Rincon Welcomes Three Strategic Hires
As a growing firm taking on new challenges and opportunities, we are excited to announce the addition of Ellen Cross, Jennifer Guenther, and Linda Hunter to help take us to the next level.
Welcome to the Rincon Team!
Ellen Cross
Strategy + Development
“Ellen is a powerful force in her field and a high-level strategic thinker. She is challenging the way our Water team sees itself and providing focus and accountability in our business development efforts. I am excited for her to become more and more integrated with the team, providing mentorship around client development and strategic pursuits as well as helping to craft the vision of where we would like to be in the next 5 to 10 years.”
— Jennifer Haddow, PhD, Executive Vice President
Ellen Cross is joining Rincon Consultants, Inc. to lead Strategy and Development with over 30 years of pre-positioning engineering and planning firms as well as water and flood agencies to target and achieve their strategic goals to be high-velocity organizations. She is here to supercharge our efforts in the Water market sector with her understanding of governance, funding, stakeholders, technical and regulatory perspectives that are key to understanding policy and program implementation challenges and opportunities.
Ellen is based in Northern California (specifically Oakland) but has contacts and connections throughout the state in the “water world”. Ellen has already jumped in and started assisting with organizing our strategic efforts around several key market areas (e.g., Groundwater Sustainability Plans and Climate Action Plans for Water), key clients, and several key RFP pursuits. She is working with groups formed from multiple service line representatives to develop a vision for what we would like to achieve and how Rincon can become a major player in these arenas.
“I’m excited to join Rincon and support our teams in resolving our clients toughest planning and science challenges. As we enter the era of undeniable climate change impacts, the Rincon team has an opportunity to ‘rethink’ how we solve 21st century challenges with innovations that clients and societies will demand. I look forward to being a part of the Rincon team to elevate a holistic project delivery approach that reflects Rincon’s long-standing reputation.”
— Ellen Cross
Jennifer Guenther, Esq.
General Counsel
“The addition of Jennifer and a new general counsel function opens up new horizons for the company. Jennifer has a profound understanding of the law as it relates to environmental consulting from top to bottom, and will enable us to improve both our internal functions and level of expertise and service for our clients.”
— Rich Daulton, Principal
Jennifer Guenther joins Rincon in a newly created role, General Counsel, where she will provide general and specialized legal support for a variety of functions, ranging from contract review to legal research to litigation support. Jennifer also has a strong background in CEQA, NEPA, ESA/CESA, and mitigation and regulatory project work, with experience in most areas of environmental law, and can assist with document QC and project strategy. She will also be assisting the Board of Directors, executive team, and Rincon’s Business Operations team on a wide variety of legal matters.
Jennifer’s background includes 13 years with a law firm, where her focus was on environmental law, land use, and litigation, followed by over seven years as general counsel for an environmental/business process outsourcing group of companies, where she led a small legal team and provided an across-the-board level of support in corporate, HR, environment, mergers and acquisitions, contract management, privacy law, and other related areas. She also teaches environmental law and policy, and environmental impact assessment classes at the University of California Riverside.
“Joining Rincon was an easy decision given the strong leadership and sense of community that is pervasive throughout the company. The level of professionalism, respect and collaboration clearly show through in not only the work product but in my daily interactions. I am very pleased to be part of this exciting and growing team.”
— Jennifer Guenther
Linda Hunter
Senior Principal, Business Development
“Linda is an outstanding asset for Rincon and we are thrilled to have her return to the firm. You can tell from interactions with her that she takes genuine pleasure in contributing in so many ways, from mentoring junior staff who are just dipping their toes in business development to cultivating trusted relationships with clients at the highest levels of their organizations to helping craft meaningful business development strategies around upcoming legislation and funding packages. ”
— Jennifer Haddow, PhD, Executive Vice President
Linda Hunter has been with Rincon since 2015 and is back as our new Principal of Business Development where she will lead efforts to track funding and projects, build upon relationships with partners and clients, and put together winning teams for water and transportation infrastructure projects, long-range planning, renewable energy and more.
Those who know Linda know that she is relentless in pursuing, developing, and maintaining strategic relationships with project owners and Rincon teaming partners. While she will be turning much of her focus to helping to grow our transportation practice statewide, Linda will also use her extensive contacts throughout the environmental industry to provide support in recruiting and information gathering in multiple other market sectors. As a strategic resource for business development efforts, Linda will better position Rincon for upcoming pursuits, including those that sometimes require two and three years to effectively pre-position. Linda is a resource for the entire Rincon team and provides invaluable mentorship and training on how to fearlessly identify, build and maintain long-lasting and trusted relationships within the environmental industry.
“I am excited to work with a team of folks all working toward the same goals: to work on exciting projects, work with integrity and have fun with each other in the process.”
— Linda Hunter