Kim Silvi
Senior Historian and Project Manager
Work at HAI | Legal
At HAI | Legal, Kim leads and conducts litigation research. Undaunted by challenging questions, Kim typically manages teams of four to eight historians and directs projects with dollar values over a quarter million. A calm demeanor, meticulous attention to detail, and adaptive approach enables Kim to successfully provide customized historical research and analysis for a variety of legal, regulatory, and crisis management matters.
Kim has developed broad expertise in investigating the corporate and environmental history of contaminated sites, including former manufactured gas plants, examining the design and operations of coal ash disposal sites, and locating World War II and Cold War-era federal production and facilities contracts.
Her research specialties include:
- Potentially responsible party (PRP) searches
- Land use and site histories
- Historic government contract searches
- Legislative and regulatory history
- Manufacturing processes, waste disposal, and standard procedures
- The history and use of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and trichloroethylene (TCE)
- Federal and military specifications research
- Watershed and water use histories
- Research on the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan
- Product liability and toxic tort research
- Tribal disputes
- Looted art claims
She has also completed historical research and content development projects for clients such as:
- CooperVision
- Optical Society of America
- Reliance Steel & Aluminum Co.
- U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
- U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
- U.S. National Park Service
Path to HAI | Legal
Before joining HAI | Legal in late 2009, Kim assisted with government contract work and bid proposals as an operations assistant at Trace Systems. She also worked as a program intern at the Center for International Policy in Washington, D.C., where she contributed to program reports and successfully organized three conferences.
Kim holds a bachelor’s degree in history and international studies from St. Mary’s College of Maryland. Her senior thesis, “Subduing an Idealistic President’s Attempt to Assert Guatemalan Sovereignty: The United States and the 1954 Coup,” focused on rationales for the coup from U.S. and Guatemalan perspectives. Kim also studied abroad at the Institute for Central American Development Studies in San Jose, Costa Rica, where she interned for the journal Mesoamerica. In addition to her studies, Kim rowed crew and served as the novice women’s coach where she planned on-land workouts, on-water drills, and effectively communicated instructions to a team of 25 first-year rowers.