NEPA Workshops: Meet Our Speakers

Carolyn Nelson

Instructor
Licensed Civil Engineer
Director for the Environmental Analysis & Compliance Division of PHMSA

Carolyn Nelson is a Licensed Civil Engineer who works as the Director for the Environmental Analysis & Compliance Division of PHMSA. She is responsible for providing technical assistance for NEPA compliance and other related environmental laws and Executive Orders including EJ & Equity guidance. Carolyn has over 30 years’ experience as a geometric design engineer and NEPA practitioner. She is also Co-Chair of the White House Environmental Justice Interagency Council (IAC), NEPA Committee, and is recognized as a national expert for NEPA compliance and Environmental Justice implementation.

Carolyn has worked at the Federal Highway Administration Headquarters Office and in the FHWA Michigan Division Office. Prior to FHWA, she worked for the Michigan DOT and CH2M Hill Consultants (now Jacobs). She holds both B.S. and M.S. degrees in Civil Engineering from Southern University and A&M College in Baton Rouge, LA and Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan respectively.

Back to NEPA Home

Chuck Nicholson, Ph.D.

Instructor
NAEP Board Member, Chair NEPA Practice Group
Senior Environmental Planner/Scientist, HDR

Dr. Nicholson has been a NAEP Member for over 10 years and is an elected NAEP Board Member and chair of the NEPA Practice Group. Chuck has 43 years of professional experience in the environmental and natural resources fields and 23 years as a NEPA compliance specialist. He has extensive experience in the preparation of EIS, EA, and CE documentation for a wide range of actions. Chuck earned his Ph.D. in Ecology & Evolutionary Biology from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2004, an MS in Wildlife Management from the University of Maine in 1978, and a BS in Wildlife and Fisheries from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 1975. 

Back to NEPA Home

Courtney Arena

Instructor
NAEP Regional Chapter Representative
Principal Environmental Scientist, Gannett Fleming, Inc.

Courtney Arena is responsible for leading, managing, marketing, and executing a variety of environmental services for energy, water resources and transportation infrastructure projects. Her expertise includes National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) documentation, Project Development and Environment studies (PD&E/NEPA) for the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) with public involvement participation, air quality and traffic noise studies, contamination screenings, wetland identification and delineation, and protected species and habitat assessments. Her water resources background and project experience includes working with the US Army Corps of Engineers, Natural Resource Conservation Service, and the South Florida Water Management District. Courtney’s expertise extends to solar site development, ecosystem restoration, protected species monitoring, and regulatory permitting with federal, state, and local agencies.

Courtney has 25 years of experience in Florida and the southeast region. She studied Marine Biology at UNC Wilimington, where she earned her B.S. She earned a M.S. in South Flolrida from Nova Southeastern University’s Oceanographic Center.

Courtney currently serves on the NAEP Board as the Florida Chapter Representative. She also serves a reciprocal role on the FAEP Board as the NAEP Chapter Representative.

Back to NEPA Home

Emily Gulick

Instructor
NAEP Elected At-Large Board Member
Environmental Planner, Jacobs Engineering

Emily Gulick (she/her) is an Environmental Planner/Scientist at Jacobs. She specializes in implementing National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) including writing and preparing EISs and EAs for federal agencies such as NASA, DoD, and NSF. She also has experience in California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), working on transportation- and infrastructure-related projects. Emily currently leads the NAEP EJ Working Group Lead.

Back to NEPA Home

Fred Wagner

Instructor
NAEP Elected At-Large Board Member
Partner, Venable LLP

Heather Miller

Instructor
NAEP Member
Principal Historian, Historical Research Associates, Inc.

