Urs graduated from Cheshire High School in 1976 before attending Georgetown University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in foreign service in 1980. Urs spent his junior year of college studying abroad in Quito, Ecuador. He received a master's degree in international economics from the University of Texas in 1985.[4]
Urs has served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Transportation Affairs and Chief U.S. Government Aviation Negotiator at the Department of State; as Director in the Office of Aviation Negotiations in the Bureau of Economic, Energy and Business Affairs in the Department of State; as Deputy Chief of Mission and chargé d'affaires at the U.S. Embassy in La Paz, Bolivia; and as Director of the Office of Economic Policy and Summit Coordination in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs at the Department of State.[5]
In June 2014, Urs became Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Madrid. In January 2017, he was named the mission's chargé d'affaires.[6]
In March 2020, amidst the coronavirus pandemic, Urs departed Peru due to what the embassy called "medical concerns" while American citizens were still stranded in the country.[8] A different State Department official was then dispatched to Peru to oversee the repatriation of U.S. citizens stranded in Peru.[8]