ACWA Awards Water Law & Policy Scholarship


SAN DIEGO, Dec. 04, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA) today announced the winner of its 2019 Stephen K. Hall Water Law & Policy scholarship. Dylan Soares, a law student at Harvard Law School, was selected from a group of well-qualified applicants to receive $10,000 to put toward his law school tuition costs.

Soares is a second year student at Harvard Law School. He accepted the scholarship at the 2019 ACWA Fall Conference & Exhibition in San Diego, where water professionals from throughout California gather for programs and panel discussions on a variety of key water issues.

“For more than a decade now, ACWA and its funding partners have invested in exceptional graduate-level students who are well on their way to becoming future leaders in our industry,” said ACWA President Brent Hastey. “We are excited to be able to present this year’s scholarship to a young professional who is ready to take on the challenges and opportunities that exist in California’s agricultural water industry.”

Before Harvard Law School, Soares graduated magna cum laude from Cal Poly with a degree in bioresource and agricultural engineering and is pursuing a law degree so that he can help improve and protect agricultural water resources. Dylan was a Water Resources and Policy Intern at Wonderful Orchards, a Congressional Intern for U.S. Congressman Devin Nunes, a Summer Law Clerk at the Environmental Protection Agency and a Summer Associate at Downey Brand.

The scholarship is funded in part from the annual Steve Hall Fierce Competitor Golf Tournament, which this year raised approximately $15,000 for the scholarship and the ALS Foundation. The scholarship was established in 2007 in honor of former ACWA Executive Director Steve Hall, who passed away in 2010 after a lengthy battle with ALS.

For more information about ACWA’s scholarship programs, including its three undergraduate scholarships, please visit www.acwa.com/about/scholarships.

ACWA is a statewide association of public agencies whose more than 450 members are responsible for about 90% of the water delivered in California. For more information, visit www.acwa.com.

Contact: Heather Engel, Director of Communications | (916) 441-4545 | C (760) 217-0627