About Michael McNulty
Mr. McNulty is a partner in the firm’s Environmental and Natural Resources and Administrative and Regulatory Practice Groups. He concentrates his practice in water and utility law, involving issues affecting natural resources and land use regulation at the city, county, tribal, state and federal levels.
Mr. McNulty is general counsel to the Metropolitan Domestic Water Improvement District, a water utility serving 75,000 people residing north of Tucson, Arizona. He also represents other water utilities and real estate developers and a number of not-for-profit corporations including the Tucson Museum of Contemporary Art.
Prior to joining Lewis and Roca, Mr. McNulty was managing partner at the Tucson office of Brown & Bain. Mr. McNulty began his legal career as a staff attorney to the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs. He was a congressional liaison at the Office of Director Jack Gibbons, Director of the Office of Technology Assessment in the U.S. Congress. Mr. McNulty then served as the Administrative Assistant to Congressman Morris K. Udall. Moving to Tucson, Arizona, Mr. McNulty became Director of the southern branch of the Arizona Department of Water Resources.
Representative Cases/Matters
- Represented the Organizing Committee of the Metropolitan Domestic Water Improvement District, a successful customer-managed effort to purchase and manage a formerly private water utility that now serves 75,000 people in Northwest Tucson.
- Provides water rights advice to water utilities and developers, and has particular experience in obtaining “assured water supply” determinations from the Department of Water Resources under Arizona’s Groundwater Management Act of 1980.
- Provides water resource, water infrastructure, and water utility strategies for the developers of master planned communities.