Office of General Counsel & Environmental Policy

R.C. Flynn
General Counsel

OGC Staff

Laurie Leibowitz

Legal Assistant/Paralegal

Prior to joining the Environment Department, Laurie Leibowitz worked as a Legal Assistant-Secretary/Paralegal for private practice attorneys in Santa Fe, NM and in Washington, DC.

Education

• Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with a concentration in Green and Sustainable Enterprise Management, University of Phoenix.

Melissa Mascarenas

Paralegal

Prior to joining the Environment Department, Melissa Mascarenas worked as an Appeal Court Legal Assistant to Justice Petra J. Maes at the New Mexico Supreme Court.

Education

• Bachelor of Business Administration, College of Santa Fe, NM Major Public Administration; Minor Political Science.

Morgan R. Nelson

Policy Analyst & Special Projects Manager

Mr. Nelson is responsible for managing department-wide special projects, coordinating the Legislative Tracking Office, working with constituents and requests, and providing support to the Office of the Secretary and the Office of General Counsel.

Prior to joining the Environment Department, Morgan served as a Policy Analyst in Governor Susana Martinez’s office. In that role, he conducted research on all policy issues ranging from water rights to criminal law. In addition, he prepared daily event and background briefs for the governor.

Prior to working for the State of New Mexico, Morgan was a Senior Intelligence Analyst for PREDICT, a contract project, at New Mexico State University. There, he produced open-source intelligence analysis on imported foodstuffs entering the United States that the federal government used to maintain the nation’s safe food supply. In 2008, he worked for former United States Republican Senator Pete V. Domenici in his Washington DC office.

Mr. Nelson graduated with honors from New Mexico State University with a double major for a Bachelor of Business Administration in Economics and a Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Economics/Agricultural Business. Mr. Nelson was recognized by his college as an Outstanding Senior, one of six students in his 2009 graduating class. While at NMSU, he was instrumental in founding Aggies Go Global, an undergraduate international study program, and served as a Student Ambassador for three years representing the university at many official functions.

Mr. Nelson currently resides in Albuquerque and attends the University of New Mexico where he is pursuing an MBA from the Anderson School of Management.

Thomas Ruiz

Border / Environmental Justice Liaison

Prior to joining the OGC, Mr. Ruiz served within the Office of the Secretary. Prior to that, Mr. Ruiz worked for the Air Quality Bureau as an Environmental Analyst and began his career with NMED in 2001 as an Environmental Scientist in the Field Operations Bureau. Mr. Ruiz has also worked for the New Mexico Department of Health – Office of Border Health as the Border Environmental Epidemiologist. During each fall semester at NMSU, he teaches an undergraduate course on Environmental Health.

One of his many roles within NMED includes serving as the liaison with Mexican border states on advancing efforts and policy aimed at improving the environmental conditions of the U.S./Mexico border. Overseeing activities under the EPA-funded Border 2012 program, Mr. Ruiz has implemented projects along the New Mexico border aimed at improving air quality, water protection and conservation and environmental education. Being involved with groups at the community level is essential in his duties as Environmental Justice Liaison. He works on accomplishing some of the tasks under the Environmental Justice Executive Order by providing outreach and education to communities on issues such as public involvement in permit hearings. He has also coordinated the statewide, nine-agency, Environmental Justice Task Force.

Professional Activities

Mr. Ruiz is a member of the Good Neighbor Environmental Board, an advisory committee to the U.S. President and Congress on U.S./Mexico border environmental issues. He also serves as a delegate on the Border Governors Conference – Environment Worktable.

Education

• Master of Science, 1997, Molecular Biology, New Mexico State University
• Bachelor of Science, Biology, 1994, Purdue University Calumet

Karen Thomas

Office Manager

Ms. Thomas has served the Office of General Counsel in the New Mexico Environment Department since June 1998. Prior to being asked to join the Office of General Counsel, she briefly served as Hearing Clerk for the Department. Ms. Thomas is in the midst of obtaining her B.S. in Environmental Science.

Attorneys

Christopher N. Atencio

Assistant General Counsel

Mr. Atencio has been an attorney with the New Mexico Environment Department since the summer of 2012. He was admitted to practice in New Mexico in 2011. Prior to joining the Department, Mr. Atencio provided contract legal services in Albuquerque, NM.

