Jose A. Almanzar

Jose A. Almanzar is an attorney in Holland & Knight's New York office and a member of the Public Policy & Regulation Group. Mr. Almanzar focuses his practice on navigating environmental risks in high-stakes transactions and defending clients in significant environmental litigation and enforcement actions.

Mr. Almanzar is a seasoned environmental and regulatory attorney who leverages his prior professional experience as an environmental scientist to provide clients with practical, technically informed counsel on their most complex challenges. As a lead diligence attorney, he manages all aspects of the environmental workstream for mergers and acquisitions (M&A), finance and development projects across the country. His transactional experience spans the real estate, renewable energy, financial services and manufacturing sectors. Mr. Almanzar serves as one of the primary environmental attorneys for Holland & Knight's Representations and Warranties Insurance (RWI) Team, where he assesses and quantifies environmental liabilities on fast-paced, complex deals. In his litigation and regulatory practice, Mr. Almanzar defends clients in matters involving federal Superfund proceedings, Clean Water Act (CWA) citizen suits and toxic tort claims, and he develops nationwide environmental compliance programs for clients in highly regulated industries.

Mr. Almanzar's work also includes counseling clients across the full spectrum of environmental laws and regulations. His experience covers foundational federal statutes, including the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA), CWA, Clean Air Act (CAA) and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). At the state level, he has deep experience with New York's State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) and Oil Spill Act, as well as New Jersey's Industrial Site Recovery Act (ISRA) and Spill Act. Mr. Almanzar also represents clients in challenges to administrative actions under Article 78 of New York's Civil Practice Law and Rules (CPLR) and advises on a host of local regulations, such as New York City's environmental laws and solid waste licensing rules.

Mr. Almanzar's recent representative engagements include:

• Landmark Energy and Infrastructure Transactions. Served as a key environmental diligence attorney for the Public Utility Commission of Texas on its landmark $10 billion Texas Energy Fund, managing the environmental, health and safety (EHS) review for multiple proposed energy projects. Co-led the environmental diligence for a multinational financial services corporation as the tax equity investor in utility-scale battery energy storage system (BESS) projects and renewable energy (solar and wind) projects in Texas.
• Lead Counsel for M&A and Real Estate Portfolios. Acted as lead environmental counsel managing all aspects of diligence for complex, multistate portfolio transactions, including the acquisition of 12 bank branches for a financial services client and the refinancing of a 50-property industrial real estate investment trust (REIT) portfolio.
• Nationwide Environmental Compliance Programs. Co-led the development of a nationwide environmental compliance program for a major military housing provider to address issues concerning asbestos and lead-based paint, including creating multistate legal trackers and standard operating procedures.
• Complex Environmental Litigation. Serves as a key litigation team member and primary client contact defending one of Holland & Knight's largest industrial clients in a CWA citizen suit involving a major manufacturing facility. Represents clients in large, multiparty billion-dollar Superfund remedial design and allocation proceedings for major sediment sites.
• Emerging Contaminant and Toxic Tort Defense. Defending a national manufacturer in a consumer class action lawsuit filed in federal court in California alleging unfair competition claims related to the sale of products containing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).
• State-Level Remediation and Brownfield Redevelopment. Representing the owner of a large, mixed-use property in Brooklyn through the New York State Brownfield Cleanup Program to address chlorinated solvent contamination, requiring significant coordination with state regulators and project engineers.

While in law school, Mr. Almanzar completed legal internships with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Environmental Protection Bureau within the Office of the New York State Attorney General and in the Environmental Enforcement Division of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection. He has also completed internships in the performance track program in EPA's Region 2 and Region 10 offices, as well as in the New York State Assembly.