Advises on a variety of matters, including acquisitions and dispositions, business counseling, real estate finance and joint ventures.

Burton Lehman, one of the firm’s founders, served as a partner from 1969 until 2003, when he took a hiatus from law firm practice to join Tishman Speyer Properties as senior adviser and general counsel. Since 2006, he has served as of counsel to our M&A and Securities and Real Estate Groups. 

After receiving his A.B. from Columbia College, Burt attended Columbia University School of Law, where he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and the Writing and Research Editor on the Columbia Law Review. After graduating magna cum laude from that institution, he had the distinction of serving as a law clerk to the Hon. Harold R. Medina of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, after which he became assistant counsel to the New York State Temporary State Commission on the Constitutional Convention.

Burt chaired the New York City Bar Association’s Program on Institutional Investors, Corporate Governance and Proxy Reform. He has been active in the New York State Bar Association, including serving on the Committee on the State Constitution, the Committee on Partners and Partnerships, and the Committee on Attorney Professionalism. He is an inactive member of the Florida Bar.

Among Burt’s many philanthropic causes, he is a member of the Board of Visitors of Columbia Law School, a member and former chair of the Board of Governors of Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, and a former trustee of three prestigious New York institutions, Central Synagogue, The Town School and HealthCare Chaplaincy. He was a member of the New York City Conflicts of Interest Board from 2009 to 2014.