Overview

Ms. Lee has over 25 years of experience as an attorney and mediator with an emphasis in environmental compliance and litigation. She also has many years of experience as a neutral helping parties resolve environmental policy disputes and lawsuits involving environmental issues. She has litigated joint, multi-level governmental enforcement actions for the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and other agencies. Ms. Lee has many years of experience negotiating the resolution of a number of environmental issues on behalf of private clients with the EPA and state regulatory agencies. She has provided legal advice in connection with the development and implementation of environmental management systems in order to comply with state and federal environmental laws; her development of such systems have been recognized for their creative, streamlined approaches to environmental compliance. Ms. Lee has advised clients on the most current innovative approaches to land-use and growth management planning as well as federal and state land-use, real estate, and environmental laws.

Ms. Lee has managed her own private practice since 1994, which has specialized in complex litigation, mediation and client counseling on numerous environmental and commercial matters. The firm has represented clients in a variety of environmental and commercial cases at both the trial and appellate levels and has advised private entities on numerous environmental compliance issues and negotiated on their behalf with the EPA and state regulatory agencies. The firm has also provided mediation services to successfully resolve numerous disputes involving environmental issues between private and governmental entities. Her firm has also represented clients involved in investigations by federal enforcement agencies.

For six and half years, Ms. Lee was a Trial Attorney at the Environment Enforcement Section of the U.S. Department of Justice where she represented the EPA. During her tenure at the Department of Justice, Ms. Lee led multi-million dollar cases involving hazardous wastes and toxic substances under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA), the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), water and air pollution, and natural resource damages. She obtained over $100 million in judgements and settlements pursuant to consent decrees. In addition to negotiating consent decrees with private parties, she also negotiated/facilitated the development of highly complex interagency agreements among co-plaintiffs including the EPA, other federal and state agencies, and municipalities.

Ms. Lee is a trained mediator with experience mediating multi-million dollar disputes in federal district court as well as conflicts focusing on contentious issues such as flood risk management, dredged material disposal and impacts to endangered species. These conflicts involved as many as forty participants representing a wide range of stakeholders, EPA and numerous other federal and state agencies. She has mediated partnering sessions between regulators and regulatees on environmental matters to address long-range plans for the resolution of environmental and land-use issues. She has facilitated agreements among multiple agencies with respect to complex environmental problems in the Pacific Northwest. Ms. Lee has also worked with diverse agencies to build consensus regarding environmental impacts in the Columbia River.

Education

  • J.D., Yale Law School, New Haven, CT, 1984
  • M.S. Civ. Eng., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, 1976
  • B.S. Biology, maga cum laude, Bates College, Lewiston, ME, 1975

Affiliations

  • Member of the Washington and District of Columbia Bars
  • Member of the US District Court Bar for the Western District of Washington
  • Member of the US District Court Bar for the District of Columbia
  • American Bar Association, Vice Chair, Climate Change & Sustainability Committee
  • Member of the Board of the Association of Women in Environmental Professions
  • Member of the Board for the Washington Council on International Trade