Speakers
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Robert Andrew Branan, JD is an Associate Extension Professor with the Agriculture and Natural Resources Department, NC State University. Andrew is a legal educator/researcher in agriculture with 20+ years experience working across North Carolina and the Southeast, including private and non-profit law practice concentrating in farm and forest production. His Extension education program, Farm Law and Tax for Producers and Landowners, includes farm succession, land use regulation and zoning, water and natural resource protection, agribusiness regulation and liability, and heirs property issues. His campus courses include Environmental Law and Agriculture Law.
He has authored the handbooks Planning the Future of Your Farm and So You Have Inherited a Farm. Andrew graduated from Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia with degrees in Economics and History and earned his juris doctorate from Wake Forest University Law School.
Amy Beth Cyphert is an Associate Professor at the West Virginia University College of Law. A Morgantown native, she graduated from Carnegie Mellon University in 2001 as a Truman Scholar and earned her law degree cum laude from Harvard Law School in 2005.
Following law school, Cyphert clerked for the Honorable Laura Taylor Swain in the Southern District of New York. She then worked as a senior litigation associate at WilmerHale in New York City, where she focused on complex commercial litigation and First Amendment pro bono matters.
At WVU, she developed and teaches courses on Artificial Intelligence and the Law, including a course on Regulating AI. Her recent research explores the impact of generative artificial intelligence on the legal profession, copyright law, and broader regulatory challenges. She has also written extensively about algorithmic decision-making in the criminal justice system. In 2021, she received the Privacy Papers for Policymakers Award from the Future of Privacy Forum for her scholarship on machine-learning algorithms and online surveillance.
Jennifer S. Friedel, Esq. is an Associate Professor of Practice in the Ag & Applied Economics Department at Virginia Tech. She teaches Ag Law and Environmental Law and is the Director of the Land Use-Value Assessment Program, providing special tax assessment values for qualifying agricultural, horticultural and open space lands in the Commonwealth. Licensed in Tennessee and Virginia, her private law practice focuses on land use, property law, contracts, farm succession planning, and other issues relevant to her agricultural-producer client base. Jen is also co-owner and operator of her family's registered Angus seedstock operation in southwest Virginia and northeast Tennessee.
Paul Goeringer is a Principal Faculty Specialist and the Extension Legal Specialist at the University of Maryland. He joined the University of Maryland’s Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics in 2012. His research and extension program is focused on agricultural leases, energy leases, landowner liability, production contracts, agricultural nuisance issues, environmental law, and estate planning issues impacting agricultural producers in Maryland. Paul has authored over two hundred articles and is a sought-after speaker on agricultural law issues.
He grew up on his family’s wheat and cattle operation in Western Oklahoma. Upon graduating from high school, Paul graduated from Oklahoma State University with a Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Economics. After graduating from OSU, Paul decided to attend law school for some strange reason still unknown to him. He graduated with a Juris Doctorate from some school in Norman, Oklahoma (also known as the University of Oklahoma). After law school, Paul received an LL.M in Agricultural Law and a Master of Science in Agricultural Economics from the University of Arkansas and is licensed to practice in Oklahoma. He is a Topic Area Coordinator in Agricultural Law for Southern Ag Today. He has served on a number of college and campus committees in his time at UMD. Paul is a past board member of the American Agricultural Law Association, an active member of the Agriculture Law Section of the Maryland State Bar Association, and a member of the Southern Agricultural Economics Association and the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association.
