Board of Advisors
Daniel M. Baum received his B.A. from Columbia University and his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center. He is currently an associate with the firm Menaker and Herrmann LLP where his practice focuses on commercial litigation and general corporate work. In addition, Dan has helped to grow the firm's environmental practice to include work in the areas of climate change, sustainable development, and renewable energy. Most recently, he has advised clients on issues relating to green roofs, rooftop farming, and locally sourced food.
Michael B. Gerrard is a partner in the New York office of Arnold & Porter LLP, where he heads the environmental practice group. He has practiced environmental law in New York since 1979, concentrating in litigation, project development, and transactions. He was the 2004-2005 Chair of the American Bar Association’s Section of Environment, Energy and Resources. He has also taught environmental law as an adjunct professor at Columbia Law School and the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. He is the author or editor of seven books, two of which were named Best Law Book of the Year by the Association of American Publishers. Gerrard also serves on the boards of the Council on the Environment of New York City; New York Environmental Advocates; and the Legal Aid Society of New York; and is General Counsel of the Municipal Art Society of New York, Inc.
Eric A. Goldstein is a senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. ("NRDC"), a national, non-profit environmental organization, and co-director of its Urban Program. At NRDC he has worked for more than two decades exclusively on urban environmental issues, including air pollution, solid waste, drinking water and environmental justice. He gained nationwide attention in the early 1980's for spearheading the public campaign to reduce levels of toxic lead in gasoline. Over the past decade, he has been intimately involved with public policy efforts to protect the New York drinking water supply via pollution prevention and watershed protection. Mr. Goldstein is co-author of award winning New York Environment Book and has written numerous studies and articles on urban environmental issues. In addition to his work at NRDC, he co-teaches the Environmental Law Clinic at New York University School of Law.
J. Cullen Howe is an environmental law specialist in Arnold & Porter LLP's environmental practice group. He is the managing editor of Environmental Law in New York, a monthly newsletter, and edits the Environmental Law Practice Guide, Brownfields Law and Practice, and Environmental Impact Review in New York. He recently co-authored chapters on climate change and green buildings for the Environmental Law Practice Guide. Prior to joining Arnold & Porter, Mr. Howe practiced for six years at two litigation boutiques in Manhattan, where he focused on commercial litigation and employment law. Mr. Howe is a graduate of Vermont Law School, where he was the managing editor of the Vermont Law Review, and a graduate of DePauw University, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
Michele is an attorney with a diverse background in environmental and land use law. Most recently, Michele practiced in the environmental and climate change groups at the international law firm of Paul Hastings, Janofsky & Walker in New York. Prior to that, she advised local governments throughout the country as an attorney and planner with the national land use consulting firm, Clarion Associates, located in Denver, Colorado. Michele represented developers in land use matters as an associate at Gibbons, P.C. in Newark, New Jersey, and spent a year working as a fellow at the Center for Urban Policy Research at Rutgers University. Currently, Michele is spending precious time at home with her one year old son. Michele obtained her B.A. from Boston College in 1995, her J.D. from the University of Connecticut School of Law in 2000, and her M.C.R.P. in 2001 from Rutgers’ Bloustein School. Michele is admitted to practice in New York, New Jersey and the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.
Walter has served since 2008 as Director of the Emergency and Remedial Response Division for Region 2 of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, responsible for the Superfund program. From 2002 - 2008 he served as Director of Environmental Planning & Protection, responsible for the region's air, water, hazardous waste, pollution prevention and environmental assessment programs. Previously, Mr. Mugdan served as Regional Counsel since 1995. He joined EPA Region 2 in 1975 as a staff attorney, and subsequently served in various supervisory positions in the Office of Regional Counsel. He is a frequent lecturer and has authored numerous publications on environmental law and regulation. He was an Adjunct Professor at Pace University Law School teaching Superfund law (1991 - 1997); and serves as Director of U.S. EPA's annual Trial Advocacy Institute (1992 - present). In 2006-07 Mr. Mugdan served as Chair of the Environmental Law Section of the State Bar Association. He earned his J.D. (1975) and his B.A. (1972) from the University of Michigan.
