Mona O'Bryant practices in the administrative law arena and primarily focuses on environmental matters and the regulation of tobacco-related products at the federal, state and local levels and alcoholic beverages at the federal level.
Mona’s environmental counseling practice includes:
She regularly assists clients with strategies for dealing with contaminated properties, including Brownfields, risk-based remediation/closure and contract negotiations. Mona has counseled clients through wetland and stream permitting and mitigation and sediment and erosion control issues for a golf course, a landfill and numerous commercial/industrial sites and real estate developments. She also has assisted with permitting of solid waste management and construction landfill facilities, including obtaining local approvals, siting and permitting of solid and hazardous waste management facilities, and media permitting for textile and other industrial plants. In addition, much of her work centers around remediation of contaminated properties and underground storage tank regulation.
Mona also advises clients in the tobacco-related product and alcoholic beverage industries on compliance, excise tax, licensing and business issues that arise under federal statutes and the regulations of the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB), as well as state laws and regulations applicable to the manufacturing, distribution and sale of these products. Her established relationships with regulators at both the federal and state level in this area allow her to provide focused assistance on these issues.
Mona has been recognized by Chambers USA as a leading environmental attorney in North Carolina (2007-present) and listed in The Best Lawyers in America© for Environmental Law (2018, 2019). She has been named the Best Lawyers’® “Lawyer of the Year” for Environmental Law in Greensboro (2019) and Raleigh (2020, 2022). In 2011, she was selected to Business North Carolina’s Legal Elite Hall of Fame in Environmental Law. Martindale-Hubbell has rated her an AV attorney, its highest rating available.
Mona is a member of the North Carolina Bar Association (NCBA) and that organization’s Environment, Energy and Natural Resources Law Section, where she has served as a past chair, vice chair, secretary, treasurer and section council member. She served on the NCBA’s board of governors from 1994-1997 and has chaired several committees.
She also was recognized as one of North Carolina Business Leader’s Women Extraordinaire (2010) and received an Alumni Achievement Award from her alma mater, Alderson-Broaddus College. In 2004, the Triad Business Journal named her among its Top Women in Business.
Active in the community, Mona serves on the advisory board and is a past chair of the Salvation Army of Greensboro, and she serves on the advisory board for Greensboro Beautiful, Inc. Mona is a member of Greensboro First Baptist Church, where she has served on various committees.
Mona earned her Juris Doctor degree, with honors, from the University of North Carolina School of Law. She earned her Bachelor of Arts degree, summa cum laude, from Alderson-Broaddus College (since renamed Alderson-Broaddus University).