Lawyer Flight

Lawyer Flight

By David R. Corder

Associate Editor

Mark Straley and Tracy Robin had reached a crossroads. The long-time Akerman Senterfitt shareholders had cultivated a niche market as real estate attorneys over 12 or so years. They're among a small group of lawyers in Florida who represent community development districts, a tax tool developers use to pay for infrastructure costs.

Straley and Robin's work with taxing districts fueled a desire to gain more control over this rapidly growing legal practice. Together they represent more than 50 taxing districts. Two months ago, they joined with former Akerman Senterfitt tax attorney Robert S. Williams to create Straley Robin & Williams PA.

The trio's decision to spin off a new firm couldn't have come at a more inopportune time for their former employer. Over the past several months, the Orlando-based firm's Tampa office has lost almost a third of its legal staff. Nine shareholders or associates have left the firm.

And this lawyer flight isn't isolated to Tampa, acknowledges J. Thomas Cardwell, Akerman Senterfitt's chairman and chief executive officer. Five members of the firm's corporate practice group in Fort Lauderdale recently defected to the much larger Greenberg Traurig LLP.

The flight also comes as Akerman Senterfitt adjusted last year to a new wave of growth, Cardwell says. Two mergers added about 60 attorneys to a legal staff that now totals about 400.

"Certainly, there are no negative systemic issues here," Cardwell says. "Each of the stories of their leaving is entirely different. We hate to see people go but unfortunately these days there's a higher degree of mobility of lawyers than when I started practicing."

No one reason

The reasons for the departures in Tampa vary, though only a few of the nine lawyers responded to requests from GCBR for comment.

Former Akerman Senterfitt lawyer Tommy Permenter Jr., for instance, had been commuting to Tampa from Ocala.

Permenter, who practices at Ocala's Bond Arnett Phelan Smith & Craggs PA, says he simply wanted to spend more time with his family. He also cited commute costs as another reason for the change.

With the exception of Straley, Robin, Williams and Permenter, the largest percentage of the group that left Akerman Senterfitt accepted new jobs in St. Petersburg or Tampa with established firms such as Holland & Knight LLP and Hill Ward & Henderson PA.

The St. Petersburg office of Holland & Knight recruited Tina Dunsford, a former Akerman Senterfitt shareholder. Dunsford, who did not respond to a request for comment, serves as a senior counsel in Holland & Knight's family businesses and tax-exempt organizations practice group.

Hill Ward recruited three Akerman Senterfitt lawyers, including shareholders Brian Sparks and Ben Hill IV and associate Gordon Hill. The Hill brothers are sons of Ben Hill III, the firm's president and co-founder.

Sparks worked at Holland & Knight prior to joining Akerman Senterfitt, where he headed its private client group. At Hill Ward, he heads the firm's estate planning and administration group. He did not respond to a request for comment.

Neither of the brothers, who join as senior associates, responded to a request for comment. But the move by Ben Hill IV comes almost two months after Akerman Senterfitt announced his selection as a shareholder. He also is a past president of the Hillsborough County Bar Association's Young Lawyers Division and active in leadership roles with the American Bar Association.

Each of the three joined Hill Ward because of potential growth opportunities, Ben Hill III says. As for his sons, he abstained from the hiring decision.

"The firm believed it was a decision to be made without me being involved at all," Hill says. "The shareholders met and decided it would be something that would be beneficial to the firm if the boys wanted to join the firm."

Hill did not why his sons left Akerman Senterfitt. However, he says his sons explained to him how difficult it was to make the decision.

"As with anyone who makes a move, they saw an opportunity ... In terms of them leaving Akerman, it was a difficult decision because the Akerman firm has been extremely good to both of them," he says. "They had strong relationships with the people there and consider them close friends."

Another former Akerman Senterfitt attorney, Wesley Tibbals, joined Sivyer Barlow & Watson PA, a small Tampa litigation firm. Tibbals declined to comment.

Mahlon "Tripp" Barlow III says the firm had been interested in Tibbals for some time. He says it was a good business decision to hire Tibbals once he became available.

Neither Straley nor Robin nor Williams mentioned any Akerman Senterfitt policies that affected their decision to spin off.

"Ours was a terrific experience," says Robin, who also serves as general counsel to the Hillsborough County City-County Planning Commission. "Akerman Senterfitt is an excellent firm with hundreds of very capable, bright lawyers."

Straley adds: "We left on the best possible terms. They could not have been more gracious."

Rapid growth

Since the late 1990s, Akerman Senterfitt has grown by more than half. In 1999, the firm reported about 250 lawyers. It now has about 400. Founded in the 1920s, the firm expanded in the early '90s into Tampa.

Last year the firm added 59 new lawyers through mergers with Tallahassee's Katz Kutter Alderman & Bryant PA and Miami's Muller Mintz PA. That fueled new revenue gains.

The firm produced about $160 million in revenue for the fiscal year ended Oct. 31, Cardwell says. That compares with about $145 million the firm reported the year before. "We actually exceeded our budget last year by 6% as for distributable income to shareholders," he says.

Tampa accounts for a percentage of that growth, Cardwell adds.

"We had a fine year last year and exceeded our budget," he says. "The Tampa office itself did very well within our system. From that standpoint, the performance of the office and performance of the firm is positive."

The departures pose only a short-term problem for the Tampa office, says Joe Rugg, the local managing partner. Already he has recruited three lateral attorneys with plans to recruit three more over the next few months.

The departure does not diminish the firm's commitment to the Tampa Bay market, Rugg says. He says the departures pose a challenge in that Akerman Senterfitt competes against several large homegrown law firms such as Fowler White Boggs Banker PA, Holland & Knight LLP and Carlton Fields PA.

"The firm's commitment to the Tampa office is to grow and add more market size," he says. "For us to be competitive with them, we need growth."

Cardwell says: "I would expect that you'll see us within the next two years growing to where we were before.

"My goal is for us to be a 50-lawyer office over time," Cardwell adds. "There's always a step forward and a step back. We regret these departures, but it's part of the growing pains for any firm that seeks to be a major player in a major market."

Cardwell describes the Tampa Bay area as one of Akerman Senterfitt's key markets. Besides the markets already mentioned, the firm has a presence in Jacksonville, Tavares and West Palm Beach. It also has expanded into Washington, D.C., and Cardwell hints that the firm may expand into other Northeast markets, possibly even New York.

"Our firm's goal is to be one of the recognized top two or three firms in the state of Florida, something which we believe we have achieved," he says. "Then it also is a goal of ours to be in the top three or four markets we are in. We've certainly achieved that in Miami and Orlando. While I don't know that we're there yet in Tampa, that is our goal."