Jill Willis is a partner in the Environmental Law & Natural Resources practice group of the law firm of Best Best & Krieger LLP. Ms. Willis specializes in water rights and related issues. She has represented clients in complex groundwater adjudications and before the State Water Resources Control Board. She regularly assists both public agencies and private interests in matters involving water supply planning and water supply transactions. She has worked on water rights issues in the Antelope Valley, the Santa Maria Groundwater Basin, the Cucamonga Basin, the Chino Basin, the Central and West Coast Basins, the Santa Ana River, and the Colorado River, as well as numerous other groundwater and surface water systems throughout the state.
Ms. Willis is actively involved with the Association of California Water Agencies Legal Affairs Committee and is the Chair of the Urban Water Planning Task Force for the Southern California Water Committee. Ms. Willis regularly speaks at conferences throughout the state on water-related issues. She is also a member of the American Bar Association (ABA) Water Resources Committee and is Co-Chairing the ABA Annual Water Law Conference in February 2010. In addition, Ms. Willis is an adjunct professor at California State University, San Bernardino, where she teaches graduate courses on water law and administrative regulation.
Ms. Willis joined Best Best & Krieger in 2002 after working for Latham & Watkins, where she advised clients on a variety of federal and state environmental issues as well as complex insurance disputes arising from environmental liabilities. She also worked as a staff attorney for the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and served as a judicial law clerk for Judge Emmett Cox of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
Ms. Willis graduated with high honors from the University of Florida College of Law in 1997, where she served as Editor-in-Chief of the Florida Law Review and authored two student articles that were published in the Review. She graduated summa cum laude from Florida Southern College with a Bachelor of Arts in English. Ms. Willis is a member of the State Bar of California and is also licensed to practice in the District of Columbia.
Education
- University of Southern Florida, J.D. (1997)
- Florida Southern College, B.A. (1994)
Bar Admissions
- California (1999)