Anthony G. Gorski is an attorney with The Law Offices of Anthony G. Gorski LLC in Annapolis, Maryland. Tony specializes in environmental, natural resources, and agriculture law. In addition to providing advice on permitting and compliance, he represents clients in trial and appellate litigation in State and federal courts and administrative forums. He has over 33 years of experience representing clients on these issues throughout Maryland and the Mid-Atlantic region. Prior to entering private practice, he served as an Assistant Attorney General representing the Md Department of the Environment in environmental enforcement and permitting litigation and on regulatory matters. He is a member of the MSBA (Environmental Law Section, Past Chair, & Agriculture Law Section, Past Chair). He is an Adjunct Faculty member at Johns Hopkins University, Whiting School of Engineering (1995-Present), teaching courses in Environmental Law and Business Law. Tony obtained a Juris Doctor and a Master of Environmental Law from Vermont Law School (1990) and a Bachelor of Science degree from Frostburg University ( majors: Wildlife & Fisheries Management, minors: Biology & Chemistry)(1986).
Peggy Kirk Hall is the Director of the Agricultural & Resource Law Program at The Ohio State University, a research and outreach program focused on legal issues for Ohio agriculture. Hall teaches Agribusiness Law in OSU’s College of Food, Agricultural & Environmental Sciences and was awarded the Distinguished Extension Faculty award from her college in 2024. She is a long-time member of the American Agricultural Law Association (AALA) and has received the AALA’s Excellence in Agricultural Law Award and Distinguished Service Award. Hall is also a research partner with the National Agricultural Law Center. She holds B.S. and M.S. (degrees in natural resource policy from Ohio State and a Juris Doctor from the University of Wyoming College of Law, where she was on the Land & Water Law Review editorial board.
Annette Hiatt is a Senior Staff Attorney with the Land Loss Prevention Project. She enjoys working one on one with clients to retain and preserve the connection of family to the ownership and retention of land. Ms. Hiatt received her Bachelor of Social Work from UNC-Charlotte and her J.D. from Case Western Reserve University. She is a North Carolina Dispute Resolution Commission Certified Superior Court mediator, achieving that status in 2015. Ms. Hiatt is a member of the NC Local Food Council, a member of the board of Center for Community Connection and the mother to two kiddos who lead her on many adventures.
Robert Moore is an attorney and research specialist for the Agricultural and Resource Law Program at The Ohio State University and teaches Agribusiness Law in OSU’s College of Food, Agricultural & Environmental Sciences. He was raised on a dairy farm in Coshocton County, Ohio, where his family continues to raise beef cattle, sheep, and crops. Robert received a Bachelor of Science degree in dairy science, a Master of Science degree in agricultural economics from The Ohio State University and graduated cum laude from Capital University Law School. Prior to joining Ohio State, Robert was the owner of Wright & Moore Law Co. LPA in Delaware, Ohio, where he practiced law for 18 years with a focus on farm succession, estate planning, and business planning.
Jesse J. Richardson, Jr. is the Hale J. and Roscoe P. Posten Professor of Law and the Lead Land Use Attorney at the Land Use and Sustainable Development Law Clinic at the West Virginia University College of Law. Richardson holds a B.S. and M.S. in Agricultural and Applied Economics from Virginia Tech and a J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law. He began his legal career in private practice in his hometown of Winchester, Virginia and previously served on the faculty at Virginia Tech. His research and experience focus on property law, water law and land use law.
Jackie Schweichler is a Staff Attorney at the Center for Agricultural and Shale Law at Penn State University. In this role, she provides legal research, analysis, and education on a wide array of issues impacting agricultural law and policy. Her primary areas of focus include liability, agritourism regulation, seed law, pesticide use and compliance, and rural economic development.
Ms. Schweichler is also the Director of Pennsylvania’s Agricultural Mediation Program, a USDA- initiative that facilitates alternative dispute resolution for agricultural producers and landowners throughout the Commonwealth. In this capacity, she oversees mediation services addressing matters such as credit and lending, conservation compliance, and farm transition planning.
Ms. Schweichler earned her Juris Doctor from Penn State Dickinson Law and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Edinboro University. She is an active member of several agricultural organizations, including the American Agricultural Law Association (AALA), the Farm and Ranch Stress Assistance Network, the Pennsylvania State Council of Farm Organizations, and The Philadelphia Society for Promoting Agriculture.