Mr. Widener has been Of Counsel to the firm since May, 2008, after being a shareholder and director of the firm. Mike Widener entered private law practice in 1983, where he has practiced in the areas of shopping center and industrial property development, commercial leasing, property and business acquisitions, sales, reorganizations and mergers, financing, workouts and foreclosures, zoning and land use, and administrative and governmental relations law. Mr. Widener has represented shopping center, industrial and office building developers, a supermarket chain, automobile dealerships, a national nursing-care facility chain, a national behavioral healthcare provider, commercial property management companies, restaurant chains, two major Maricopa County municipalities, institutional and commercial banks, wholesalers, retailers and land speculators.

Though many of his clients have significant revenues, Mr. Widener advises emerging businesses and entrepreneurs, too, as well as a variety of non-profit corporations involved in private citizen diplomacy, homeless and HIV-client advocacy, affordable housing and community redevelopment.

Mr. Widener owns commercial properties outright or in co-ownership in four states, including agricultural and forest lands, resort rentals, office and industrial properties. He has been a borrower, and his holdings have been damaged from natural causes. As an owner, he has dealt with administrative agencies such as the Federal Communications Commission, the U.S. Forest Service, the Army Corps of Engineers and state historic preservation offices, as well as contractors, insurance carriers, lenders and tenants. His understanding of the development, leasing and management of commercial real estate has been gained from personal experience. Mike’s Certificate of Specialization in Real Estate Law from the State Bar of Arizona’s Board of Legal Specialization should not suggest he’s a navel-gazer. He employs a common-sense approach, focused on cost-effectiveness to the client, in solving commercial transactional problems.

Mr. Widener teaches domestic and international business law part time in local universities and has written more than a dozen scholarly articles on subjects ranging from dispute resolution in multiparty conflicts, to affordable housing, to ethics in local government. A link below leads the reader to those writings. In addition, his real estate and business law blog is found at http://terraincogito.com. In April, 2012, Mike completed his book on commercial leasing to medical marijuana enterprises, called Joint Tenancies: Landlords and Medical Marijuana Businesses.

Mr. Widener’s community engagements include being a Director of the Maricopa County Justice Museum and Learning Center, the past President of the Saint Mary's High School Scholarship and Benefit Fund, past President of the Board of Trustees of the Orangewood Presbyterian Church of Phoenix, a past member of the steering committee of the University of Virginia Club of Phoenix, and past Chair of the Catania, Italy, Committee of the Phoenix Sister Cities (and a former Director of the Sister Cities’ Board).

Mike is on the Roster of Fulbright Senior Specialists for the term 2011-2016, and he welcomes inquiries by universities abroad about his availability for consultation in commercial and real estate law and land use planning. Mike has been blissfully married for 34 years and has three adult daughters. Mike is included in the list of “Southwest Super Lawyers” annually and is A-V rated in the Martindale-Hubbell Peer Review Ratings.



[Curriculum Vitae]

http://terraincogito.com

Mike Widener’s Social Science Research Network Page

[Arizona Business Lawyer Article (Oct. 2007)]

[Notice to Educational Institutions Abroad (2012)]