Climate & Health Advocates, WildEarth Guardians

Climate & Health Advocates, Wild Earth Guardians

Organization/Grantor:Wild Earth Guardians

Position/Title/Fund:Climate & Health Advocate (two positions open)

Type/Term:Full-time, Permanent

Salary:$64,453 - $86,275 annually

Description:

Wild Earth Guardians is hiring two positions to bolster our nationally-recognized Climate & Health team, known for its innovative and leading-edge approach to keeping fossil fuels in the ground and exposing the true costs of oil and gas pollution: the Climate & Health Attorney and the Climate & Health Advocate. Collectively, these roles will operate primarily in New Mexico and Colorado with an eye toward larger, west-wide policy around public lands leasing, oil and gas waste, impacts on frontline communities, and keeping it in the ground.

We’re looking for candidates who have experience litigating, advocating, building coalitions, and winning in the oil and gas space. We are open to different approaches for filling these capacity needs with the knowledge that at least one role needs to be filled by a practicing attorney, ready to engage in federal court, state administrative proceedings, or both. We welcome applicants with diverse backgrounds in this realm of work and seek the two best candidates to tackle the major problems facing the West.

Reporting to the Wild Earth Guardians’ Climate and Health Program Director, the Climate and Health Advocate will develop, spearhead and implement strategies and tactics to expose the true cost of oil and gas extraction, with a particular emphasis on public lands, including lands managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. The Advocate will leverage environmental and health liabilities to support and sustain action to end fracking and keep fossil fuels in the ground.

The Advocate will focus on policies and rule makings that protect air, water, and public health –including addressing the growing threats of produced water contamination and oil and gas waste mismanagement– while working to hold regulators and industry accountable. The work will be focused within the Rocky Mountain West, primarily in Colorado, in close coordination with the New Mexico Climate & Health Advocate and the broader program team to ensure regional consistency and shared strategy.

Responsibilities
:

Program-Focused Engagement (80%)

• Initiate and proactively engage in precedent setting rule makings related to the regulation of air, waste, and water and to advance new policies through creative strategies and tactics.
• File and sustain comment letters, technical comments, and administrative appeals, challenging air pollution, produced water, and other environmental permits for oil and gas facilities.
• Collaborate with Program Director and Climate and Health team members, as well as other organizations and allies when engaging in rule making and other proceedings-including potential use of expert and non-technical witnesses, primarily focused in Colorado.
• Draft and submit comment letters, develop appeals targeting Bureau of Land Management decisions, with the aim of confronting ill-conceived development proposals and to strengthen land and resource safeguards.
• Review, provide analysis and recommendations on state legislation (as needed), as well as providing testimony on behalf of Wild Earth Guardians to the Legislature and legislative committees, and administrative hearings and committees throughout the year.
• Monitor federal oversight of Colorado’s regulation of air and water, and develop litigation against the U.S. EPA for compliance over laws and regulations surrounding air and water.
• Assist staff attorneys in the development, filing, and prosecution of environmental enforcement cases in federal court, including cases under the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act.
• Participate in coalition-building strategies at a local, regional, and national level; maintain key relationships with partner organizations, key government officials, and represent the organization on task forces and committees.
• Perform duties as assigned.

Communications & Fundraising (10%)

• Communicate with the media to provide perspective and commentary on issues of importance to Guardians.
• Prepare press materials,…