A Foreign Policy for America's Local Governments: The Northern Virginia Model and What Places Like Erie, Pennsylvania Can Learn from It

Dr. Dale Medearis is a senior regional planner for the Northern Virginia Regional Commission. In that capacity, he co-leads the NVRC’s regional climate mitigation and energy programs and manages NVRC’s international environmental partnerships – among the few problem-focused, goal-oriented, and geographically-specific transfer of lessons from abroad to the US. He helped co-launch the first formal climate and energy partnership between the 40 largest U.S. and European metropolitan regional councils, co-initiate the Transatlantic Climate Bridge, co-launch the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation’s “Cities and Climate” Network, and co-develop the Transatlantic Urban Climate Dialogue with the “Free University of Berlin” (Germany). Prior to working for NVRC, Medearis spent approximately 20 years at the Office of International Affairs, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, as the program manager for western Europe and urban environmental programs. In that capacity, he worked to identify, analyze and apply “green” building, brownfields, smart growth, energy, climate and related urban environmental policies from OECD member countries to the United States. As program manager for Western Europe, he coordinated EPA’s science and technology agreements with the EU and Western Europe. Medearis also served as the program manager for the U.S. National Park Service’s Potomac American Heritage River Initiative. He has been the vice-chair of the OECD Territorial Development Committee and chairman of the OECD Working Group on Urban Affairs. In addition to serving as a board member of the American Friends of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Medearis also serves on the board of advisers for the American Friends of Georgia. Medearis has been awarded fellowships to study urban and environmental planning in Europe from the Alexander Von Humboldt Foundation, the Fulbright Commission, the European Union, and the American Council on Germany. Medearis has taught courses on environmental policy and planning courses as an adjunct faculty at the University of Redlands, Virginia Tech University, and the Johns Hopkins University. Medearis has a Ph.D. in environmental design and planning from Virginia Tech University, an M.S. in Cartographic and Geographic Science from George Mason University, an M.G.A. in Government from the University of Pennsylvania, and a B.A. in International Relations from the University of Redlands. He is a member of the board of the American Friends of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.