Prior to joining the TJSL faculty in the fall of 2003, Professor Kass practiced law for close to a decade in the Seattle offices of Preston Gates & Ellis (now K&L Gates) and Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe where her practice focused primarily in the areas of land use and environmental compliance and litigation. Prior to entering private practice, she conducted immunology research at Harvard Medical School, served as the Research Editor of the Berkeley Women’s Law Journal and clerked for the Massachusetts State Superior Court.
She currently serves on the Executive Committee of the AALS Natural Resources Section, on the Editorial Board of the ABA’s National Resources & Environment publication, as a Vice-Chair of the ABA Endangered Species Committee, and as a faculty advisor for the TJSL Environmental Law Society and Outlaw student organizations. She has also served on the Editorial Board of the Washington State Bar Association Environmental and Land Use Law Newsletter, as Chair of the Public Interest Grant Selection Committee of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Bar Association of Washington (QLaw), and as a Visiting Professor at the University of Seattle School of Law. Her primary areas of teaching and scholarship are environmental and natural resources law.
Courses include:
Environmental Law, Natural Resources Law, Scholarly Legal Writing, Torts I & II, Wildlife & Marine Life Law
Issue Editor, Natural Resources & Environment Volume 28:2 (Fall 2013), 28:1 ABA Natural Resources & Environment (2013) (with Laurie Ristino)
Issues Editor (2002-present), Natural Resources & Environment (American Bar Ass’n Section of Environment, Energy and Resources)
Hubris and Humility in Environmental Law, 2 Geo. Wash. J. Energy & Envtl. L. (2011)
Educating the Next Generation of Environmental Lawyers, 25 Nat. Resources & Env’t. 52 (2010)
A NEPA-Climate Paradox: Taking Greenhouse Gases into Account in Threshold Significance Determinations, 42 Ind. L. Rev. 47 (2009)
A Least Bad Approach for Interpreting ESA Stealth Provisions, 32 Wm. & Mary Env. L. & Pol'y Rev. 427 (2008)
Is the Atmosphere Half Empty or Half Full?, 22 Natural Resources & Env. 52 (Spring 2008)
Little NEPAs Take on Climate Goliath, 23 Natural Resources & Env. 40 (Fall 2008)
Vantage Point, 22 Natural Resources & Env. (Fall 2007)
Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act: A for Effort, 21 Natural Resources & Env. 52 (Spring 2007)
The National Park Service Management Policies Controversy, 20 Natural Resources & Env. 68 (Spring 2006)
Vantage Point, 19 Natural Resources & Env. (Winter 2005), with Arnold Lum
Wetlands Turnabout, 18 Natural Resources & Env. 62 (Spring 2004)
Threatened Extinction of the Plain Vanilla Rule?: The Emergence of Complex 4(d) Rules and Local Government Response, 16 Natural Resources & Env. 78 (2001)
The Puget Sound Salmon 4(d) Rule, in the American Bar Association, Endangered Species Committee Newsletter (November 1999)
The Statewide Strategy to Recover Salmon: A Work in Progress, Washington State Bar Association Environment & Land Use Law Newsletter (Winter 1999)
Brownfields: Where the Market Makes Green, Natural Resources & Env. 345 (1998), with Bridgen and Lee
Special Committee on Climate Change and Sustainable Development 1997 Annual Report, Natural Resources, Energy, and Environmental Law: The Year in Review (1997), with Kosloff, Hodas, Fang, Miller, Goldberg and Kirkpatrick
The Future of Environmental Law and Regulation, a background paper for Thinking Ecologically: The Next Generation of Environmental Law and Policy, Yale Univ. Press (1997)
Land Use: So You Really Think You Can Get This Project Approved, written for a legal education seminar sponsored by the King County Bar Assoc. & the Univ. of Washington Law School (1997)
New Source Review and BACT, written with R. Macfarlane for a legal education seminar on the Clean Air Act, Seattle, Washington (1993)
New Federal CFC Labeling Regulations, Environmental Litigation and Practice Group Update (June 1993)
Key Note Speaker, Seattle Journal for Environmental Law Annual Banquet and Volume Launch, Seattle Law School, Seattle, WA (April 16, 2015)
"Death by Plastic," Seattle University Sullivan Leadership Day, Seattle University, Seattle, WA (January 19, 2013)
Moderator, Wind, Water, Weather & Endangered Species Act, ABA's 20th Fall Section Meeting on Environmental, Energy, and Resources Law, Austin, TX, October 11, 2012
An invited speaker at a Professors' Workshop titled: Curriculum Adaptation: Teaching Environmental Law in an Era of Climate Change and Other Global Challenges, Pace Law School, New York
Introduction to Legal Analysis and Writing in the United States, UCSD English Language Program, San Diego, CA, Dec. 2004
Panel Moderator, The Endangered Species Act at 30, Conference at Lewis & Clark School of Law, Portland, OR, 2004
