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Trip Pollard

Senior Attorney and Land and Community Program Leader

Trip develops and leads SELC’s program to promote cleaner, more equitable transportation and smarter growth. He identifies key opportunities to improve transportation and land use policies and projects both regionally and nationally. Those opportunities include legal cases and policy reforms, and he collaborates with other SELC team members to assess and decide strategy. And he writes articles and op-eds that raise awareness of the most pressing transportation and land use issues. Based in Richmond, he is also the point person for most on-the-ground transportation and land use policy work with Virginia’s top state officials and General Assembly.

With SELC since 1992, in addition to his legal work, Trip advocates for and coordinates resources for program staff, and helps mentor new team members. He manages relationships with key program funders and partners and helps develop grant proposals with the development and communications teams.

Trip played a key role in drafting and helping pass Virginia’s Clean Cars legislation, expected to reduce more carbon pollution than any policy the Commonwealth has adopted. He worked to pass record transit and rail funding in Virginia as well. He is proud of protecting significant natural resources by advocating to stop destructive highway proposals such as a new Route 460 that would have destroyed more wetlands than any other highway project in Virginia. He also helped stop a proposed raw water intake, pump station, and pipeline at Rassawek, the historic capital of the Monacan Indian Nation and a sacred site for the tribe in Virginia. 

I am deeply committed to protecting and enhancing both the natural and human environment—including ensuring clean, thriving communities for all.

Trip Pollard

“SELC makes an enormous difference in addressing the pressing environmental issues we face and is increasingly focused on the social justice aspects of these issues as well. And since I have lived my whole life in the South, I am particularly committed to working on these issues in this region.

  Previous Experience

  • Assistant City Attorney, Alexandria, Va.
  • One of SELC’s first law interns
  • J.D., University of Virginia School of Law
  • M.A., University of Virginia
  • B.A., University of Virginia, with high honors 
  • With SELC since 1992