Gray Montrose joins VCPC as assistant director

The Virginia Coastal Policy Center at W&M Law School welcomes a new assistant director, Gray Montrose. Prior to joining VCPC, Montrose worked in the Virginia Attorney General’s office in the environmental sector, where her work focused on the Clean Air Act, dam safety, land use for preserved lands, and agricultural best management practices.

In this role, she also served as counsel to the Environmental Justice Council and as a liaison between the Attorney General’s office and Virginia tribes. As assistant director, Montrose will work with VCPC students and Virginia’s coastal communities participating in the Resilience Adaptation Feasibility Tool (RAFT), in addition to other projects.

“I’m excited to get to work with students who will be agents of change down the road, and also getting to work with communities for sea level resiliency to address their day-to-day challenges,” Montrose said.

Montrose’s passion for conserving Virginia’s cultural resources has carried across her work. She earned a master’s in architectural history from the University of Virginia and has worked for the Virginia Department of Historic Resources. She became interested in the law as a tool to create solutions and earned a legal degree from the University of Richmond School of Law.

“Gray brings critically important perspectives on cultural and historic resources,” Virginia Sea Grant Director Troy Hartley said. “Her experience will strengthen VCPC, VASG, and the entire Sea Grant legal network well as we continue to work on the front lines of coastal adaptation and building resilience, and answer questions like ‘How do we protect the most vulnerable in society? How do we respect cultural and historic resources, as waters rise and coastlines change?’”

Outside of work, Montrose has been working to restore a house from the 1860s and learn about the home’s history. The restoration process has included searching through newspaper archives for clues about previous owners, reading through old letters, and traveling across state lines in search of authentic building materials for restoration.

Contributed Photos by Gray Montrose 
Photos by Aileen Devlin | Virginia Sea Grant

Published March 25, 2021.