• Danielle provides strategic advice to clients about what to anticipate when working with federal agencies to advance projects on public lands and how to work through challenges. She is familiar with the procedures involved in federal oil and gas leasing and permitting, authorization of renewable energy and transmission rights-of-way on public lands, and approval of hardrock mining plans of operation. Danielle understands the constraints and opportunities of the federal and state legal framework, and the factors that influence agency decision-making, including administrative policy, potential impacts to resources and resource uses, Tribal interests, interagency consultation, and public involvement.
• Danielle is adept at analyzing complex resource challenges that arise from the layered directives in agency regulations and guidance, executive policies, federal resource and environmental statutes (Federal Land Policy and Management Act, Mineral Leasing Act, Indian Mineral Development Act, General Mining Law, Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act, and Clean Water Act) and state laws. She assists clients in their analysis and planning for proposing projects on federal or tribal lands and guides them in working with agencies to refine and improve project proposals. Danielle also helps clients with participation in public comment opportunities during agency decision-making that affects their interests, such as rulemakings, resource management plans, and project proposals.

• Energy Development on Federal Public Lands
• Federal Oil and Gas and Geothermal Leasing and Permitting
• Federal Leasable, Locatable, and Saleable Mineral Authorizations
• Tribal Lands and Minerals
• Federal Land Exchanges
• Rulemaking and Policy Development for Federal Lands and Minerals
• Federal and State Mineral Interest Conflicts
• Litigation and Administrative Appeals

Publications and Presentations

• Co-Author and Presenter, “The Evolution of BLM’s Resource Management Plans,” Foundation for Natural Resources and Energy Law, Annual Institute (2025) (with B. Brennan).
• Participant, University of Wyoming Ruckleshaus Institute Workshop on the BLM Conservation and Landscape Health Rule (Nov. 2024).
• Co-Author and Presenter, “Ethics Potpourri: Observing the Ethics Rules When Assisting Clients with Federal Permit Applications and Compliance,” The Foundation for Natural Resources and Energy Law, Special Institute on Protected Wildlife (2024) (with P.C. Lowe).
• Author, “Renewable Energy on Federal Public Lands – BLM Initiatives and the Value of Regional Planning,” Natural Resources & Environment 39(1) (2024).
• Co-Author and Presenter, “Piecing it Together – A Guide to Finding NEPA Resources,” The Foundation for Natural Resources and Energy Law, Special Institute on National Environmental Policy Act (2023) (with M. Bennett).
• Presenter, “Administrative Appeals of Public Land Management Decisions”; National Association of Counties, Public Lands Policy Steering Committee Meeting, Adams County, Colorado, July 21, 2022.
• Co-Author, “Expanding Use of the Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for Renewable Energy Development on Public Lands,” Public Lands and Resources Committee Newsletter (2008) (with R.W. Watson).
• Author, “The Migratory Bird Rule and Constitutional Avoidance in Solid Waste Agency,” University of Colorado Law Review 74(2): 795 (2003).
• Co-Author, “Reproduction of Amphibians in Natural and Anthropogenic Temporary Pools in Managed Forests,” Forest Science 48: 397 (2002) (with M.L. Hunter, Jr.).

Education

• J.D., University of Colorado School of Law, 2003
• M.S., University of Maine, Wildlife Ecology, 1998
• B.A., Smith College, Biological Sciences, 1992

Bar Admissions/Qualifications

• U.S. District Court, District of North Dakota, 2025
• Colorado, 2003
• U.S. District Court, District of Colorado, 2004
• U.S. Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit, 2005

• Editor, Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation, Law of Federal Oil and Gas Leases, Chapter 19, “Administrative Procedures and Judicial Review” (LexisNexis Matthew Bender 2025, 2026)
• Member, Board of Advisors, Western Energy Alliance, 2024 to present
• Editorial Board, Foundation for Natural Resources and Energy Law Journal, 2023 to present
• Editor, Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation, American Law of Mining, Chapter 7, “Public Domain Lands Available for Leasing” (LexisNexis Matthew Bender 2024, 2025)
• Open Space Advisory Committee – Jefferson County, Colorado – Chair (2025–present), Member at Large (2022–2025)