Director/Senior Attorney, Land Conservation

Land Conservation Director/Senior Attorney The Land Conservation Director/Senior Attorney will lead a team of experienced land conservation advocates who focus on safeguarding our priceless public lands to preserve critical ecological and cultural values. This includes working defensively against the onslaught of attempts to sell off public lands, protecting bedrock conservation laws, elevating targeted campaigns in priority landscapes, and promoting durable, conservation focused solutions to meeting energy demands. The Director will play an important leadership role in NRDC's lands work - joining the Lands Division Leadership team, collaborating with teams and leadership across NRDC, and engaging on external campaigns and coalitions. In addition to serving as a Senior Attorney and thought leader for Land Conservation advocacy, the Director will oversee the team's day-to-day work, engage in fundraising, guide communications efforts, and help lead priority state and federal legislative and administrative advocacy campaigns. To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable qualified individuals with disabilities to perform the following essential functions: Manage the land conservation team, which consists of lawyers, scientists and policy advocates advancing critical land conservation efforts, including public lands defense and conservation focused solutions to meeting energy demands. Develop and lead Land Conservation team strategies and goals, ensuring alignment with fundraising, institutional priorities, team members expertise and capacity, and key partnerships. Represent NRDC and the Land Conservation team as an authoritative source both internally as well as externally in public forums, including administrative proceedings, legislative committee hearings, and media outlets. Build and maintain relationships with partners, coalitions, decisionmakers, and other stakeholders to guide strategy, influence policy outcomes, and identify advocacy needs. Oversee staff performance and provide mentoring, guidance, and on-going feedback to ensure that staff develop and reach performance goals that support division priorities, institutional DEI, professional development, and management needs. Provide legal expertise and guidance to Nature Leadership and staff, including other NRDC departments, on priority strategies and related legal, technical and/or policy issues; and help develop and oversee litigation on priority public lands issues, in collaboration with NRDC's Litigation Team. The above list of duties is not comprehensive but generally demonstrates the types of matters under this position's responsibility. Other duties may be assigned.

Work is sometimes performed primarily in office. The noise level in the work environment is usually quiet in office settings and moderate in other situations. Hours of employment may sometimes require working flexible and/or longer hours, including nights and weekends, when necessitated by projects. The job includes work-related situations such as those involving challenging, important, urgent, time-sensitive, or multiple matters. NRDC is committed to advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion, both in our work and in our workplace. We believe that celebrating and actively welcoming diverse voices and perspectives is essential to solving the planet's most pressing environmental problems, and we encourage applications from candidates whose identities have been historically under-represented in the environmental movement. We are an equal opportunity employer and do not discriminate in hiring or employment on the basis of race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, marital status, sexual orientation, national origin, citizenship, age, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law. Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records. We offer competitive salaries, excellent benefits, and a supportive working environment. Salary is based on a nonprofit scale and is commensurate with skills and experience. Internal equity will be reviewed and considered to determine a final offer. For this position, the salary range is $162,000 to $180,000.