The lead administrative truste is a natural resource trustee who is designated on an incident-by-incident basis for the purpose of preassessment and damage assessment and chosen by the other trustees whose natural resources are affected by the incident. The lead administrative trustee facilitates effective and efficient communication during response operations between the OSC and the other natural resource trustees conducting activities associated with damage assessment, and is responsible for applying to the OSC for access to response operations resources on behalf of all trustees for initiation of a damage assessment.

The Federal Lead Administrative Trustee may assume the responsibilities of the lead administrative trustee. The only difference between the two is that, as the name implies, the Federal Lead Administrative Trustee can only be a Federal Agency representative, while the lead administrative trustee may be a Federal, State, or tribal representative.