Babst Calland provides a valuable resource for public and private sector clients facing environmental and health and safety issues. We have 20 lawyers in our Environmental Health and Safety Services Group who practice environmental regulatory law exclusively, one of the largest staffs of regulatory lawyers in the tri-state region. Each lawyer has developed subspecialties such as water quality/wastewater discharges, stormwater, sewage facilities planning and permitting, hazardous and solid waste management, spill reporting, natural resources development, site investigation and remediation and community right-to-know. Our firm is listed in the top tier for its Pennsylvania environmental practice in Chambers USA America’s Leading Lawyers for Business, and seven of our lawyers are listed individually as top environmental lawyers in the Chambers USA directory as well as in the Best Lawyers in America for environmental law. We also have several lawyers in our Litigation Services Group who concentrate on environmental litigation and several lawyers in our Business Services Group focus their practices on environmental transactions.
In recent years, the number of environmental laws and regulations applicable to local political subdivisions and municipal authorities has increased dramatically. Babst Calland lawyers are positioned to service the needs of our public sector clients in this increasingly complex and expanding area of the law. The firm currently serves as solicitor for the largest public sanitary authority in western Pennsylvania and as special environmental counsel to other sanitary authorities. Babst Calland lawyers also act as special counsel to western Pennsylvania regional development authorities and industrial development corporations on a wide range of environmental issues including brownfield redevelopment. We routinely counsel municipalities and authorities on managing stormwater, planning for sewage facilities and growth, protecting wetlands, drafting ordinances relating to environmental matters, and applying for funding for public projects.
The extent and range of experience levels within our group also distinguish Babst Calland’s environmental, health and safety practitioners from those in other firms. Many of our lawyers have more than 25 years of environmental experience. These lawyers have had the benefit of participating in the development of the primary federal and state statutory and regulatory programs, giving them a fundamental understanding of how these environmental programs apply to the firm's broad spectrum of public and private clients. Our lawyers participated in the initial implementation of, and challenge to, key provisions of what have become today's air, water and waste regulatory programs. Many of our lawyers have undergraduate and graduate degrees in environmental science or engineering, which help them to solve complex environmental problems and work with and coordinate the efforts of consultants and scientists.
