Lee DeHihns, a member of Alston & Bird's Environment, Land Development & Natural Resources Group, has been appointed to chair the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Task Force on Sustainable Development. The Task Force—consisting of lawyers and non-lawyers from relevant ABA entities; the United Nations (UN); the Environmental Law Institute; the U.S. State Department; the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; and other multinational organizations and nongovernmental organizations—will review and make recommendations regarding the involvement of the ABA in implementing sustainable development matters worldwide.
The Task Force will focus on ways that the ABA can provide leadership on a national and international basis regarding sustainable development issues, as well as assisting the United Nations and other organizations in implementing sustainable development recommendations from the UN’s 2012 Rio+20 Sustainable Development Conference’s report, “The Future We Want,” including the goal of providing sustainable energy for all by 2030.
“I am both honored and humbled to be selected for this position,” said DeHihns. “I look forward to working with an elite team of experts and leaders in their respective fields to tackle perhaps the most critical issue of our time—the sustainability of our very planet.”
“I cannot imagine a mind and character better suited for the task at hand,” noted Doug Arnold, co-chair of Alston & Bird’s Environment, Land Development & Natural Resources Group. “Lee brings with him decades of experience, as well as the steady hand necessary to navigate the complex issues this Task Force will address.”
DeHihns will serve a one-year term.
About Lee DeHihns
Lee DeHihns concentrates on regulatory and enforcement matters, including climate change, corporate compliance, debarment, air quality, hazardous waste, wetlands and water quantity and quality matters for both industrial and municipal clients. DeHihns chaired the ABA's Section of Environment, Energy and Resources (SEER) in 2007-2008 and is a SEER delegate to the ABA House of Delegates (2009-2015). He has been ranked as a leading environmental lawyer in Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers for Business, for seven consecutive years, beginning in 2006. He also wrote a chapter titled “Constitutional Influences on Climate Litigation” in the ABA's Principles of Constitutional Environmental Law published in September 2011, and recently chaired the ABA delegation to the UN’s 2012 Sustainable Development Conference, which was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Mr. DeHihns joined the firm in 1990 after serving four years as the Deputy Regional Administrator of USEPA Region 4, the agency's senior career position in the Southeast. His career began with USEPA in 1974 in Washington, D.C., where he rose to the position of Associate General Counsel. Mr. DeHihns received a Senior Executive Service Meritorious Rank Award from President Bush in 1989. He is on the Board of Trustees of Marywood University (2009-2015).