Legal Support Services

 

Summit provides litigation support and technical expertise within the dynamics of the regulatory environment. Summit’s staff has expertise in a wide-range of scientific and managerial disciplines and has provided legal support in areas including hydrogeology, spill response, wetland permitting, cultural resources, and natural resource assessments.

A recurring issue in environmental law is scientific and technological uncertainty. As such, most contested environmental concerns become frustrating and very expensive as each potential party puts forth resonable scientific judgements that completely contradict the other. Our success in this field has come from the recognition of the "uncertainty" and the complexities associated with environmental projects. We have performed educational seminars and developed innovative procedures to build concensus and understanding of complex projects.

An example illustrated below uses our in-house modeling and Geographic Information Systems workstations. This tool helps people with non-technical backgrounds to understand complex systems as well as providing a quantitative basis for determining the allocation of liability between parties at a clean-up site.

 

Capabilities

Our support services include:

• Technical support for litigation preparation;
• Expert witness testimony;
• Facility compliance auditing;
• Preparing professional opinions;
• Providing second opinions on the feasibility and effectiveness of proposed corrective action designs; and
• Completing audits of file information for completeness and accuracy.

Our legal support services are provided at federal, state, and local levels for both the private and public sectors. We take pride in our successes as being part of a team and providing our expertise in evaluating technical concerns.