From 1987 through 1989, Mr. Periconi served as Chief of the Solid and Hazardous Waste Enforcement Bureau of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. During his tenure there, he oversaw the nation's largest and most complex state Superfund program. From 1982 to 1987, Mr. Periconi was an Assistant Attorney General in the Environmental Protection Bureau of the New York State Department of Law, where, among other matters, he prosecuted the first hazardous waste felony jury trial to corporate and individual convictions in New York, and sued the United States Environmental Protection Agency in one of the earliest "acid rain" cases. He served as an Assistant District Attorney in the New York County District Attorney's Office from 1977 to 1980. Mr. Periconi was chair of the Environmental Law Section of the New York State Bar Association in 2003, was the Chairman of the Board of INFORM, Inc., a New York-based national environmental organization, from 2004-2006 and remains a Board member and is a member of the Board of Advisors of the Toxics Law Reporter, published by the Bureau of National Affairs in Washington, D.C.
Gail S. Port is the head of Proskauer Rose LLP’s interdepartmental Environmental Practice Group, and has been practicing environmental law, land use law and litigation for over 30 years. Prior to joining Proskauer, from 1984-1989, Gail was the Deputy General Counsel (and Acting General Counsel) and the chief environmental advisor to the New York State Urban Development Corporation. A 1976 magna cum laude graduate of New York Law School, Gail has lectured and written widely on a broad spectrum of environmental topics. As an adjunct faculty member at Pace University School of Law, she taught a course entitled “Commercial Environmental Law. Gail is past Chair of the New York State Bar Association’s Environmental Law Section, the former Chair of the Environmental Law Committee of the City Bar Association and a member of the Boards of Directors of Environmental Advocates and the New York League of Conservation Voters Education Fund. Since 1992, following her appointment by Governor Cuomo, and subsequent reappointment by Governor Pataki, Gail has served as one of only five citizen members on the New York State Environmental Board.
E. Gail Suchman has over 25 years of experience in all facets of environmental and energy law and policy. She also teaches at Columbia Law School, Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs, and is senior legal advisor to the Urban Design Lab for Sustainable Development at Columbia's Earth Institute. Prior to joining Stroock in 2007, Ms. Suchman was the managing attorney for the New York City office of Gilberti Stinziano Heintz & Smith, P.C. Her practice includes permitting and compliance, transactional due diligence, litigation, and legislative matters. She works closely with real estate and industrial developers on traditional environmental and land use matters, as well as community outreach and green design, and advises on socially responsible investment.
Ms. Suchman began her legal career as an enforcement attorney at the United States Environmental Protection Agency, Region V, in Chicago. She spent over ten years as an assistant attorney general in the Environmental Protection Bureau at the New York State Attorney General's office and served for three years as regional director for the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection. As senior environmental counsel for New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, Ms. Suchman represented communities in litigation and transactional matters involving solid waste management, energy, brownfields and environmental justice.
Philip Weinberg (J.D., Columbia Law School) taught Constitutional Law and Environmental Law at St. John’s University School of Law from 1978 to 2009. Prior to his joining the St. John’s faculty he was Assistant Attorney General in Charge of the Environmental Protection Bureau in the New York State Attorney General’s Office. He argued numerous appeals at the Attorney General’s Office, including three at the United States Supreme Court. Professor Weinberg wrote the Practice Commentary to McKinney’s New York Environmental Conservation Law for over two decades, until 2009, and is author of an environmental law casebook, as well as numerous articles on environmental law and constitutional law. He is a co-author of Understanding Environmental Law (LexisNexis, 2007) and of Environmental Impact Review in New York, (LexisNexis, 1990 and annual updates). He is editor of Environmental Law and Regulation in New York (West/Thomson 2009). He has chaired the New York State Bar Association's Environmental Law Section as well as several New York City Bar Association committees in the environmental law area.