Penn Valley man named state’s public lawyer of the year

Michael Colantuono

Michael Colantuono will receive the 2010 Ronald M. George Public Lawyer of the Year Award at a reception during the State Bar’s Annual Meeting, which will be held from Sept. 23-26 in Monterey.

Michael Colantuono will receive the 2010 Ronald M. George Public Lawyer of the Year Award at a reception during the State Bar’s Annual Meeting, which will be held from Sept. 23-26 in Monterey.

“I am deeply honored by this recognition, both because it is the most significant award granted to a public lawyer in California and because it reflects a judgment of my professional peers, which is deeply gratifying.  I am grateful to the Public Law Section for this honor,” Colantuono said in statement.

The Public Lawyer of the Year Award recognizes lawyers who have dedicated a significant portion of their career to public service. Award recipients are lawyers who represent the highest level of professional and ethical standards and who are inspirational advocates for the public interest, according to the state bar.

Colantuono is a shareholder with the firm of Colantuono & Levin, which has offices in Los Angeles and Penn Valley. He has specialized in municipal law since 1989 and now works as the city attorney for Auburn and Calabasas. The attorney is also the current president of the Nevada City Rotary Club.

In addition to those duties, Colantuono works as the general counsel for the Auburn Urban Development Agency, the North Yuba Water District, the Yuba County LAFCO, and the Rough & Ready and Ophir Hill Fire Districts.

He previously served as city attorney of Barstow (1997-2004), Cudahy (1994-1999), La Habra Heights (1994-2004), Monrovia (1999-2002) and Sierra Madre (2004-2006) and as general counsel to the Barstow (1997-2004) and Sierra Madre (2004-2006) Redevelopment Agencies and the Big Bear City Community Services District (1994-2001).

In 2003-04, Colantuono served as president of the City Attorneys Department of the League of California Cities where he appointed the department’s first ethics committee, which developed a guidebook on professional ethics for public lawyers.

Colantuono has taken a leadership role in advocating for local governments in the area of municipal revenues, leading the committee that drafted and negotiated the Proposition 218 Omnibus Implementation Act. He also served on the committee which wrote the League of California Cities Proposition 218 Implementation Guide in 1997 as well as having edited and contributed to updates to the Guide. He has argued before the California Supreme Court on behalf of public entities frequently, including Richmond v. Shasta Community Services District (2004), as well as successfully arguing on behalf of the League of California Cities in an amicus role in Bonander v. Town of Tiburon in 2009.

 He recently appeared  before the California Supreme Court in Greene v Marin County Flood Control and Water Conservation District (argued April 7, 2010 and pending) and his firm will appear before that Court in Ardon v. City of Los Angeles again later this year.

The public lawyer of the year award was renamed in 2009 after California Supreme Court Chief Justice Ronald M. George, who traditionally speaks at the award ceremony and introduces the year’s winner. It recognizes the chief justice’s exceptional contributions to the public and to further define and exemplify the caliber of the contributions provided to the public by the award recipients.

“Each year this award goes to an extraordinary individual for outstanding service to the public,” George said at the Sept. 11, 2009, awards ceremony. “But of course with this tradition we do more than celebrate a single career. We commemorate the power of law in the public interest, and the deeply held values of our profession and of our nation that make this work possible. In presenting this award, we encourage all lawyers who choose public service over personal gain, and who join us in our cause, to make good on the promise of equal justice under law. And finally we remind ourselves of why we wanted to be lawyers in the first place, and of the common good that a committed public-interest lawyer can accomplish.”