Dr. Heather Lee Miller joined HRA in 2005 and works in both HRA’s History and CRM divisions. On the history side of the house, Heather has worked on complex research and writing projects pertaining to federal, state, and local environmental and tribal litigation. On the CRM side of the house, Heather works on projects related to cultural resources management, Section 106/110 and NEPA/SEPA compliance, the development of historic contexts, inventory and evaluation, and mitigation reports. From 2007–2015, she served as the lead of HRA’s aboveground history program (a subsection of HRA’s Cultural Resource Management division) before returning to focus more closely on litigation support projects, specifically regarding chlorinated solvents, PFAS, PAHs, PCBs, hexavalent chromium, and 1,4 dioxane, to name a few. An effective project manager with a strong grasp on cultural resources compliance and history as well as an eye for detail, Heather also has exemplary research, writing, and editorial skills, having worked for over two decades in scholarly journal and book editing. She has served as HRA’s marketing director since 2014 and became Vice President of Business Development in 2018.

Back to NEPA Home

Jack Allen

Instructor
NAEP Member
Environmental Planner, Avenue Consultants

Jack Allen has 38 years of experience in the field and is a national resource in transportation NEPA and known for unprecedented depth of knowledge leading to best informed project decision making. His timely delivery of balanced environmental policy compliance 12 state DOTs illustrates an ability to meet client expectations immediately. He has led all facets - from process strategy to agency and public outreach to impact analyses to primary author. His successful experience on contentious, high-profile projects exemplifies a diplomatic, outside-the-box approaches when needed. Jack has been responsible for many “firsts” in the industry including: 

• FHWA legal sufficiency considered the EIS completed in 29 months one of the best submitted to the agency at that time 
• Successfully designed and implemented first partnering application to the EIS process at the DOT level 
• Primary author of state DOT’s first “reader-friendly” hybrid format EIS; elements of which are now considered as portions of the state DOT’s NEPA document templates 
• Provided Design Builder with strategic assessment on ATCs leading to $450 million in savings on project of national significance 
• Applied innovative approaches to purpose and need justification and alternatives development and screening at the project level 
• Successfully led first efforts to implement NEPA/404 Merger Process at the project level 

Back to NEPA Home

Jomar Maldonado

Instructor
NAEP Member
Director for NEPA, Council on Environmental Quality

Jomar Maldonado is the Director for the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) at the Council on Environmental Quality. In this role, he provides policy guidance to Federal agencies and regulatory interpretation to assist with their compliance with NEPA. Jomar has over 15 years of environmental policy and legal experience within the Federal government working on environmental review matters such as NEPA, Environmental Justice, Endangered Species Act, Floodplain Management, Wetlands Protection, and similar requirements. Prior to joining CEQ Jomar worked as the Project Development Team Lead within the Office of Environmental Review and Project Development for the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). His career includes 7 years as an environmental attorney with the Program Legal Services in FHWA and 7 years in the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Office of Environmental Planning and Historic Preservation, where he functioned as the Agency’s Environmental Officer. In his various roles, he has worked on many complex issues such as the assignment of NEPA responsibilities to States, initiatives to expedite permitting of Federal projects, resiliency/ hazard mitigation, floodplain reviews, environmental review of the National Flood Insurance Program, Buy America requirements, contract administration for highway projects, environmental justice considerations, and tolling and innovative financing for highways.

Back to NEPA Home

Kimberly Wetzel, AICP

Instructor/Moderator (In Person)
NAEP Regional Chapter Representative
Senior Environmental Planner, Jacobs 

Kim Wetzel (she/her) is an environmental and land use planner based in the Jacobs Portland, Oregon office with 20 years of experience in environmental planning, environmental justice, and public engagement for a wide range of infrastructure projects throughout the West and Alaska. She currently serves on the board of the National Association of Environmental Professionals (NAEP), Northwest AEP, and the City of Hillsboro Planning & Zoning Hearings Board.