Professional Activities

Mr. Atencio is a member of the New Mexico State Bar.

Education

• Juris Doctor, 2011, University of New Mexico School of Law (Natural Resources Certificate)
• Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, Political Science, 2007, University of New Mexico; minor in Earth and Planetary Sciences
  
  

Bar Admissions

• State of New Mexico
  

Kathryn S. Becker

Assistant General Counsel

Prior to joining the Department, Ms. Becker worked as legal counsel to the State Parks Division of the NM Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department. Ms. Becker previously worked as a lawyer for the Navajo Nation Department of Justice.

Professional Activities

Ms. Becker is a member of the American Bar Association, New Mexico State Bar and Navajo Nation Bar Association.

Education

• Juris Doctor, 2000, University of North Dakota School of Law
• Bachelor of Arts and Sciences, 1995, University of North Dakota, Majored in Humanities; Minored in Indian Studies, Spanish and Photography
  
  

Bar Admissions

• State of New Mexico
  
• United States District Court for the District of New Mexico
• Navajo Nation

Charles de Saillan

Assistant General Counsel

Mr. de Saillan has served as Assistant General Counsel in the New Mexico Environment Department since December 1999. He represents the Department in enforcement and permitting actions involving air quality, surface water quality, ground water quality, hazardous wastes, and site remediation. He has litigated complex groundwater discharge permit cases involving hard rock mines before the Water Quality Control Commission and the New Mexico Court of Appeals. He successfully pursued an action for injunctive relief in the federal Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, seeking cleanup of groundwater contamination at an industrial site in Albuquerque (the matter is now on appeal). He has also represented the Department on all matters related to Los Alamos National Laboratory, including the recent hearing and appeal of the hazardous waste permit for the Laboratory, and the March 1, 2005 Administrative Order on Consent, which requires comprehensive investigation and cleanup of environmental contamination at the Laboratory.

From 1993 to 1999, he served as Assistant Attorney General in the Environmental Enforcement Division of the New Mexico Office of the Attorney General. In that position he represented the Environment Department and the New Mexico Office of the Natural Resources Trustee, which is authorized to bring claims for damages for injury to natural resources under CERCLA and the Oil Pollution Act. He helped develop the State's natural resource damage program, and negotiated several natural resource damage settlements. He also worked on reauthorization of the Superfund law before the 103rd, 104th, and 105th Congresses. He was head of a National Association of Attorneys General workgroup on Superfund reauthorization, which commented extensively on reauthorization proposals in Congress. He presented testimony to Congressional committees on Superfund reauthorization on five occasions.

Before moving to New Mexico, Mr. de Saillan worked for eight years at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Enforcement, in Washington, D.C., where he was Senior Attorney. He handled all aspects of environmental enforcement litigation under CERCLA, RCRA, the Clean Water Act, and the Safe Drinking Water Act, including trial of several significant cases. He helped prepare the Exxon Valdez case for litigation. Mr. de Saillan also served as a Special Trial Attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice, Environmental Enforcement Section. In that capacity, he handled a major drinking water case in Butte, Montana, which resulted in the construction of filtration plants and the largest civil penalty ever obtained under the public water supply provisions of the Safe Drinking Water Act.

After graduating from law school, Mr. de Saillan worked for the Massachusetts Executive Office of Environmental Affairs, in Boston. He served on the Special Legislative Commission on Liability for Releases of Hazardous Material and Oil established to report on the adequacy of the legal system in compensating victims of hazardous waste exposure and to recommend legislative reform. He was a co-author of the of the Commission’s Interim Report.

