Bill’s practice is devoted to environmental counseling and litigation, with a focus on assisting clients with respect to contaminated property. Bill has more than 40 years of experience in prosecuting, defending, and serving as an expert witness in environmental cases, and in working with regulatory agencies on site investigations, cleanups, enforcement and regulatory matters.

Bill served as an enforcement attorney with the U.S. EPA for 13 years. During his last six years at EPA, he was Chief of the Hazardous Waste Branch of the Region IX Office of Regional Counsel, developing enforcement policy and supervising the 30 attorneys enforcing CERCLA, RCRA and TSCA in Arizona, Nevada, California, and Hawaii.

In private practice for the past 28 years, Bill has represented a variety of clients (plaintiffs and defendants) in hazardous site cases in California, New York, Connecticut, Nebraska, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington.

He is the author of chapters in two different treatises on hazardous site cleanup: “Cleanup of Hazardous Substances,” Chapter 52, California Environmental Law and Land Use Practice (Matthew-Bender Treatise) and “Hazardous Waste Considerations,” Chapter 6, California Real Property Sales Transactions (California Continuing Education of the Bar Treatise).

He is “AV” rated by Martindale-Hubbell (highest rating) and is rated “Superb” by avvo.com (highest rating). He has been consistently selected by other lawyers as a “Northern California Super Lawyer” in Environmental Law by Law & Politics. He is named among 455 lawyers named in The International Who’s Who of Environmental Lawyers. He is a former member of and now advisor to the Executive Committee of the Environmental Section of the State Bar of California, and is a member (and former Chair) of the Environmental Section of the Bar Association of San Francisco. Named an Adjunct Professor at Golden Gate University School of Law, he is a frequent speaker and writer on environmental issues (and has been a contributor to “The Practitioner” column on environmental law in the San Francisco Daily Journal and Los Angeles Daily Journal).

PRACTICE AREAS:

• Air Quality
• Alternative Dispute Resolution
• Asbestos Defense
• Brownfield Redevelopment
• Contract Drafting and Negotiation
• Corporate Law
• Defense of Civil and Criminal Environmental Enforcement Matters
• Environmental Regulatory Matters
• Expert Witness
• Federal Environmental Law
• Hazardous Waste
• Insurance
• Land Use
• Litigation
• Petroleum Products
• Real Estate Development
• Remediation
• Risk Assessment
• State and Local Environmental Law
• Superfund
• Toxic Tort Defense
• Vapor Intrusion
• Water Quality
• Wetlands
• Wildlife & Plants

INDUSTRY SECTORS:

• Banks
• Cities
• Construction Materials Suppliers
• Government Agencies
• Landfills
• Landlords
• Landowners
• Manufacturing
• Mining
• Ports
• Tenants

CASE STUDIES:

• Aventis CropScience USA, Inc. v. American Motorists Insurance Co., et al.
• California DTSC v. Electronics Manufacturer
• Champsi, et al. v. Chaitin, et al.
• City and County of San Francisco v. Atlantic Richfield Co.
• Delta Star, Inc. v. Tiegel Manufacturing Co. et al.
• Emeryville Redevelopment Agency v. Robinson, et al.
• Ferguson v. Arcata Redwood Company, et al
• Goss, Ross, Doyle Trust v. Shell Oil Co.
• In Re: Angelillo Property Superfund Site, Southington, Hartford County, CT, A.R. Sandri, Inc., et al.
• Mar/Dan and Srue v. Wells Fargo Bank, et al.
• Members of the GBF/Pittsburg Landfill(s) Respondents Group, et al. v. Contra Costa Waste Service, Inc.
• Pellegrini v. Technichem, et al.
• Pendleton Site Group, et al. v. Arcata Graphics Co., et al.
• People of the State of California, et al. v. M & P Investments, et al.
• Port of Redwood City v. Gibson Environmental, Inc. et al.
• Richmond Redevelopment Agency v. Petromark, Inc.
• S.F. Partners v. Irvine Pressman, et al.
• Schutte & Koerting, Inc. v. United National Insurance Company
• Schutte & Koerting, Inc. v. California Regional Water Quality Control Board for San Diego Region
• Sherron Teal v. Borg-Warner Corporation, et al.
• State of California Department of Toxic Substances Control v. Bay Area Drum Co., et al.
• Unilever Best Foods and CCL Custom Manufacturing Inc. v. American Steel & Aluminum Corp, et al.
• United States v. El Dorado County, et al.
• Volvo GM Heavy Truck Corp. et al. v. HM Holdings, Inc. et al.
• West County Landfill, Inc. et al. v. Allied Chemical Corp. et al.