[Law-envtlcert] Lunch Monday, May 20 with FSU Law Alum Jeff Wood

[Shi-Ling Hsu]

For those of you in Tallahassee:

We have a last-minute treat for you. One of our alum, Jeff Wood, a partner at the Washington DC office of Baker Botts and the former Acting Assistant Attorney General for the US Department of Justice Environment and Natural Resources Division, will be in town for an informal lunch on Monday, May 20, at 12:15 pm in Room A106 of the Advocacy Center. Jeff has been a very supportive alum of the law school, and a Trump Administration official that had the respect of career lawyers at the Justice Department. If you would like to attend, please RSVP to Alisa Duke (cc'ed above).  I have pasted a Greenwire story about him below.

DOJ environment official heads for the exit
Ellen M. Gilmer<https://www.eenews.net/staff/Ellen_M_Gilmer>, E&E News reporter Published: Friday, December 21, 2018
[Jeffrey Wood. Photo credit: Ellen M. Gilmer/E&E News]
Jeffrey Wood, who led the Justice Department's Environment and Natural Resources Division on an interim basis for 21 months, is leaving the agency. Ellen M. Gilmer/E&E News
The political official who led the Justice Department's environmental practice for nearly two years is leaving the agency.
Jeffrey Wood's last day at the Environment and Natural Resources Division is today. Installed after President Trump's inauguration last year, Wood served as acting chief of ENRD until November and then as principal deputy assistant attorney general.
"It has been an immense honor to be able to serve at ENRD," he said in a statement. "Through these last almost two years, I have come to more deeply appreciate that our historic division is a powerful force for good in our nation, and that the ranks of our Division are filled with exceptional and dedicated public servants.
"And I am excited about the important work that is ahead for the Division under the leadership of [Assistant Attorney General] Jeff Clark."
He hasn't yet announced his next steps.
Wood spent 21 months as the stand-in head of ENRD, the longest tenure for an acting assistant attorney general in the division's history. Trump nominated Jeffrey Bossert Clark for the job in 2017, but Clark's nomination languished in the Senate until October, when he was finally confirmed.
Wood managed the division in the meantime, establishing its "back to basics" enforcement policy, defending the Trump administration's deregulatory agenda.
Some of his work drew the ire of environmentalists, but he was generally well-liked by career staff in the agency (Greenwire<https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060104783>, Oct. 31).
Clark issued a statement today praising Wood's work.
"The Environment Division of the Justice Department will sorely miss Jeff Wood, and I will personally miss him as my Principal Deputy," Clark said.
"He has served with distinction, honor, and record longevity as the Acting AAG in the 21-month period before I was confirmed by the Senate," he said. "I know the whole Division wishes him and his family well in the next exciting chapter of his professional career."
Wood was a former staffer for Jeff Sessions, who left his role as attorney general in November.
In an email to the environment division last night, Wood praised the team as "a powerful force for good in our nation." He's now heading on vacation with his wife and four kids to visit national parks and other sites in Utah and Arizona.
"Along the way, I'll be proud to share with them how the lawyers and staff in this Division helped to establish, and now help to ensure the proper and lawful management of, these and so many other conserved areas in the country," he wrote in the message obtained by E&E News.
"I am very much looking forward to that time with my family," he added, "and then to thinking more about next steps after that."


Shi-Ling Hsu
D'Alemberte Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Environmental Programs<http://www.law.fsu.edu/academics/jd-program/environmental-energy-land-use-law>
Florida State University College of Law
425 West Jefferson Street, Tallahassee, FL 32306-1601  //  tel: 850-644-0726
ssrn: http://papers.ssrn.com/author_id=182577  //  website: http://myweb.fsu.edu/shsu/

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