Back to NEPA Home

Kris W. Thoemke, Ph.D., CEP

Instructor (Virtual)
NAEP Member
Senior NEPA Specialist at Barge Design Solutions

Kris’ career began as a marine biologist doing research and consulting work on projects in the coastal zones of Florida and Louisiana. Over time he began conducting National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) assessments and has focused on NEPA work for the past 15 years. He has prepared EAs and EISs for the US Army Corps of Engineers (Corps), Tennessee Valley Authority, Federal Aviation Administration, US Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The Corps has selected him to serve as an expert panel member on 11 Independent Environmental Peer Review (IEPR) panels assessing major Corps public works projects requiring an EA or EIS. He also is a part-time faculty member at American Public University System teaching graduate level classes in NEPA, Environmental Policy, Regulation and Law, Conservation Biology, and Restoration Ecology. He is a Board member of the NAEP and is a Certified Environmental Professional by the Academy of Board Certified Environmental Professionals.

Back to NEPA Home

Krish Vijayaraghavan

Instructor (Virtual)
NAEP Member
Principal at Ramboll

Krish Vijayaraghavan is a Principal at Ramboll with over 20 years of experience in environmental modeling. Krish has directed Environmental Impact Statements and Environmental Assessments under NEPA to assess and disclose impacts for power, renewable energy, conventional energy, airports, aviation, surface transportation, reclamation, mining, and other natural resource projects with agency stakeholders from BLM, EPA, BOEM, FAA, USACE, NHTSA, OSMRE, BOR, FRA, USAF, NPS, USFWS and other agencies. Krish is on the Ramboll Americas Impact Assessment Leadership team. His technical area of expertise is air quality and greenhouse gas/climate change analysis. Krish has published over 40 peer-reviewed papers in scientific journals and co-authored two technical books. He holds an M.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Kansas and an M.S. in Environmental Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Back to NEPA Home

Marie Campbell

Instructor
NAEP Elected At-Large Board Member
President, Sapphos Environmental, Inc.

Michael Drummond

Instructor
Director for Permitting and Innovation
Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ)

Michael Mayer

Instructor
NAEP President
Principal Environmental Project Manager at HDR

Michael Hendrix

Instructor
NAEP Member
Chair, AEP Climate Change Committee

Nicolas Frederick

Moderator (Virtual)
NAEP Treasurer
Director of Conservation and Planning, DAWSON

Nic Frederick has over 12 years of experience managing environmental projects, including NEPA, Natural Resources, and public involvement. He is an at-large board member with NAEP and heads the communications committee. As a member of the board, he has helped spearhead the initiative to broaden the scope of services offered by NAEP. He is also the cohost of the NAEP podcast, Environmental Professionals Radio. As the Director of Conservation and Planning at DAWSON, he is responsible for the development of DAWSON's core competencies related to environmental policy. He has provided general Conservation and Planning services to a wide variety of federal and state clients and has been an integral part of the development of these services for DAWSON.

Back to NEPA Home

Rich Walter

Instructor
NAEP Member
Vice President, Environmental Planning 

Rich Walter has 29 years of experience in environmental planning, compliance strategy, permitting, and mitigation development and implementation. He serves as project director/environmental lead for environmental planning for large-scale infrastructure projects for public agencies and private clients. He has worked with a wide variety of federal agencies on NEPA compliance including FRA, FTA, FAA, NPS, BLM, USACE, USFWS, and FERC. Rich has also led ICF’s California Municipal Climate Action Planning practice since 2006 which has developed climate action plans, greenhouse gas (GHG) inventories for hundreds of communities across the U.S., general plan policies for climate change, cost-benefit analyses of emission reduction strategies, climate adaptation studies (including sea-level rise), as well as numerous California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) documents addressing GHG emissions and adaptation. 

