Erik Kancler
Executive Director

Erik is a graduate of U.C. Santa Barbara’s Department of Geography where he received a B.S. in Physical Geography (1997) and an M.A. in Geography (2001). He also worked as post-graduate researcher at the Institute for Computational Earth System Science in Santa Barbara, and stemming from his work there is a published climate scientist.

Erik spent the next several years as a planning consultant in Ventura, CA with Solimar Research Group, a small think-tank and policy shop focused on issues related to regional land use planning, “smart growth,” and natural resources and open space protection in the West.

Beginning in 2003, while working at Solimar, Erik also worked as a contributing writer for California's only statewide publication dedicated to planning and development, the California Planning & Development Report, a position which he retained through 2006. Erik also worked as a freelance writer for the Ventura County Reporter, and for the better part of 2005 as an editorial fellow for Mother Jones Magazine in San Francisco before moving to Central Oregon in the summer of 2005.

In the fall of 2005, Erik took a job with Bend’s weekly newspaper, the Source Weekly, where he served as the paper's lead environmental reporter and copy editor and wrote a column on local planning and politics until joining LandWatch in October of 2006 as the group’s executive director. Although his work as a professional advocate has forced him to pull back from journalism, Erik has retained his role as a correspondent for Planetizen, the nation’s leading independent website on land use and planning.

Paul Dewey
Litigation Director

Paul is a graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law and has been an attorney in Oregon for over 25 years specializing in land use, environmental, and Indian law. He is admitted to practice in Oregon, the Federal District Court of Oregon, the Ninth Circuit, the Federal Court of Claims and the Federal Circuit, and has experience with cases involving the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act, NFMA and NEPA, and Oregon land use laws.

His private clients have included the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon, the Wilderness Society, the Oregon Natural Desert Association (in successfully stopping development on Steens Mountain and along the John Day River) and farmers in the Grand Ronde Valley (in successfully stopping Measure 37 claims). He has experience with over 30 other Measure 37 cases.

Paul has worked for two Oregon governors reviewing roadless areas in the state and was on Governor Kitzhaber’s Eastside Forest Advisory Council for 6 years. He has received a number of land use and environmental protection awards and in 2006, was recognized as Central Oregon’s Man of the Year by Bend’s weekly newspaper, the Source Weekly.

In 1986 he organized the Sisters Forest Planning Committee (now Central Oregon Landwatch) and has been active in the organization ever since. Paul has represented LandWatch in numerous land use cases before local governments, the Land Use Board of Appeals, State Circuit Court, and the Oregon Court of Appeals.

Pamela Hardy
Attorney

Pam graduated from the University of Oregon School of Law in May, 2006. While attending law school she was a Sustainable Land Use Fellow with the Environment & Natural Resources Department, the Treasurer and Conference Co-Director for the Environmental Law Society, Land Air Water as well as Treasurer and Chair for Alternative Dispute Resolution Advocates.

Her legal experience includes work with the Soda Mountain Wilderness Council and the Western Environmental Law Center for whom she did legal research and prepared court briefs while in law school. She also interned at the Land Use Board of Appeals where she worked closely with the referees to help decide cases and draft opinions. Other experience includes a summer internship with Oregon Solutions – a project of Gov. Kitzhaber’s to help implement economically, environmentally, and socially sustainable community development projects – as well as work with the University of Oregon Law School’s Alternative Dispute Resolution Department, and the Steens Mountain Advisory Council.

Prior to attending the University of Oregon, Pam worked as a freelance backcountry guide in Moab Utah, where she contracted with outfitters, non-profits and museums to lead natural & cultural history programs in the Canyonlands of the Southwest, and as Director of Education for HawkWatch International.

Pam joined LandWatch as an attorney this past August.