Joe is chair of the firm’s Land Use and Water Rights practices and has more than 23 years of experience in local, state, and federal permitting, enforcement matters, and water rights. Joe puts his past experience working for city and county agencies and EPA Region 10 to work for his clients and delivers cost-effective legal services that produce results. He works closely with consultants, developers, lenders, real estate investors, and agency officials to achieve the client’s objectives. Joe has served under two gubernatorial administrations as Regulatory Performance Advisor to the Washington State Department of Ecology.

He is one of the leading water rights lawyers in Washington state, providing strategic advice, permitting, and litigation support to water purveyors, public utility districts, ports, industry clients, and private property owners. Joe represents clients in administrative appeals and in state and federal court on a wide range of water rights and water resource matters.

Joe’s clients include: Costco Wholesale, Inc.; Safeway, Inc.; Port of Tacoma; Pierce County; King County Department of Natural Resources; King County Facilities Management Division; Skagit PUD; Asotin PUD; City of Anacortes; ICON Materials; Goodman Real Estate; Vulcan, Inc.; Beacon Capital Partners; Swedish Hospital; Harborview Medical Center; Virginia Mason Hospital & Medical Center; Triad Development; Seattle Pacific University; Madison Marquette; City of Renton; Klickitat County; Skamania County; Spokane County; City of White Salmon; Wright Runstad & Co.; City of Yelm; Olympic Property Group; Griffin Capital Corporation; and Green Diamond Resources Company.

Recent Representative Matters:

• Serves as lead outside environmental counsel for major Western Washington port in several Clean Water Act Section 404 compliance matters in federal District Court.
• Served as lead counsel successfully defending appeal of municipal water rights granted to City of Yelm.
• Serves as special counsel to Eastern Washington PUD on water right acquisition and transfer issues.
• Serves as lead Endangered Species Act outside counsel for Pierce County on ESA Section 9 compliance.
• Served as lead litigator representing City of Anacortes and Skagit PUD in multi-year water rights litigation before the Washington Growth Management Hearings Board and in State court concerning revision and implementation of the Skagit River Instream Flow Rule.
• Serves as lead water rights counsel for major forest products company in the acquisition of water rights to serve nine new residential communities in the state of Washington.
• Represented dozens of real estate investors on land use due diligence related to development of residential and commercial properties in Washington state.
• Serves as land use counsel on the preparation and City of Seattle approval of Major Institution Master Plans and Master Plan development projects for Seattle's largest hospitals and universities.
• Serves as special counsel to King County for the re-development of its Juvenile Justice Center in Seattle.