Irving B. Sugerman Partner

Irv is a partner in Brouse McDowell’s Real Estate and Litigation Groups. His practice includes all facets of land use planning, zoning, economic development, real estate, and business litigation. Through his years of litigation and trial practice, Irv has become a leader in governmental law and litigation, as well as mediation and alternative dispute resolution.

In the early 1990s, Irv began representing political subdivisions and has done so for the past 30 years. He currently serves as the Law Director of Coventry Township, the Village of Lodi and the City of New Franklin and serves as General Counsel to the Summit County Public Health Department. In addition, he also serves as special counsel to the City of Barberton, Richfield Township, and the City of Munroe Falls. In the past, Irv has served as the Law Director or special counsel to many other political subdivisions, including Summit County Metro Parks, Copley Township, Springfield Township, and the Villages of Lakemore and Peninsula.

During Irv’s representation of Springfield and Coventry Townships, he negotiated the first Joint Economic Development Districts in the State of Ohio. He has also negotiated numerous intergovernmental agreements, including the establishment and implementation of Regional Council of Governments that combined the dispatch operations of Copley Township and the Cities of Norton and Barberton in one instance and the Cities of Green and New Franklin in another.

From 2002 through 2015, Irv served as the Adjunct Professor of Negotiations at the University of Akron School of Law and was honored to receive the John R. Quine Outstanding Adjunct Professor Award in 2012. Irv is also a graduate of the Advanced Course on Mediating Land Use Disputes presented by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Consensus Building Institute and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Professor Lawrence Susskind).

Irv is a frequent lecturer in the areas of zoning, land use, economic development, real estate, negotiations, mediation, and attorney health and well-being. He has made presentations to and taught seminars for the Akron Bar Association, the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association, the United States Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Ohio, the University of Akron School of Law, the Ohio Township Association, the Ohio Prosecuting Attorney’s Association, the Summit County Zoning Inspector’s Association, the Summit County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, the Medina County Planning Association and numerous private companies and organizations.