Rachel Toker

As an experienced sustainability professional and real estate lawyer, Ms. Toker brings over 20 years of experience navigating the intersection of real estate, economic development, urban growth, and sustainability.

Bio and Featured Works

Her work has focused on real estate development, sustainable cities, green building and green infrastructure, land and forest conservation, climate resilience, and social equity.

As a transactional real estate attorney, Ms. Toker has worked closely with developers, government agencies, and nonprofits, most recently advising corporate clients on sustainability obligations, climate regulations, and building performance laws in addition to drafting and negotiating green leases, rooftop solar leases, and ground leases. Collaborating with private developers, corporate tenants, equity investors, and governmental entities has allowed Ms. Toker to support forward-thinking real estate operations that address 21st-century challenges.

Ms. Toker now serves as the Sustainability Division Manager for the City of Durham's General Services Department in Durham, North Carolina. In one of her previous roles, which spanned the last decade, she served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Urban Ecosystem Restorations, Inc. (UER), a nonprofit urban land trust, where she worked to create, protect, and aggregate special kinds of urban green spaces designed to support ecological function in and around the Washington, D.C. region. Ms. Toker also teaches “Foundations of Real Estate Law,” “Sustainable Development & Construction,” and “Ethics in Action” for the Masters of Professional Studies – Real Estate Program at Georgetown University’s School of Continuing Studies.

Ms. Toker received her Master of Environmental Management degree at Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment in May 2022. She is a LEED AP (BD&C), and she has been certified as a Chesapeake Bay Landscape Professional by the Chesapeake Bay Landscape Professional Certification Program (www.cblpro.org) and as a Weed Warrior supervisor (for invasive species removal) by the Parks Department of Montgomery County, Maryland.

Ms. Toker also previously worked as a real estate lawyer at DLA Piper LLP (US). In addition, she has served as a consultant to the Redevelopment Authority of Prince George’s County, Maryland, assisting in the creation of green building initiatives and affordable housing programs. She also served as an attorney in private practice at Bocarsly Emden Cowan Esmail & Arndt LLP, a boutique law firm specializing in low-income housing tax credits, and in the real estate practice group at Arnold & Porter LLP in Washington, D.C. She has served in government at the Office of Chief Counsel in the Economic Development Administration (within the United States Department of Commerce); the Anacostia Waterfront Corporation, formerly an instrumentality of the District of Columbia government; and the Real Estate Section of the Office of the Attorney General for the District of Columbia, representing and advising the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development under former Mayor Anthony Williams.

Before starting in private practice, Ms. Toker served as a judicial law clerk to the Hon. Myron H. Bright of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. She received her J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School, a Master in Public Policy degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and her B.A. from Stanford University, received with University Honors and Distinction.

About Rachel Toker

Expertise

Environment
Real Estate
Urban Policy