Back to NEPA Home

Ron Lamb

Instructor
NAEP Member, Former Board Member
CEP Emeritus

Ron is a senior NEPA project manager and former NEPA program manager for the U.S. Marine Corps (retired 2022). At his retirement was awarded the Superior Civilian Service Award—the highest honorary award the Commandant of the Marine Corps may bestow on a civilian employee. In 2023 Ron was awarded the Dr. Richard Kramer Memorial Award by the Academy of Board Certified Environmental Professionals (ABCEP). In 2016-2017 Ron was detailed to the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) where he served as the Deputy Associate Director for NEPA to support administration transition and NEPA guidance and procedures. In 2014 he was detailed to the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Environment (DASN-E) to serve as Acting Director for Environmental Planning and Terrestrial Ecology. Ron was a Vice President at HDR|e2M where his clients included the Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, Air Force, Bureau of Land Management, General Services Administration, National Park Service, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and NASA.

Ron has been an elected member of the NAEP Board of Directors and led the NEPA Working Group. Ron holds an M.S. in Environmental Science from Johns Hopkins University and his Certificate in NEPA from the Duke University Nicholas School of the Environment.  

Back to NEPA Home

Rona Spellecacy

Instructor/Moderator (In Person)
NAEP Past-President
Senior Environmental Project Manager, HDR 

Rona is a senior environmental project manager at HDR with 20 years of experience managing multi-disciplinary teams for a wide variety of projects for both public and private clients. She has managed the environmental review process for complex and high-profile projects in the Pacific Northwest and served as environmental manager for the SR 520 Bridge Replacement Program. Rona is a Project Management Professional (PMP) certified by the Project Management Institute (PMI). She served as President of the National Association of Environmental Professionals (NAEP) (2021-2023) and is a Certified Environmental Professional (CEP) by the Academy of Board Certified Environmental Professionals. She holds certification from the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP) and is a member of the American Planning Association. She has been recognized by HDR as a Senior Professional Associate for her commitment to quality and technical excellence. Rona is the Environmental Director for HDR's Power, Industrial, and Waste Sectors. 

Back to NEPA Home

Scott Phillips, MA

Instructor
NAEP Member
Senior Technical Director, SWCA Environmental Consultants, Inc.

Scott Phillips is a subject matter expert in heritage preservation and cultural resources management, including as it intersects with environmental planning. As Senior Technical Director at large, he provides this expertise nationwide on behalf of SWCA Environmental Consultants, where he has been since 2001. Scott began his career in cultural resources management in 1990. He received his M.A. in Anthropology (cultural focus) from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Back to NEPA Home

Ted Boling

Instructor
NAEP Member
Partner, Perkins Coie

Ted Boling served as the country’s top National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) attorney as an associate director at the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) in the Executive Office of the President. He also served at CEQ, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) in Democratic and Republican administrations. Ted currently advises leaders on transportation and energy development projects, agencies that must hire outside counsel, and the environmental professionals that support them on the development of renewable energy, resource development, transportation, and infrastructure. He has drafted NEPA guidance on mitigation and monitoring, cumulative impacts analysis, and the development categorical exclusions from detailed NEPA documentation. He advised the White House on the establishment of numerous national monuments, including the first marine national monuments in the United States and the largest marine protected areas in the world. He also assisted in briefing three U.S. Supreme Court cases. Ted has handled matters involving energy development on the outer continental shelf, including offshore wind power development, and the fast track for solar and wind energy projects on public lands. 

Back to NEPA Home

Ward Marotti

Instructor
NAEP Elected At-Large Board Member
Director: Land and Water Resources, Spangler Environmental, Inc.

For more than 30 years, Ward Marotti has completed hundreds of public and private environmental compliance and permitting projects, including CWA 404/401 Individual and Nationwide permits, NEPA and SEPA EAs and EISs, water quality variances, Endangered Species Act Section 7 and 10 impact permits and conservation plans, protected species relocation plans, and watershed use re-classifications. Ward is the Past President of the National Association of Environmental Professionals (NAEP) North Carolina Chapter. He served on the recently affiliated South Carolina Chapter’s inaugural board. In January 2023 Ward was elected as an at-large member of NAEP’s national Board of Directors and currently serves on its Education and Conference Committees and chairs its Chapters Committee.

Back to NEPA Home