Martin has practiced law in the city of New Orleans for over 30 years. He knows the city, he knows the courts and he knows the businesses that drive the region. Throughout his career Martin has worked with national law firms and corporate clients to navigate the local scene, including local, state and federal courts and municipal, parish and state governments.
Martin’s legal practice includes complex corporate litigation, class action defense, state and local tax disputes, telecommunications, franchise, zoning, real estate, property rights and general commercial litigation. He regularly represents clients before various city and state agencies on these and related matters. Martin has successfully represented several large national clients in a variety of cases, ranging from small fiber optic damage subrogation claims to large scale class actions based on service outages. He has been regularly called upon to draft and negotiate franchise agreements, leases, purchase and sale agreements, cooperative endeavor agreements, contracts, rights of way acquisitions and fiber optic capacity use and service agreements for local and national business clients.
Following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, Martin was deeply involved in the City of New Orleans’ unified planning and neighborhood redevelopment initiatives. During hurricane recovery, he chaired the District 5 (Lake Area) Neighborhood Recovery Group consisting of seven distinct neighborhoods serving over 15,000 homes; re-drafted commercial, multi-family and residential zoning regulations for the Lake Area; and assisted in the development of business and community-based recovery programs. His post-Katrina work helped secure a sustainable recovery for the city’s Lake Area neighborhoods and is referenced in the books We Shall Not be Moved and Katrina After the Storm. In the years following, Martin led several members of the firm in assisting state agencies in Louisiana and Texas to draft and implement disaster recovery programs based on Federal Community Development Block Grants.
Martin is a well-respected leader within the firm, the bar and the community. He has served on the firm’s Management Committee and is currently responsible for mentoring and developing educational programs for its associate attorneys. He also chairs in the firm’s Recruiting and Diversity committees. Over the course of his career, he has been elected and appointed to various bar leadership positions including chairman of the Louisiana State Bar Association (LSBA) Young Lawyers Section Continuing Legal Education Committee and Delegate of the Young Lawyers Division for the American Bar Association (ABA) Annual Meeting.
Among his many charitable endeavors, Martin helped establish the St. Dominic Parish/Haiti Partnership to re-build and sustain a Catholic school and church parish in rural Savanne Henri, Haiti following the devastating 2010 earthquake. He has travelled to Haiti multiple times to build the relationship and oversee the infrastructure projects and school programs funded by the group. The work continues and has expanded its reach. Martin also annually co-hosts a fundraiser benefiting Boys Hope Girls Hope, a non-profit organization that provides a stable home and quality education to at-risk children.
Asked to comment about his 30-plus year tenure at the firm, Martin stated: “This is a wonderful law firm with great lawyers and staff. It is a blessing to work with so many talented people on a daily basis. I learn something new every day.”
Practices:
- Appellate
- Arbitration and Mediation
- Class Actions
- Commercial Litigation
- Oil, Gas and Energy Litigation and Arbitration
- Products Liability
- Real Estate and Commercial Leasing
- Oilfield Service Company Transactions and Litigation
- Tax – State and Local Banking
Industries:
- Banking
- Construction
- Energy and Natural Resources Insurance
- Real Estate
- Telecommunications and Utilities Transportation
Admissions:
- Louisiana
- U.S. Court of Appeals, 5th Circuit
- U.S. District Court, Eastern District of LA
- U.S. District Court, Western District of LA
- U.S. District Court, Middle District of LA
Education:
- Loyola University New Orleans College of Law, J.D. 1988
- Louisiana State University, B.S. 1985
Affiliations:
- American Bar Association
- Federal Bar Association
- Louisiana State Bar Association – Civil Law and Litigation, Taxation and Corporate and Business Law Sections
- New Orleans Bar Association
- Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation – Policy Committee
- Lakeview Crime Prevention Taxing District – Commissioner
- Friends of Lakeview 501c3
- St. Dominic Parish/Haiti Partnership – Mission
Recognition:
- America’s Top 100 High Stake Litigators (2018)
- Louisiana Super Lawyers – Business Litigation (2008, 2014-2018)
- New Orleans Magazine”Top Lawyers” – Communications Law; Commercial Litigation (2016- 2018)
- Best Lawyers in America- Commercial Litigation (Since 2013)
- Listed in the A.M. Best’s Directory of Recommended Insurance Attorneys
- CityBusiness Leadership in Law (2012)
Publications:
- Arbitration Clauses: Binding You to More Than You Think, Presenter, Gordon Arata Montgomery Barnett Annual Duck Lunch & Seminar, October 2018
- State and Local Tax Issues for Oil and Gas Companies: Audit Procedures; Oil Severance Tax, Presenter Gordon Arata Montgomery Barnett Annual Duck Lunch & Seminar, October 2017
- Louisiana Department of Revenue Attempts to Rewrite Crude Oil Purchase Agreements in an Effort to Collect More Severance Taxes, Drill Deeper Blog, May 2017
- Beware of Louisiana Severance Tax Assessments on Crude Oil, Drill Deeper Blog, March 2016
- Downloading, Streaming, and Purchasing Over the Internet, Co-Presenter, 2015 Louisiana State & Local Taxation Workshop – Society of Louisiana CPAs, July 2015
- Get Your Ducks in A Row – Recent Developments in State and Local Tax Litigation in Louisiana, Presenter and Co-Author, Gordon Arata Annual Duck Lunch & Seminar 2014
- 2013 State & Local Tax, Presenter, Workshop for the Society of Louisiana Certified Public Accountants, June 2013
- Taxpayer Rights and Appeals, Presenter and Author,Louisiana Multi-Parish Tax Commission Annual Conference, April 2013