On October 31st, the US Supreme Court denied a petition for certiorari filed by private landowners in the Pavlock case, declining to consider the legal questions posed by petitioners and to require further consideration by the 7th Circuit.

Conservation Law Center seeks applications for a Senior Staff Attorney to join our team based in the beautiful Midwestern college town of Bloomington, Indiana. This is an exciting opportunity to join a growing public interest law firm working on some of the most important and challenging conservation issues in the US and beyond. The Senior Staff Attorney will be involved in all aspects of CLC’s work, including advocacy and litigation on the organization’s substantive focus areas, and helping teach students in the Conservation Law Clinic at Indiana University’s Maurer School of Law. While CLC engages in multiple kinds of conservation advocacy, roughly one-third to one-half of CLC’s work involves litigation. The Senior Attorney will be expected to contribute to CLC’s ongoing projects while also developing their own base of clients for CLC. This full-time position is open to practicing attorneys with seven or more years of experience.

Spring 2022 will be Professor Jeff Hyman’s final semester teaching the Conservation Law Clinic through Indiana University Maurer School of Law. Jeff has taught over 150 law students throughout his tenure with CLC, many of whom have gone on to practice environmental law as a career. It is safe to say he had high expectations of his students and held them to a high standard, but he also met them with honesty and respect. Clinic students have been fortunate to learn both the practice of law as well as specific areas of environmental law from such an experienced professional.

It has become clear to us that the case was not just about the Gundersons and a single beach. Nor was it just about Indiana or even just about Lake Michigan. Rather, the Gunderson case was a strategically important battle in a nationwide war over the sanctity and future of public lands in this country.

Last week, Sr. Attorney Jeff Hyman presented two panels at the Public Interest and Environmental Law Conference in Oregon. One panel on the Public Trust Doctrine and the other about the Endangered Species Act. 

The Conservation Law Center, with attorney Jeff Hyman leading the litigation, represented environmental groups Alliance for the Great Lakes and Save the Dunes in a bid to protect the public’s right to use the Lake Michigan shore as public land.

On December 7th, the Indiana Court of Appeals ruled that Indiana's Lake Michigan shoreline is held in trust for the public up to the ordinary high-water mark. The opinion, setting an important precedent, recognizes the public trust in Indiana.