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Practice/Industry Group Overview
Cole Schotz's Environmental Law Department, the largest environmental practice group in Bergen County and one of the largest in New Jersey, has extensive experience with the environmental aspects of real estate, corporate and business transactions across the nation. Perhaps our greatest strength is in helping clients who are selling, buying, leasing, financing or developing property to avoid or manage environmental liability so that their goals are achieved. This is accomplished by knowing the full range of options that are available and using them creatively to overcome whatever barriers may arise.
Many properties that are the subject of transactions today are contaminated. We believe the contamination should seldom be an obstacle to closing the transaction, so long as the client understand the nature of the risk and is comfortable with what has been done to protect against it. We routinely coordinate due diligence and environmental site assessments to get a thorough understanding of the facts, the law, and to allow our clients to make the best decisions concerning how to proceed. We have identified some of the most experienced and cost-effective consultants available to address the issue that needs to be resolved and recommend to the client as needed.
One of the greatest obstacles to closing a transaction involving contaminated property is to make all the parties comfortable with how they are going to pay for a cleanup which is much more expensive than was anticipated when they signed the contract or closed the deal. Securing the cost of the "worst case scenario," so that the buyer, seller and the lender are willing to proceed, is often a significant challenge. The Environmental Law Department has negotiated environmental insurance policies for over one hundred properties, so that the closing of title and the development and use of the property could proceed before the cleanup is completed. Our extensive experience with insurance companies and brokers that specialize in environmental insurance has allowed us to routinely make the use of innovative approaches.
We have substantial experience advising clients concerning the cleanup of contaminated properties under the various state and federal laws which require such cleanups. Our goal is to help clients avoid or minimize the cost of the cleanup. For example, we have obtained many millions of dollars from the clients's insurance companies under the typical business liability insurance policy, as well as from prior owners and operators of the property, to help pay for the cleanup. We ordinarily try to avoid litigation to get this money paid by demonstrating to our adversary that we have a full command of the issues to try to convince them that little will be gained through litigation. However, if litigation is needed we have the experience to consistently obtain a favorable result.
Another approach we have used to help clients avoid cleanup costs is to pursue the brownfields funding available from state and federal governments to pay those costs. We have obtained brownfields approvals for several client's projects, both big and small, that have resulted in governmental approval for our clients to recover many millions of dollars of remedial costs.
We regularly assist our clients with commercial, industrial and residential development of property, including contaminated property. We help obtain permits or approvals to develop in or near wetlands, streams, the Highlands and in coastal or waterfront areas, as well as to address stormwater, vapor intrusion and other site development issues.
Our daily involvement with the broad array of environmental issues keeps us on top of the latest developments in the law and the marketplace, so that when some impediment arises we can offer the client the full range of options so that the best choice can be selected to accomplish the client's objective.
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