Land Use

Mike represents clients in permitting and enforcement matters before local zoning boards and other municipal  bodies, including planning boards, conservation commissions, historic districts, boards of health, select boards, city councils, town meetings, regional planning authorities, and state agencies. He helps them obtain the approvals and permits they need to develop their property and operate their businesses. Mike has successfully represented clients in obtaining approvals from permitting boards in well over 100 Massachusetts communities. He also represents clients in federal and state courts on zoning appeals and other land use matters.

Mike has a Master’s degree in City Planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and 25 years of service on municipal boards. This includes prior service as a member and chair of his town’s planning board, its zoning board of appeals, and its select board. He currently serves as Town Moderator. This gives him a good appreciation of the view from the other side of the table—invaluable experience for advising and representing clients on the practical aspects of development permitting strategy and negotiations with municipalities, as well as the legal requirements. Mike has represented clients in the wireless telecommunications industry for more than 20 years, and he has successfully permitted hundreds of sites at the local level, in some cases after winning a judicial appeal. He has represented a national retailer in resolving abutter opposition and obtaining local and state approvals to construct and operate a gasoline station. He also has represented developers and end users in navigating through local concerns to secure  approvals  for distribution and biotech facilities. He represented a waterfront property owner in pursuing resiliency responses to address coastal erosion and negotiating related agreements with an abutter.  He has represented developers of large ground mounted solar facilities in obtaining and defending entitlements

Real Estate + Development

Mike also represents clients in transactions involving residential, commercial and industrial property, including dealing with title and related matters. He helped homeowners abutting a recreational lake form a municipal district to successfully acquire and permit the reconstruction of a failing dam that posed a threat to their properties. He also represented a retail developer in acquiring rights needed for a parking area in connection with redevelopment of a shopping center and has represented other commercial owners in resolving issues involving easements impacting their property.

Mike has made frequent local and national speaking appearances before professional, business, civic, and student groups on zoning; constitutional issues, including takings, religious land use, and equal protection law; and other land use and environmental law subjects. He is a contributing author of the Massachusetts Zoning Manual, co-edited an American Bar Association treatise on religious land use law, and has contributed articles on land use and constitutional law topics to numerous other publications. For many years he has co-chaired a seminar on zoning basics for Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education. The Massachusetts Superior Court has qualified him as an expert witness on land use permitting.