Description: This training course will present to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) practitioner a set of practical skills for preparing either an Environmental Assessment (EA) / Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) or Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) that includes all the required content, as well as skills for safely leaving out content that is not necessary.  The descriptor “perfect” refers to both content that is necessary as well as to content that is not necessary.  NEPA lessons learned will also come from various project examples.

Information is provided by a substantial handout that includes graphical models, case lists that support the models, and sample documents.  The presentation includes a PowerPoint-type of graphical illustration of the models. Each attendee will take home a copy of the extensive handout, which serves as a reference in the workplace.  Major themes include: How to make the findings required by law; Timing the NEPA process to the decisionmaking process; All eight good legal reasons not to prepare an EIS; Scoping a reasonable range of alternatives; Writing the “perfect” cumulative effects analysis; and the Administrative Record.

About the Instructor: OWEN L. SCHMIDT, BA, MA, JD, has more than 32 years of service with the Federal Government.  He has served as Senior Counsel with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of the General Counsel in Portland, Oregon, where he advised the Forest Service, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and other USDA agencies in Washington and Oregon.  He was also a Special Assistant United States Attorney in the District of Oregon.
 
Before joining USDA in 1991, he was an attorney for the Bonneville Power Administration, where he joined the legal staff after several years as an Environmental Specialist. Mr. Schmidt received his J.D. from Northwestern School of Law of Lewis & Clark College (1977), and a B.A. (1969) and M.A. (1973) in biology from St. Cloud State University, Minnesota. Mr. Schmidt is a frequent author and lecturer on the National Environmental Policy Act.  He served as a Vice-Chair of the American Bar Association’s Book Publication Committee for the Section of Environment, Energy, and Resources and as a Vice President for the Ninth Circuit, The Federal Bar Association.  He was the Editor of Oregon Birds, a quarterly journal of Oregon Field Ornithologists, for 14 years (1985-99), and is a long-time member of the Oregon Bird Records Committee.