Water Fellow – Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy & the Environment
Mr. Garcia is a Water Fellow at the Getches-Wilkins Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment at Colorado Law. Additionally, he is an adjunct faculty member for Wake Forest’s Masters in the Studies of Law program, teaching the Public Law course. Prior to joining the GWC, Mr. Garcia was an enforcement attorney for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, where he worked as part of an agency-wide program to assist at-risk public water systems. He began a career focused on water and environmental issues because of his personal interest in preserving our public lands and water.

Colorado State University
Ms. Gimbel has a juris doctor degree from the University of Wyoming, a master’s degree in Mathematics from the University of Delaware and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Wyoming. She currently is the senior water policy scholar for the Colorado Water Center, based at Colorado State University. In this position she teaches a graduate seminar on water issues and develops policy strategy papers on issues facing the Colorado River and the Upper Basin states, of which Colorado is one. Before that, she served as the principal deputy assistant secretary for water and science in the Department of the Interior and was deputy commissioner for external and intergovernmental affairs for the Bureau of Reclamation. From 2008 to 2013, Gimbel was the director of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, a group within the Department of Natural Resources that works to protect and develop the state’s water resources.

Attorney , Somach Simmons & Dunn | Attorneys At Law
For over two decades, Ms. Kropf has impacted the status and outcome of some of the West’s most challenging water issues. Her experience is built on a unique combination of high-level legal work in both the private and public sectors where she has successfully handled cases with far-reaching, national implications. She is a shareholder with Somach Simmons & Dunn’s Boulder, Colorado office. Ms. Kropf joined the firm after completing an appointment as the deputy solicitor in the Water Resources Division of the U.S. Department of the Interior in Washington, D.C. She currently mediates Indian water right settlements and other Reclamation matters in New Mexico and California, represents a variety of clients in the Colorado River Basin, along with work in Oregon’s Klamath Basin, Washington State, and other Colorado, regional, and interstate water matters. She is admitted to practice law in Colorado, Arizona, and Wyoming as well as the Federal District Court, Colorado, and the United States Supreme Court. She has also served as chair of the Water Resources Committee of the American Bar Association.

Faculty Fellow, University of Colorado Law School
Mr. MacGregor is a water attorney focused on environmental justice and agricultural land preservation. He currently serves as the director of the Acequia Assistance Project, a pro bono legal service organization aiding traditional Hispano farmers in southern Colorado. He also teaches the law school’s advanced natural resources field seminar, the Law of the Colorado River, which culminates in a floating symposium and graduation in the Grand Canyon.

Chief- Interstate, Federal, and Water Information Section – Colorado Water Conservation Board
Ms. Ostdiek is the Chief of the Interstate, Federal, and Water Information Section at the Colorado Water Conservation Board. Much of her work focuses on Colorado River matters, including supporting Commissioner Becky Mitchell in her role as Colorado’s principal negotiator on interstate Colorado River matters. Prior to joining CWCB, Ms. Ostdiek was an Assistant Attorney General with the Colorado River Subunit at the Colorado Attorney General’s Office. Ms. Ostdiek is originally from rural Western Nebraska. She attended the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the University of Colorado Law School.