JANE C. LUXTON TO BE NEW NOAA GENERAL COUNSEL

NOAA today announced that Jane C. Luxton will be named as NOAA general counsel. In this position, she will be the chief legal officer for all NOAA activities, and will serve as a policy advisor to the NOAA administrator. She will replace outgoing NOAA General Counsel James R. Walpole, who announced his retirement in February.

As general counsel, Luxton will provide overall management and leadership to more than 90 attorneys. Legal issues at NOAA include those relating to coastal zone management, operation of weather and environmental satellites, management of commercial fisheries, protection of marine mammals and endangered species, monitoring oceanic and atmospheric data and mapping and charting U.S. waters.

Luxton has been a partner at the law firm King and Spalding in Washington, D.C., since 1999. She is a member of both the environmental and Latin American practice groups. Luxton’s environmental practice currently focuses on federal and state environmental law, as well as international environmental regulation. She also has extensive experience in international trade matters.

“NOAA will greatly benefit from Jane’s extensive legal experience,” said retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad Lautenbacher, Ph.D., undersecretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. “With our broad portfolio of issues ranging from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, NOAA needs expert legal counsel from someone with the national and international experience that Jane brings.”

Luxton graduated from Harvard University and Cornell Law School. She is a member of the American Bar Association and the District of Columbia Bar.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, an agency of the U.S. Commerce Department, is celebrating 200 years of science and service to the nation. From the establishment of the Survey of the Coast in 1807 by Thomas Jefferson to the formation of the Weather Bureau and the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries in the 1870s, much of America's scientific heritage is rooted in NOAA.

NOAA is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and information service delivery for transportation, and by providing environmental stewardship of our nation's coastal and marine resources. Through the emerging Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), NOAA is working with its federal partners, more than 60 countries and the European Commission to develop a global monitoring network that is as integrated as the planet it observes, predicts and protects.