News

Sara Bronin Nominated for Chair of the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation

Sara Bronin Nominated for Chair of the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation

The Biden Administration has nominated Sara C. Bronin to chair the U.S. Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. An ALI Member since 2015, Bronin currently serves as Associate Reporter for Restatement of the Law Fourth, Property. She officially joins the Cornell faculty July 1 in the Department of City and Regional Planning in the College of Architecture, Art and Planning, and as an associated member of the faculty of Cornell Law School.

From the White House Press Release:

Sara Bronin is a Mexican-American architect, attorney, and policymaker specializing in historic preservation, property, land use, and climate change. She is an incoming Professor at the Cornell College of Architecture, Art, and Planning and an Associated Faculty Member of the Cornell Law School, and she has held visiting positions at the Yale School of Architecture, University of Pennsylvania, and the Sorbonne, among other places. Among other scholarly service, Bronin is an elected member of The American Law Institute and a past chair of the State & Local Government Section of the American Association of Law Schools.

Bronin’s interdisciplinary research focuses on how law and policy can foster more equitable, sustainable, well-designed, and connected places. She has published books and articles on historic preservation law and currently leads the research team behind the groundbreaking Connecticut Zoning Atlas.

Active in public service, Bronin is a board member of Latinos in Heritage Conservation and an advisor for the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the Sustainable Development Code. As the founder of Desegregate Connecticut, she leads a coalition that successfully advanced the first major statewide zoning reforms in several decades. Previously, she chaired Preservation Connecticut, served on the city of Hartford historic preservation commission, and led Hartford’s nationally-recognized efforts to adopt a climate action plan and city plan, and to overhaul the zoning code.

Bronin won several design awards for the rehabilitation of her family’s National-Register-listed 1865 brownstone. She holds a J.D. from Yale Law School (Harry S Truman Scholarship), M.Sc. from the University of Oxford (Rhodes Scholarship), and B.Architecture/B.A. from the University of Texas. While in law school, she clerked for then-Judge Sonia Sotomayor on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.

Featured Members