Thomas Ruppert

Thomas Ruppert works with the Florida Sea Grant College Program as a statewide specialist in coastal planning. Mr. Ruppert is a licenced Florida attorney whose work with Florida Sea Grant focuses on hazard mitigation, post-disaster recovery planning, environmental protection, marine spatial planning, and associated long-term challenges and opportunities of Florida’s coastal communities. In this role, Mr. Ruppert provides assistance to agents and local governments served by Florida Sea Grant. Mr. Ruppert’s areas of expertise include beach and coastal policy in Florida, Florida’s coastal construction control line permitting, comprehensive planning law, sea turtle habitat protection, the Endangered Species Act, coastal and marine permitting programs, and 5th amendment takings law. From 2007 to 2010 Mr. Ruppert with the University of Florida extension system and the UF Levin College of Law’s Conservation Clinic in supervising law student work on conservation-related legal issues. Additional environmental issues with which Mr. Ruppert has worked include the Clean Water Act’s total maximum daily load program, water quality trading, low-impact development stormwater, homeowners’ associations, and boating law issues.

Mr. Ruppert speaks fluent Spanish and has worked and presented in several Latin American countries. Topics in this realm have included human rights, water, land use planning, property issues, and U.S. environmental law.