Lead Counsel

Roger Moore

Roger Moore is an advising attorney for the California Water Impact Network’s public trust legal actions.

One of California’s leading lawyers in public interest issues, Roger’s practice has included environmental, water, land use, natural resources, energy, and constitutional law at all levels of litigation in the federal and California state courts, and in administrative proceedings and negotiations. 

A Chicago native, Roger took his BA in political science with highest honors from Swarthmore College and his JD with honors from Harvard Law School. Following his degrees, he moved to California to serve in a judicial clerkship. He subsequently worked with University of California environmental law professor Joseph Sax, the nation’s leading authority on the public trust doctrine’s application to water resources.

In private practice, Roger has emphasized the role of the public trust in the protection of the Bay/Delta, the Owens Valley, the Central Valley, the Colorado River, and the communities surrounding Oroville Dam from unsustainable diversions, exposure to contaminants, and planning decisions that fail to account for climate change. In every aspect of his practice, Roger seeks accountable and informed decision-making from lawmakers and officials and the sustainable management of land, surface water, and groundwater in a changing physical and regulatory climate.

He is an advisor to and former officer of the executive committee of the California Lawyers Association’s Environmental Law Section, has organized and spoken on many legal conference panels, and has written extensively on the nexus points among environmental law and water law in an era of climate change emergency.

In his work as a litigator, Roger has protected California environmental law from federal preemption; prevented financing and construction of destructive freeway and water diversion projects; challenged lax nuclear waste radiation standards; and opposed deficient review of major water contracts. He has developed a deep expertise in focusing judicial attention on the disparity between “paper water” and deliverable water, and the subsequent need for accountable decision making.

Roger has gained wide renown as an authority on California water issues and is often contacted by the media on water policy and law. He was interviewed for the National Geographic Documentary, Water & Power: A California Heist, which debuted at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival.

In his spare time, Roger is – in his own words – a percussionist of great passion and questionable quality. He has worked part-time as a music reviewer, completed 15 marathons at a leisurely pace, coached school teams in creative problem-solving competitions, and pursued an interest in the culinary arts, often resulting in severely scorched paella pans.