Selected Publications

• The Disposal of Spent Nuclear Fuel in the United States and Europe: A Persistent Environmental Problem, 34 HARVARD ENVIRONMENTAL LAW REVIEW 461 (2010).
• United States Supreme Court Rules on Regulation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions, 17 EUROPEAN ENERGY & ENVIRONMENTAL LAW REVIEW 63 (2008) (Netherlands) (with Claybourne F. Clarke).
• The Use of Imminent Hazard Provisions of Environmental Laws to Compel Cleanup at Federal Facilities, 27 STANFORD ENVIRONMENTAL LAW JOURNAL 43 (2008).
• United States Supreme Court Rules EPA Must Take Action on Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Massachusetts v. EPA, 47 NATURAL RESOURCES JOURNAL 793 (2007).
• Superfund Reauthorization: A More Modest Proposal, 27 ENVIRONMENTAL LAW REPORTER (ELI) 10201 (May 1997).
• CERCLA Liability for Pre-Enactment Disposal Activities: Nothing Has Changed, NATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL ENFORCEMENT JOURNAL, Oct. 1996, at 3.
• In Praise of Superfund, ENVIRONMENT, Oct. 1993, at 42.
• Acid Rain, Canada, and the United States: Enforcing the International Pollution Provision of the Clean Air Act, 1 BOSTON UNIVERSITY INTERNATIONAL LAW JOURNAL 151 (1982).
  
  

Professional Activities

Mr. de Saillan is a member of the American Bar Association, Section on Environment, Energy, and Resources; and the New Mexico Bar Association, Section on Natural Resources, Energy, and Environmental Law.

He is a frequent speaker on environmental issues.

Education

• LL.M. magna cum laude in Energy and Environmental Law, 2009, Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, Belgium
• J.D, 1982, Boston University School of Law (Associate Editor, Boston University International Law Journal)
• B.A. cum laude with Distinction, 1979, Boston University College of Liberal Arts
  
  

Bar Admissions

• Supreme Court of New Mexico
  
• Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts
• United States District Court for the District of New Mexico
• U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Fourth, Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, and D.C. Circuits

Jerry Dickinson

Assistant General Counsel

Jerry Dickinson was admitted to practice in New Mexico in 1979, to the United States District Court for the District of New Mexico in 1980, and to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in 1987. He was in private practice in Albuquerque for three years prior to joining the New Mexico Health and Environment Department’s Office General Counsel in 1982. In 1991, he began practicing with the New Mexico Department of Health, Office of General Counsel.

He joined the New Mexico Environment Department’s Office of General Counsel in 2006. His diverse civil practice has included environmental, health, employment, labor, civil rights, contract and administrative law. He is a 1979 graduate of the University of New Mexico School of Law.

Bill Grantham

Assistant General Counsel

Prior to joining the Department, Mr. Grantham worked for the National Tribal Environmental Council on issues pertaining to development of tribal air quality programs and tribal participation in state and federal air quality regulation. Mr. Grantham has also worked in legal and non-legal capacities for the U.S. EPA Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards; U.S. EPA Office of General Counsel; Oregon Department of Environmental Quality; Knox County (TN) Air Pollution Control Division, and the National Park Service.

Education

• Juris Doctor, cum laude, 1997 Vermont Law School (Head Notes Editor, Vermont Law Review)
  
• Bachelor of Science, Biology, San Diego State University, 1989
  
  

Bar Admissions

• New Mexico
• Oregon

Jennifer L. Hower

Deputy General Counsel

Ms. Hower has been an attorney with the New Mexico Environment Department since August 2007. Prior to joining the Department as an attorney, Ms. Hower was a law clerk with NMED’s Office of General Counsel from the summer of 2005 through the summer of 2007. Additionally, Ms. Hower worked for three years as an Economic and Policy Analyst for a New Mexico-based energy consulting firm.

Professional Activities

Ms. Hower is a member of the New Mexico State Bar and is currently Chair-Elect of the Public Law Section Board of Directors.

Education

• Juris Doctor, 2007, University of New Mexico School of Law (Natural Resources Certificate)
  
• Master of Public Administration, 2001, Northern Arizona University
• Bachelor of Science, Kinesiology, 1998, Kansas State University

Bar Admissions

• New Mexico
  
• United States District Court for the District of New Mexico

Andrew P. Knight

Assistant General Counsel

Prior to joining the Department, Mr. Knight worked at the firm of Sutin, Thayer & Browne. Mr. Knight has also worked for the New Mexico Court of Appeals as a law clerk for Judge Michael Vigil, and for the Office of the Public Defender.

Professional Activities

Mr. Knight is a member of the American Bar Association and New Mexico State Bar.

