Jennifer L. King
Jennifer King is a partner in Gowling WLG’s Environmental Law Group with a national practice in environmental law and its intersections with Indigenous, constitutional, land use planning and regulatory law. Jennifer is an active member of the firm’s Canada North, Indigenous, Advocacy and Municipal Law Groups. She is called to the bar in Ontario and Nunavut.
Jennifer provides strategic regulatory advice and representation on matters including environmental impact assessments, natural resource development, major infrastructure projects and endangered species approvals including in Canada’s near and far north.
She is a tenacious litigator who represents clients before all levels of Ontario courts and the Supreme Court of Canada, and regularly appears before tribunals including the Local Planning Appeals Tribunal. She has a special expertise in constitutional division of powers—foremost in the areas of climate change, municipal law and transportation.
Jennifer finds creative and pragmatic solutions to complex legal and environmental problems for clients including public entities, Indigenous groups and private companies. Her current work includes:
- Advising a group of municipalities on a federal environmental assessment of a proposed major private sector intermodal transportation facility. Jennifer was co-lead counsel on the federal panel review hearing involving multiple experts including transportation, traffic, air quality, health and species at risk
- Advising a northern Ontario First Nation proposing an all-season road within its traditional territory subject to both federal and provincial environmental assessment
- Representing an intervener in the provincial references regarding the constitutionality of the federal Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act. Jennifer appeared before the Ontario and Saskatchewan Courts of Appeal, which both upheld the Act. She is counsel on the provinces’ appeals to the Supreme Court of Canada scheduled to be argued later this year
Regularly invited to speak on a wide range of topics, Jennifer is a climate governance expert with the Canada Climate Law Initiative and is on the faculty roster for the Intensive Trial Advocacy Workshop. She recently co-authored the 2018 reissue of Halsbury's Laws of Canada - Environment (LexisNexis Canada), a comprehensive and authoritative guide to Canadian environmental law.
Jennifer acts as chair of Gowling WLG’s Canadian Diversity & Inclusion Council’s Recruitment and Retention Committee and is a member of the Federation of Asian Canadian Lawyers. For over 10 years, she has served on the boards of local neighborhood centres helping to provide a range of community and social services. Jennifer currently sits on the board of the Eastview Neighbourhood Community Centre, a charitable multi-service neighbourhood centre that offers a broad range of recreational, social and capacity-building programs to residents in Toronto's east end.