Marie Tomassi spoke with the Daily Business Review to discuss the latest class of new shareholders with the firm after William “Bert” McBride, Melodie “Dee” M. Menzer, Mathew S. Poling, Paul F. Rush and Brian Tunis were elevated in late September. The five shareholders is the most the firm has elected in several years.
“We’ve had other years where we’ve had three or four, but five is a good number, especially for them coming in as new shareholders,” Tomassi said. “When you bring in a 20-year lateral, they’re going to come in as a shareholder; it’s exciting but different from somebody moving up the skills and experience ladder.”
Menzer and Tunis practice in the firm’s Business Transactions group and benefitted from the boom in commercial deals at the end of 2020 and into 2021, and Tomassi said the plans to add two or three new attorneys to the group in the upcoming months.
Poling and Rush practice in the firm’s Real Estate and Lending practice, which has also seen a massive uptick of deal work prompting plans for the firm to continue adding skilled attorneys.
McBride practices in the Litigation and Dispute Resolution group, which has seen matters return to normal levels after COVID-19 caused a dip.
Tomassi also discussed the adjustments creditors’ rights and bankruptcy attorneys have made as filings have not picked up as much as expected. “I’ve been at the firm 33 years, I’ve seen this happen probably three to five times: As the economy changes, the real estate lawyers become bankruptcy and workout lawyers,” Tomassi said. “When things get better, real estate is swamped, and bankruptcy lawyers learn about real estate during the downturn.”
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