Mike represents public companies and smaller, privately-owned businesses and local governments in federal and state court litigation, as well as in land use and real estate development and entitlement negotiations, processes, and disputes. Mike has experience litigating throughout the United States but focuses his practice on land use, real estate and local government issues and solutions in North Carolina.
A lease is a contract. It is a contract in which the lessor (think, landlord or tenant/sublandlord) grants to another person or entity, called the lessee (think, tenant/sublandlord or subtenant), the right to possess and use a definite portion of land and/or a structure for a definite term […]
Today, a three judge panel of the North Carolina state court declared unconstitutional a State law that blocks a municipality — one municipality — from exercising its power to create an extraterritorial planning jurisdiction, or “ETJ”. Thanks to my colleague Laura DeVivo (author of the incredible Keeping Up With […]
Today, we’re looking at Shoeheel Farms v. City of Laurinburg, COA14-1089 (August 4, 2015). The Court of Appeals dismissed as moot property owners’ appeal of a trial court’s decision denying a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction. Facts The City of Laurinburg and a property owners entered into […]
Impact fees are defined, generally, as a charge on new development to pay for the construction or expansion of off-site capital improvements that are necessitated by and/or benefit the new development. Impact fees have been a hot topic in North Carolina, which is perfectly logical in a growing […]
We’ve blogged in the past here, here and here about the political saga between the City of Raleigh and the State of North Carolina over the Dorothea Dix property in downtown Raleigh, a 300-plus acre piece of lovely real estate. And you thought cities and states were on […]
Aaron Frank
Amy C. O'Neal
John Cooke
Michael Thelen
WBD Admin
North Carolina Land Use Litigator 