Michael Rayle Email & Phone Number

Provide team leadership (5 employees and members) in estimating project costs, assigning tasks to team members and communicating with stakeholders (clients, regulatory agencies, attorneys, land owners, oyster leaseholders). Develop relationships with new clients and maintain relationships with established clients. Maintain ongoing professional relationships with other contractor personnel and regulatory personnel at Local, State and Federal regulatory agencies.Managing Partner was responsible for the supervision of field natural resource data collection for more than 100 Louisiana Department of Natural Resources Coastal Use Permits and USACE Section 404 Permits. This required the assembly and analysis of data collected, data interpretation and reporting to clients, regulatory agencies, attorneys and, occasionally courts over most of the central Gulf Coast (Mississippi Sound through Galveston Bay). Provide mentoring and training for new professionals and technicians.Prepare damage compensation estimates of actual, project based, natural resources damages for landowners, mineral lease holders and other clients. Plan, task manage, and act as senior expert witness in numerous oyster litigation cases. Review demands from attorneys representing other stakeholders claiming natural resources damages and provide scientifically based compensation estimates to clients and their attorneys to rebut plaintiff expert witness inflated demands and quantify reasonable, data based damaged resources. Conduct natural resources damage assessments in anticipation of litigation. Testify in depositions and in Federal and State courts as an expert witness in aquatic biology and oyster biology.

Establish a new environmental consulting firm, based on 24+ years of experience in providing natural resources input to environmental assessments, Coastal Use Permit applications, COE Section 404 and Section 10 Permits, NRDA compliance documents and oyster resource assessments. Bring clients from previous employer to the newly established company and retain them. This included one client with over 500 individual jobs, one with over 150 jobs and numerous clients with 10-25 individual jobs.Plan, mobilize, sample, analyze oyster habitat and standing crop (population) data and prepare assessment reports for eight CWPPRA (Coastal Wetlands Planning and Protection Act) projects for the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources. These projects were used to protect and restore coastal wetlands impacted by both natural factors and navigation projects. Provide expert witness consulting to the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources in a lawsuit brought by oyster leaseholders over the opening of the Caernarvon Fresh Water Diversion for St. Bernard Parish oyster leases (Gene Alonzo, Jr. et al v State of Louisiana, et al). Testify in depositions and in State courts as an expert witness in aquatic biology and oyster biology. The Supreme Court of Louisiana ultimately ruled for the State. Provide the same services to the U.S. Department of Justice in defending the USACE-GD from claims by Galveston Bay oystermen in Fisherman's Harvest, Inc., et al, v. The United States and Weeks Marine, Inc., No. 05-840 C and No. 05-1044 C.

Developed scientifically based methods to collect bottom type (habitat mapping) and oyster population data. In the late 1970’s, data was rarely quantitative, usually qualitative, samples were never replicated and habitat mapping was rudimentary at best. Introduced diver collected replicate samples to oyster assessment surveys submitted to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife & Fisheries and the plotting of bottom habitat data on lines of longitude and latitude. Conducted over 500 Oyster Resource Surveys required by the Louisiana Department of Wildlife & Fisheries for Louisiana Department of Natural Resources - Coastal Management Division Coastal Use Permits.Performed surveys of actual and potential damage to oyster reef communities from various types of hydrocarbon pollution (oil, drilling mud, chemical spills) and physical destruction (grounding, dredging, seismic surveys) involving 10,000 acres and hun¬dreds of oyster leases across southeast Louisiana. This work was performed for both plaintiffs and defendants on different occasions.Monitoring of 1997 Bonnet Carre’ Spillway Opening for USACE-NOD to determine the impacts on oyster resources in Lake Borne and Mississippi Sound. Author of the oyster impacts assessment portion of the report. This task was essentially an Environmental Assessment (EA) of the Spillway opening impacts on oyster production in Lake Borgne and Mississippi Sound. (Contract DACW29-96-D-0009, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans, Louisiana)Provide Expert Witness consulting to the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources in a lawsuit brought by oyster leaseholders over alleged impacts from the opening of the Caernarvon Fresh Water Diversion for Plaquemines Parish oyster leases (Avenal, et al v State of Louisiana, et al). The Supreme Court of Louisiana ultimately ruled for the State.

M.S., Biological Sciences Benthic Ecology

Activities and Societies: BBB Biological Honor Society

B. A., Biological Sciences

Activities and Societies: BBB Biological Honor Society