Peter Goldman
By Matthew Cohen
In March 1980 Peter Goldman was enjoying a year of work and travel between college and law school when he received a phone call that changed his life. Peter’s father died prematurely, leaving a substantial inheritance to his three children. At the time, the management of a family fortune could not have been farther from Peter’s mind. Like many other Baby Boomers, Peter was planning to migrate to Seattle from the East Coast because he loved the mountains of the Northwest. He planned to attend Seattle University Law School. Toward this end, he packed his belongings into an old Volkswagen and moved to Seattle.
At first, Peter viewed his inheritance more as a distraction than a resource. Peter did not aspire to lead a life of luxury. To the contrary, he lived a Spartan lifestyle, studied hard to learn the law, but found time on weekends to hike the Cascades, often in the company of a fellow law student named Martha Kongsgaard. Upon graduation Peter clerked for Justice James Dolliver of the Washington Supreme Court, and landed a job as a Deputy King County Prosecutor.
He spent eleven years in the Prosecutor’s Office. In the early years he tried over fifty jury trials. Later he concentrated in felony appeals. On weekends Peter climbed mountains, courted Martha, and volunteered in local political campaigns on behalf of environmentally progressive candidates. He joined the Washington Environmental Council Legal Committee, and tried to handle as much pro bono environmental work as his daytime job allowed.
Peter pursued all of these activities with the passion that is his hallmark. In 1987, he tried to climb the north face of Mount Everest, and reached 26,000 feet before bad weather derailed a summit attempt. Several years later he reached the summit of Pakistan’s Broad Peak, the twelfth highest mountain in the world.
Peter and Martha exchanged wedding vows in 1988. They were ready to start a family, but they also agreed that they would devote their public careers to improving the quality of life for Seattle and the Northwest. They soon decided that they could leverage their assets to accomplish more for the causes they support. In 1988 Peter and Martha established the Kongsgaard-Goldman Foundation, a family foundation that funds grants to non-profit organizations in the Northwest.
In 2003 the Foundation made 85 grants to organizations ranging from the Seattle Public Library Foundation to the Alaska Wilderness League. Peter joined the boards of directors of the Seattle University Law School, the Anti-Defama-tion League, the Friends of the Methow and the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy.
In 1997 Peter left the Prosecutor’s office to learn the craft of public interest environmental law by volunteering at Earthjustice, a national environmental law firm. A year later he founded the Washington Forest Law Center, a non-profit law firm that works to ensure that forest practices on state and private land comply with state and federal environmental laws.
Most charitable foundations draw a line between reviewing grant applications and shouldering the burdens of their grantees. Peter has a different approach to philanthropy and to life--he gets personally involved. As the lead attorney at the Washington Forest Law Center, he spends weeks each year briefing and arguing cases before the Forest Practices Appeals Board in Olympia and in the courts.
In 1997 a group of Eastside community activists needed to borrow $1.8 million to purchase a 12 mile railroad right of way from the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad for conversion to a recreational trail. Peter and Martha pledged some of the money themselves, and recruited a small group of Seattle donors to put up the balance of the purchase price. But that was just the beginning.
Over the course of the next seven years, Peter worked with other trail supporters to persuade the King County Council to acquire and develop the East Lake Sammamish Trail, defended it against lawsuits, and testified at public hearings in support of the necessary permits to build the trail. When the Sammamish City Council stalled the project, Peter worked with Washington Conservation Voters to elect a more trail-friendly City Council. Today, after seven years, the Trail still has not opened in Sammamish, but the finish line is within sight. Throughout the long process Peter’s commitment to the project never wavered. In the words of Peter’s partner Toby Thaler, “He just doesn’t give up.”
Peter’s campaigns to protect forests and build trails are waged with passion and persistence, but he does not allow his zeal for the environment to translate into disrespect for his adversaries or for the legal profession. John Hempelmann, a leading timber industry lawyer who has battled Peter for a decade in administrative and judicial proceedings, portrays Peter as “a fine fellow with a great heart, who puts his money where his ideas are.” John notes that litigating with Peter is like the “old days:” they can make a deal by handshake, without need for a confirming letter. “He has never pulled a quickie.” John also noted that Peter, unlike some environmental advocates, knows how to compromise.
Hempelmann credits Peter and a few allies for saving the 36,000 acre I-90 land exchange between Plum Creek Timber and the Forest Service, by realizing that perfection in the public land arena can prove elusive, and that a deal may be better than stalemate, even if it is not perfect.
For the last fifteen years, Peter Goldman has tried to balance a rich family life with a full time career in public interest law and advocacy. Peter and Martha have three sons, currently 15, 13 and 11. All three are Junior Olympic skiers, and Peter spends most winter weekends attending ski races with his boys. Peter has ridden the Seattle to Portland bike ride on a tandem with one of his kids seven times, and the boys have seen more than their share of political fundraisers. Everyone who works with Peter remarks that he is overcommitted, and Peter would be the first to agree. For Peter and Martha, however, raising three strong boys with healthy values trumps all other commitments. As Toby Thaler observed, “The kids come first.”
In the years ahead, Peter envisions that he will delegate to others the trench warfare of litigating administrative appeals, and focus on broad strategies to achieve environmental protection goals.
In recent years Peter has invested money and time not only in amending statutes and rules, but also in electing environmentally responsible public officials. Those campaigns, often conducted in alliance with Washington Conserva-tion Voters, have yielded some great victories and heartbreaking defeats. They also have thrust Peter’s name onto the public stage with a prominence that would make many lawyers uncomfortable.
Peter accepts the fact that his activism subjects him to public scrutiny. He is not afraid to take risks, and he does not shrink from controversy. John Hempelmann commented that he suspects Peter is a happy lawyer, because he has dedicated his life to promoting values that will benefit his children and grandchildren. From that perspective, the little hair Peter retains on his head will not turn gray from losing a few battles in a life long campaign.
Matthew Cohen is a shareholder at Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe in Seattle, where he practices environmental and energy law. He and Peter Goldman often work together on rail trail development projects in Washington State.
