Terri Cofer Beirne

Terri Cofer Beirne is eastern counsel for the Wine Institute, representing the California wineries on legal and policy issues before chief executives, legislatures and ABC Boards in seven states in the mid-Atlantic.  She recently succeeded in helping to open markets for direct wine shipments into Maryland, New Jersey and, in pending legislation, Pennsylvania.  She also practiced law in Virginia, representing wine, utility and health care clients before the Virginia General Assembly, the Executive Branch, state licensing and regulatory boards, and the State Corporation Commission.

She lobbied to pass the Virginia direct shipment law, worked to enable wineries and retailers to continue making consumer deliveries, and negotiated a law protecting Virginia wineries’ revenues. Then-Attorney General Bob McDonnell named her special counsel to the Department of Agriculture. Ms. Beirne received the Virginia Wine Industry “Person of the Year” award in 2009 for her efforts on their behalf. Ms. Beirne earned her bachelor’s in government and politics in 1988 from Mason and her law degree from the University of Richmond in 2000.

Ms. Beirne recently joined the George Mason University Foundation Board following her term as a gubernatorial appointee to the George Mason Board of Visitors, which expired in 2011.