Sara C. Bronin (formerly Galvan) is a Mexican-American architect and attorney whose scholarly research focuses on property, land use, historic preservation, and climate change law. As Gallivan Chair, she organizes public conferences and speaks frequently in the United States and internationally. She has been elected to membership in the American Law Institute, and she is the lead author of the land use volume of the forthcoming Fourth Restatement of Property. In addition to her teaching responsibilities, she serves as faculty director for the Law School’s Center for Energy & Environmental Law. At UConn, she is an affiliate faculty member of the Department of Public Policy, the Sustainable Global Cities Initiative (where she serves on the Advisory Committee), and the Center for Environmental Sciences and Engineering, and she serves on the grant-funded Transportation, Technology, and Society Research Group.
Professor Bronin received bachelor degrees in architecture and Plan II liberal arts honors from the University of Texas, a master’s degree from the University of Oxford (as a Rhodes Scholar), and a law degree from Yale Law School. While in law school, she clerked for then-Judge Sonia Sotomayor on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
Professor Bronin is a past chair of the State & Local Government Section of the American Association of Law Schools, and she has chaired several Law School committees (including the Facilities Committee and the Academic Plan Committee). While at UConn, she has also been selected to be a Visiting Professor at the Yale School of Architecture, a Visiting Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania Kleinman Center on Energy Policy, Distinguished Energy Law Scholar at Vermont Law School, a Visiting Professor at Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne University Law School and a Visiting Professor of Renewable Energy Law at the University of St. Gallen (Switzerland).
Professor Bronin serves as an expert witness and as a consultant to cities, state agencies, and private firms. Among other projects, she served as one of the lead attorneys and development strategists for the 360 State Street project, a mixed-use, transit-oriented, LEED Platinum project in New Haven. Active in public service, Professor Bronin is an advisor for the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the Sustainable Development Code, a board member of Latinos in Heritage Conservation, and the founder of Desegregate Connecticut. Previously, she led the nationally-recognized efforts of the City of Hartford to draft and adopt a climate change action plan, city plan, and zoning code overhaul. She also chaired the city's Energy Improvement District, Preservation Connecticut, Connecticut Hispanic Bar Association, and Connecticut Urban Legal Initiative.
Professor Bronin received the AIA’s Alice Washburn Award and two preservation awards for her design and rehabilitation of her Civil War-era brownstone in downtown Hartford.