B I L D Board Spotlight:
Jennifer Hernandez Holland & Knight
In her role as legal counsel to the Building Industry Legal Defense Foundation, BILD, Jennifer Hernandez is our resident warrior for CEQA reform and fair housing policies that address the needs – and dreams – of blue collar and minority families. She has practiced land use and environmental law for more than 30 years and heads the West Coast Land Use and Environmental Group for the law firm Holland & Knight. She recently shared her thoughts with Southern California Builder. Southern California Builder: What got you into the law, then into litigation and then into CEQA litigation? Jennifer Hernandez: I learned to debate nuns in school without getting kicked out – a fine line – and then went to law school because I didn’t know what I wanted to do. In law school, I went into environmental law because nobody knew what it was in 1984 so it was easy to be as smart as more experienced lawyers. In 1989, I became a land use and CEQA lawyer because the University of California Office of General Counsel hired me after losing a CEQA lawsuit. They advertised the position as an “environmental” lawyer, but on my first day there, they handed me a traffic study for UC Santa Barbara. I asked why and they said it’s environmental. I said it wasn’t and they said it was, it’s CEQA. And I said, what’s SEQUA? SCB: We all think of Berkley as the kind of place that doesn’t turn out lawyers who fight for builders, often against environmental NGOs. Are we thinking wrong or are you an anomaly?
Southern California
BUILDER |
April 2021
JH: There are two Berkeleys because there are over 30 years’ worth of kids like me who grew up in blue collar and lower income families who got into college and grad school through scholarships. We share core values like upward mobility and equity – which mean working hard, owning a home, and having and taking care of your family. We didn’t have trust funds that allowed us to volunteer for cool internships and go to expensive meetings with each other to decide how “those people” should live – we were “those people” and we needed to get on with life! I’ve met some of the worst racial and sexist bigots, most contemptible elitists, and most counterproductive environmentalists in Berkeley, and that’s done a great job of keeping me calm as I work all over California and celebrate the basic decency, shared values, and common sense of regular people - qualities that often seem in short supply for too many Bezerkleyans and Bay Areans. We still live in Berkeley, but I confess I couldn’t take it during COVID-19, so my husband and I have leased a lovely apartment in Marina Del Rey – sunshine, smiles, and swimming provide a lovely contrast to the dour defeatism of our socialist and environmental overlords to the north. SCB: Holland & Knight is a big firm – more than 20 offices and 1,100 lawyers. Give us a bit on how your specialty of real estate and environmental law/litigation fits into the bigger Holland & Knight picture. JH: Holland & Knight has the nation’s largest land use practice, but when our group joined from a boutique
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