The Secretary is the administrative head of the Agency and a member of the Governor’s Cabinet. The Agency oversees 19 state departments, boards, commissions and conservancies, including the Departments of Conservation, Fish and Game, Forestry and Fire Protection, Parks and Recreation, Water Resources, and the California Coastal Commission. The Secretary coordinates the Agency’s and departments’ policies, serves as the Governor’s representative on the Agency’s boards and commissions, and administers the California Environmental Quality Act.
Most recently, Nichols served as the Executive Director of Environment Now, a private foundation dedicated to the protection of the California environment. In 1993, she was nominated by President Clinton and confirmed by the US Senate to be United States Environmental Protection Agency’s Assistant Administrator for Air and Radiation. Nichols served as a senior staff attorney and director of the Los Angeles office of the Natural Resources Defense Council from 1989 to 1993.
She was appointed by Governor Edmund G. Brown, Jr. to the attorney seat on the California Air Resources Board in 1975, and was named chair in 1978. She also served as Secretary for Environmental Affairs, the cabinet-level agency responsible for air, water, and solid waste management that later became California Environmental Protection Agency.
Ms. Nichols was one of California’s first environmental lawyers, initiating some of the first test cases under the Federal Clean Air Act and California air quality laws while practicing as a staff attorney for the Center for Law in the Public Interest.
She has been an independent consultant, providing environmental legal services to government agencies and private clients. She also practiced environmental litigation and administrative law with a leading California law firm. While in private practice in Los Angeles she also served as a Commissioner of Parks and on the City Parks Commission in the administration of Mayor Tom Bradley.
Ms. Nichols was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota and attended school in Ithaca, New York. She received her BA from Cornell University and JD from Yale Law School.
Mary D. Nichols
Secretary for Resources
This file last modified on: Wednesday, January 6, 1999.Document URL: http://resources.ca.gov/index.html
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