In 1950, the firm was established in Elizabeth, New Jersey by Henry Farer, our founder, senior partner and chairman of our board of directors. The firm remained in Elizabeth until 1980, practicing primarily in the areas of commercial and industrial real estate and business transactions, real estate financing, counseling on business and real estate activities, and commercial litigation.

We moved to Westfield in 1980, continuing the concentration in commercial real estate and business law.

Jack Fersko joined the firm in 1981, becoming a protégé of Henry’s. Jack is now a director of the firm and chair of the Real Estate & Redevelopment practice group. He is highly regarded as a leading practitioner in real estate and redevelopment law.

At the end of 1983, New Jersey’s groundbreaking Environmental Cleanup Responsibility Act (“ECRA”, now known as “ISRA”) became the first law in the nation to precondition real estate and business transactions on government sanctioned and supervised environmental investigations and cleanups.

Coinciding with a business and real estate boom in New Jersey, ECRA had a profound and wide-ranging impact on transactions in New Jersey and elsewhere.

Given the firm's transactional focus, we were quickly involved in a broad array of environmental investigations and cleanups, as well as in allocating environmental risks in transactions and in seeking and pursuing areas of cleanup cost-recovery.

David Farer, who joined the firm in 1982, headed our efforts in this area. David is now a director of the firm and chair of our Environmental & Brownfields practice group. He is a nationally renowned environmental lawyer.

Other important environmental laws — such as New Jersey's Spill Act and the federal Superfund law – were also having an increasing impact on transactions, and the firm, steadily increasing the breadth of its knowledge and experience — swiftly became known – and sought out — for its work at the intersection of environmental law with real estate and business law.

In the mid-1980s we also began teaching and writing extensively on environmental law and its impact on real estate and business, and we became leaders in education on environmental issues.

David began teaching the first state-wide courses on ECRA/ISRA in 1985 for the New Jersey Institute for Continuing Legal Education (ICLE), which continues to publish David's ISRA manual. Shortly after, he began lecturing around the country on environmental legal issues. In 1987, he developed and chaired the first annual American Law Institute-American Bar Association national symposium on “The Impact of Environmental Law on Real Estate and Business Transactions,” one of two ALI-ABA courses he continues to lead every year.

Richard Ericsson joined the firm in 1986, as our environmental practice continued to grow. He had been an enforcement attorney with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. He is now a director of the firm, and is deeply versed in complex cleanup, redevelopment and financing issues.

Ann Waeger also joined the firm in 1986, bolstering the busy commercial real estate practice. Ann, too, is now a director of the firm. She has established herself as a leading authority on the use of environmental insurance in transactions and redevelopment projects, and in pursuing coverage both under the new insurance products and under the older general liability policies.

By the early 1990s, the firm was involved in complex projects involving the acquisition, cleanup and redevelopment of underutilized or idle industrial and commercial properties — mostly in urban areas — known or suspected to be contaminated. Such sites – now known as “brownfields” – present special, multi-faceted challenges to which the firm has been able to apply its depth of knowledge and experience. The firm’s brownfields practice has continued to grow, accelerating even further in the last several years.

We have been involved in a number of the most significant brownfields cleanup and redevelopment projects, from reclamation of highly tainted industrial sites to residential redevelopment of long-languishing municipal landfills.

Jay Jaffe joined the expanding Environmental & Brownfields practice group in 1989, and is now a director in the firm. Our partner Susan Karp joined the group in 1994.

Scholarly efforts are a central tenet of the firm. Through the nineties, Jack, Richard and Ann all began writing and lecturing extensively on environmental and transactional legal issues. Along with David, they continue to develop and participate in seminars in our state and region, and around the country. Jack is a prolific writer and lecturer, edits a major ICLE treatise and teaches regularly. Richard speaks on a regular basis for the ABA, ICLE and at other forums. Ann is on the faculty of two annual ALI-ABA national symposia, has published often, and is a sought after lecturer. Our other partners, too, have participated in such endeavors.

In recent years, we have further enhanced our legal services in our chosen areas of concentration. Our partner John Reilly, chair of our Litigation & Condemnation practice group, has over 25 years of experience in the field of condemnation and eminent domain law. Our partner Daniel Schmutter focuses on environmental and real estate litigation. Our partner Marcie Horowitz brings additional depth of experience and knowledge to our Environmental & Brownfields practice group. Our partner John Hague has over 25 years of experience in land use law.

The firm is proud to represent a number of the most distinguished national and regional real estate and redevelopment companies and manufacturing companies.

We are also proud of the recognition the firm has garnered from our clients and our peers. "Chambers USA" designates David, Jack, Richard and Ann as leaders in their fields, and ranks us as a leading firm in real estate, land use and environmental law. David and Jack are both named in "Best Lawyers in America." Martindale-Hubbell accords Henry, Jack, David, Richard, Ann, John Reilly and Marcie– and the firm as a whole – its highest rankings. Seven of us (Henry, Jack, David, Richard, Ann, Jay and Marcie) have been named as New Jersey "Super Lawyers", with Ann designated in that publication as one of the top 50 women lawyers in New Jersey. Jack and Ann are Fellows in the exclusive American College of Real Estate Lawyers, in which only 24 New Jersey attorneys have been invited to membership.