Education

• Juris Doctor, 2002, University of New Mexico School of Law (Vice-president of the Student Bar Association)
  
• Bachelor of Science, Anthropology, 1991, University of New Mexico

Bar Admissions

• New Mexico
  
• United States District Court for the District of New Mexico

Kay R. D'Souza

Assistant General Counsel

Ms. D’Souza has been an attorney with the New Mexico Environment Department since the fall of 2012. While in law school, she served as a public defender for the Tulalip Indian Reservation, volunteered for Housing Justice Project to provide legal assistance to combat homelessness, and served as a judicial extern for King County Superior Court Judge Mary Yu.

Professional Activities

Ms. D’Souza is a member of the New Mexico State Bar and the Washington State Bar Association.

Education

• Juris Doctor, 2012, University of Washington School of Law
  
• Bachelor of Arts, Political Science, 2008, University of California at Los Angeles

Bar Admissions

• New Mexico
  
• Washington
• Tulalip Tribal Court

Kevin J. Powers

Assistant General Counsel

Prior to joining the Department, Mr. Powers worked as an Assistant District Trial Attorney with the 5th Judicial District, District Attorney’s Office. In that role Mr. Powers prosecuted misdemeanor and felony criminal cases before magistrate and state district courts. Before joining the District Attorney’s Office, Mr. Powers worked as a Regulatory Compliance Director with Charles Abbott Associates in southern California. In that role Mr. Powers advised numerous municipal agencies on environmental compliance matters related to storm water and solid waste management and compliance. He represented various agencies before commission and board meetings and interacted closely with the public and elected public officials.

In 2004, Mr. Powers interned with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA) in Washington, D.C. In 2003, Mr. Powers interned with the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection regional office in Springfield, Massachusetts. In both positions Mr. Powers gained valuable insight to state and federal environmental regulation. Before this, Mr. Powers worked with DMG MAXIMUS as a Government Rate and Compliance Consultant. In this role Mr. Powers assisted large and small public agencies develop utility user rates and fee structures for water, wastewater, solid waste, and natural gas services. Mr. Powers also assisted public agencies develop compliance programs such as backflow prevention, testing and certification programs. Mr. Powers has also worked with numerous private agencies in the south and southeast U.S. related to operations, permitting, and compliance oversight of wastewater collection and treatment facilities and public drinking water systems. He has assisted several laboratories in renewal of their state certifications and has obtained his wastewater treatment plant operators license and public water distribution system operator license.

Mr. Powers served in the U.S. Navy and was stationed aboard the USS Constellation as a flight crew chief for VFA-113.

Professional Activities

• Los Angeles River Metals TMDL Technical and Steering Committee Member, 2006 to 2011
• Malibu Creek Watershed Management Committee Member, 2007 to 2011
• North Santa Monica Bay Task Force Executive Committee Representative, 2006 to 2011
• Los Angeles River Watershed Management Committee Member, 2006 to 2011
• San Gabriel River Watershed Management Area Representative, 2007 to 2011
• Los Angeles Executive Advisory Committee Representative, 2006 to 2011
• President, Environmental Law Coalition, Western New England College (2004-2005)
• Treasurer, Environmental Law Coalition, Western New England College (2003-2004)
  
  

Education

• Juris Doctor, Western New England College School of Law, October 2005
  
• Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice, University of Arkansas, Little Rock, August 1994
• Bachelor of Arts in Sociology, University of Arkansas, Little Rock, August 1994

Certification

• Attorney, State Bar of New Mexico
  
• Environmental Compliance Inspector I, California Water Environment Association (#90641001)
• Mississippi Municipal and Public Works Contractor License
• Water Production License, State of Louisiana
• Wastewater Treatment License, State of Louisiana

Carol Parker

Assistant General Counsel

Prior to joining the Environment Department, Ms. Parker worked at the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department (“EMNRD”). Before working at EMNRD, Ms. Parker clerked for the Honorable Bruce D. Black at the United States District Court for the District of New Mexico. Ms. Parker received a B.A. and M.S. in Biology from the University of Rochester, an M.B.A. from the University of New Mexico Anderson Schools of Management and a J.D. from the University of New Mexico School of Law.