Law firms call their most successful attorneys “rainmakers,” near-miracle workers who significantly boost the firms’ revenues, reputation and prestige.

If WOC were a law firm, Dan Heilig would be its undisputed rainmaker. Now, after nearly 13 years at WOC, the past five and a half as executive director, Dan has decided to take a well-deserved period of R&R.

Dan came to Wyoming in the late 1970s drawn by the state’s mountains and work with the National Outdoor Leadership School based in Lander. He spent eight years leading courses and traveling around the world climbing before deciding to go back to school. After graduating from the University of Wyoming’s College of Law and working as a law clerk for Wyoming District Court judge Arthur Hanscum, Dan came to WOC in 1991.

As WOC’s staff attorney, Dan joined four other full-time WOC employees, including our most senior staff member, Bonnie Hofbauer. For the next seven years, Dan aptly tackled a brutal workload of detailed comments to public agencies on development proposals and complex administrative appeals and lawsuits defending Wyoming’s wild, open spaces and clean environment from ill-conceived logging, mining, and oil and gas drilling on our public lands. By the time Dan took over as executive director from Tom Throop in September, 1998, WOC had a growing reputation as Wyoming’s environmental 911—the group everyone called about threats to the state’s wildlife, wild places and environmental quality.

In his nearly six years as ED, Dan has increased WOC’s staff from five to 12, hiring talented and passionate lawyers, organizers, and media and development professionals; substantially boosted our annual budget by attracting generous individual donations and foundation grants; built strong coalitions with state, regional and national conservation partners; increased and diversified the organization’s membership; and overseen the creation of a professionally managed endowment fund to ensure WOC’s long-term financial stability.

Under Dan’s leadership, WOC has won a number of precedent-setting administrative and legal victories in the seemingly never-ending battle to protect Wyoming’s natural treasures, clear skies, clean water and quality of life from runaway industrial development and violations of environmental laws and regulations. National and international media coverage has highlighted WOC’s campaigns to protect the Red Desert, the Powder River Basin, the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and other areas of the state besieged by oil and gas drilling, logging and other environmentally destructive activities.

In mid-January, after Dan told the board of his plans, we immediately convened an eight-member ED Search Committee. The committee has developed a plan and timeline for a comprehensive and professional executive director search, including a detailed schedule of activities and firm deadlines for this important executive search effort.

Thanks to Dan’s extraordinary leadership, the bright and dedicated staff he’s attracted to WOC, and the organization’s well-deserved reputation as one of the most effective and respected environmental organizations in the West, we look forward to receiving strong applications from highly qualified candidates. We anticipate welcoming WOC’s new executive director to Lander in early August, permitting several weeks of orientation by Dan before his planned departure on August 31.

While executive director transitions inevitably involve a lot of work and some stressful moments, we are confident that with your continued support and involvement, WOC will use this opportunity to continue to grow and strengthen.

Dan has done a superb job of leading WOC and he will be greatly missed. On behalf of WOC’s staff and board, members, funders and all those who love Wyoming, I offer Dan our heartfelt thanks for his devotion to WOC and his prodigious achievements as rainmaker extraordinaire.