Bill Schifino Tampa Office Manging Shareholder Gunster
What is the landscape for law firms in Tampa Bay? There is plenty of legal work in Tampa Bay for quality law firms and competent lawyers. I have been in this marketplace for 33 years, and the way law firms interact with one another has relatively remained the same. The law firms in this region play well together, and we refer work back and forth to one another because we sometimes have inherent conflicts in our cases. For example, if there is a business litigation case that involves multiple parties and the lawyer can’t represent them all, that lawyer will call other lawyers who may have been on the other side in a similar case in the past but who are capable and competent. So while I may have a case where I’ll see a credible law firm on the other side, one day they may be joining with me to help defend another group on a different case. How does Gunster serve the community? A law firm cannot attract the right talent without a commitment to community service, service to the profession and pro bono work. It is critically important that we as professionals give back to those less fortunate. Within the Florida Bar, a big focus is access to justice. In the criminal justice system, if you’re indigent then you are constitutionally entitled to a public defender, but what if you are someone that just really cannot afford a lawyer and are on the cusp of being below the poverty level? What happens if that person all of a sudden has a traumatic event in their life, and cannot get free legal service? We need to address how we as a profession can make certain that those people are being taken care of. What makes the Tampa region attractive? I’m very proud of the Central Florida market. When you look at what is happening on this coast, from Naples to Fort Myers to Pinellas to Clearwater and St. Petersburg up into Pasco, the Tampa Bay Region is incredibly dynamic. It is one of the most exciting markets in the country right now and a great time for people and businesses to be apart of it.” 52 | Invest: Tampa Bay 2020 | LEGAL
flag” law authorizing the confiscation of firearms from individuals found to pose a credible threat to themselves or others. Not long after its passage, Jefferson Eugene Davis, a Gilchrist County Sherriff’s deputy, challenged the law as vague, overbroad, and in violation of his due process rights when the Sheriff’s Office used it to obtain a risk protection order against him and take his guns for up to one year. A district court judge approved the application over Davis’s objections, and the 1st District Court of Appeals subsequently denied his appeal, saying that “the prevalence of public shootings, and the need to thwart the mayhem and carnage contemplated by would-be perpetrators does represent an urgent and compelling state interest,” and that the red flag law therefore passes the “strict scrutiny test” that applies when a statute impairs the exercise of a fundamental, constitutionally protected right. Tax reform The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (the Act) is now a couple of years old, and it has already begun to impact businesses and individuals in Florida and across the country. Law firms have a particularly interesting relationship with the new tax law in terms of how it affects how individual partners and the firm itself are taxed. The Act introduced new restrictions on state income tax deductions that could potentially expose more attorneys’ incomes to federal income tax. On the bright side, for married attorneys with adjusted gross incomes below $315,000 filing jointly with their spouses, or single attorneys earning below $157,700, the new business income tax deduction can be relied upon to offset their higher tax liability substantially, if not entirely. This new deduction will generally not be available to married attorneys making more than $415,000 or single lawyers earning at least $207,500. As for the firms themselves, gross revenue and whether the firm operates as a flow-through enterprise are determining factors impacting the Act’s bite. Partners of flow-through firms with income below the threshold now qualify for a new pass-through deduction on their flow-through earnings – those earning above the cap can’t take the deduction. Other aspects of the new tax paradigm that are being felt by law firms include: lawyers are no longer permitted to deduct meal and entertainment expenses; transportation benefits are no longer deductible by the firm, and are therefore less likely to be offered; wages paid to employees on family and medical leave are now deductible by their firms, incentivizing more generous medical leave policies; and business interest expense ( )
