For the Stegner Center, the 2012-2013 academic year was both busy and rewarding. As noted in this newsletter, the College of Law received a $4.5 million grant from the Alternative Visions Fund of the Chicago Community Trust, in support of the sustainability features in the new College of Law building. The Stegner Center’s Environmental Dispute Resolution Program and the Environmental Law Clinic are both growing and continuing to bring in new projects and generate new opportunities for students. (See the articles in this newsletter for additional information on both programs.)
The Stegner Center also hosted a variety of successful conferences and lectures, including a one-day academic conference with leading legal scholars on “The Future of Conservation Easements: What Were We Thinking and Where Do We Go from Here?” Specific topics considered by speakers and panelists included Federal Tax Incentives, State Enabling Statutes Charity Oversight, Working With State Attorney General Offices, and Taking the Long View. The conference proceedings are being published in the environmental and natural resources law issue of the student-edited Utah Law Review.
The annual symposium assembled 19 scholars and religious leaders from around the country to address “Religion, Faith and the Environment.” (For additional information, please see the article on the 18th annual symposium.) Noah Hall, Associate Professor of Law, Wayne State University Law School, joined the Stegner Center as the 8th Annual Young Scholar and delivered a young scholar lecture on “Interstate Groundwater Law: Equitable Apportionment of Transboundary Resources and Implications for the Snake Valley Aquifer Dispute” and a downtown CLE on “The Law of the Great Lakes – Ninety Percent of North America’s Available Freshwater and Not a Drop for Utah.” As part of the its lecture series, the Stegner Center hosted Joe Riis, a National Geographic wildlife photographer, who delivered a photographic lecture on “Pronghorn Passage and Other Conservation Photography Stories from Around the World” and Woody Tasch, the Founder and CEO of Slow Money, who delivered a lecture and book signing on “Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money: Investing as if Food, Farms, and Fertility Mattered.” The Stegner Center’s popular noon hour green bag series brought in several local speakers, who addressed a variety of topics, including energy development on Utah’s BLM lands, Crime Victims’ Rights in Criminal Envrionmental Prosecutions, and Confronting the Challenge of Environmental Change on the Colorado Plateau.