Biography

Patrick helps clients navigate complex project development and natural resources regulatory issues and litigation.

Prior to joining B&D, Patrick served as an Attorney-Advisor for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Office of the General Counsel’s Natural Resources and Environment Division in Washington, DC, where he advised and represented USDA and the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) in numerous public lands management real property, water rights, hydropower, and other program implementation and litigation matters. He has assisted in legislative and regulatory drafting and advised the agency on a number of issues related to land management, hydropower, carbon stewardship, wetlands mitigation, and land and water conservation. In this role, he served as USDA’s lead attorney on efforts to achieve a national framework for U.S. Army Corps of Engineers siting of wetlands mitigation projects on U.S. Forest Service Lands. Patrick additionally served as the lead attorney for USDA and USFS in prominent national litigation and negotiations. 

In private practice, he also served as outside counsel and water counsel for state political subdivisions in prominent multiagency federal, state, tribal and local resource management and infrastructure efforts, including negotiating and litigating ESA and NEPA compliance for large water diversion projects such as on the Colorado River and Middle Rio Grande.

*Admitted only in California; not a member of the MD Bar. MD practice supervised by members of the MD Bar.

Education

  • University of California - Berkeley  (B.A., with Highest Honors, 1989)
    • Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society
  • University of New Mexico  (J.D., summa cum laude, 2008)
    • Albert E. Utton Natural Resources Law Award
    • Order of the Coif
    • Staff and Lead Articles Editor, Natural Resources Journal

Bar Admissions

  • California
  • Maryland
  • New York

Publications

  • “The Public Trust in Wildlife: Two Steps Forward, Two Steps Back”, 49 Natural Resources Journal 249 (2009), available here
  • “Recovering Recovery: The U.S. District Court for New Mexico Notes U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Improper Critical Habitat Designation Processes”, Western Water Law and Policy Reporter, August/September 2009;
  • “A Conversation on Collaboration in the Middle Rio Grande”, Rio Grande Sierran, March/April 2009, available here
  • “Instream Flow Protection in New Mexico – A 2008 Update”, State Bar of New Mexico, Vista, Summer 2008, available here