceans to the tone of this year’s Florida Legislature. Organizers say Richard’s speech will be one of the conference’s can’t-miss events.

Richard grew up in Old Diamond, a historically African-American community in the shadow of the Shell Chemicals plant in Norco. After a 1988 accident at the plant killed seven workers and spewed millions of pounds of chemicals into the air, Richard, then a middle-school teacher, founded Concerned Citizens of Norco. The grassroots group pressured Shell to pay resettlement costs for people who live near the plant. Richard and her group are credited with helping secure a $5 million community development fund from Shell, as well as relocation funds for the entire neighborhood of Old Diamond.

“A lot of activists start out the way Margie Richard did – by organizing to fight environmental problems in their own communities,” Regar said. “What makes Margie Richard noteworthy is that she took on a large corporation and was successful in getting much of what she demanded.”

Richard will speak at 7 p.m. Feb. 25 in the Touchdown Terrace at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium.

The conference will also host Costa Rican presidential candidate and economist Ottón Solís, who served as Minister of Planning and Economy in the Oscar Arias administration and founded the Citizens’ Action Party, a third-party movement in Costa Rica that emphasizes social equity and environmental issues. Solis garnered 17 percent of the vote in Costa Rica’s last presidential election. Solís will deliver an address on international free trade agreements and their effect on the environment at 6 p.m. Feb. 24 at the Florida Museum of Natural History.

The conference will also host 19 separate panel discussions on a broad range of pressing environmental issues. Panel topics include:

• The War Against Citrus Canker. A discussion of Florida’s citrus canker eradication program, the rights of landowners, and proper compensation for trees that have been destroyed to stop the spread of canker.
• Got Merc? Regulating, Mitigating, and Litigating the Levels of Mercury in the Fish We Eat. How does mercury get into fish? How much fish can a person safely eat? And what happens if you consume to much mercury? A toxicologist, an ecologist and others will answer those questions.
• The Inside Scoop. State Sen. Rod Smith (D-Alachua), state Rep. Thad Altman (R-Melbourne) and others will offer a sneak preview of the environmental issues being discussed at this year’s session of the Florida Legislature
• Whose Right to Regulate? Interagency Conflicts in Permitting Authority. A look at the complex and sometimes confusing world of environmental permits, where federal, state and local jurisdictions overlap. Panelists from a variety of government agencies will explain what their permits authorize – and what they believe other agencies’ permits allow.
• From Cattle to Concrete. A discussion of development pressures facing rural landowners as Florida’s farmlands give way to spreading suburbs.

Attendees will gather Feb. 26 for a “grand finale” panel discussion about overfishing, the decline of ocean wildlife and the collapse of ocean ecosystems. Titled “The State of Our Seas,” the discussion will focus on two recently released reports on the ocean crisis – one by the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy and another by the non-profit Pew Oceans Commission – and their very different prescriptions for healing the world’s seas.

The event is sponsored by the Environmental and Land Use Law Society and the Center for Governmental Responsibility at UF, in cooperation with the Public Interest Committee of the Environmental and Land Use Law Section of the Florida Bar. UF law students, faculty, and members of the media may attend for free. Others can register for the entire conference at a cost of $110, for panel discussions at a cost of $85, or for the keynote address at a cost of $35. For more information, contact Adam Regar at aregar@ufl.edu or Ashley Cross-Rappaport at cross711@ufl.edu, or call 352-392-2237.