ELPO Law partner LaJuana Wilcher was in Cleveland, Ohio as an invited guest of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan to participate in a special recognition of the 50th anniversary of the enactment of the federal Clean Water Act (CWA). The celebration took place on the banks of the Cuyahoga River, which infamously caught fire in the 1960s, spurring Congress to pass the CWA to help protect the nation’s waters on October 18, 1972.

In 1989 LaJuana was the first woman to be confirmed by the Senate to be EPA’s Assistant Administrator for Water in Washington, D.C., and was the only woman to serve in that position for the first 48 years of the CWA’s history.  She also served as Kentucky’s Secretary of Environmental and Public Protection from 2003-2006.

She is recognized throughout the country for her deep knowledge of the CWA, and has recently spoken to groups of CWA lawyers, regulators and practitioners at conferences including the American Bar Association’s Section of Environment, Energy, and Resources 30th Fall Conference in Nashville, TN, the Association of Clean Water Administrators annual conference in Memphis, and the Indiana Water Environment Association‘s annual conference in Indianapolis. 

Following the festivities, LaJuana was a speaker on a panel for the federal EPA Alumni Association’s CWA 50th anniversary two hour webinar. 

To learn more about LaJuana and our Environmental Law practice group, click here.