Every year, AZ Big Media, which publishes both PTK and AZRE magazines, selects Arizona’s top people and projects to showcase in its premier commercial real estate magazine — PTK — from an impressive and competitive nomination pool. Each day we will highlight 20 different categories of People to Know. Here are the land-use attorneys to know in Arizona for 2024:
LEARN MORE: Read last year’s edition of PTK magazine
Arizona land-use attorneys to know for 2024
Taylor Earl
Managing partner
Earl & Curley
Founded by his father Stephen Earl in 1991, and now carried forward by Taylor Earl, Earl & Curley continues to be one of the leading zoning and land use law firms in Arizona. Taylor Earl and other firm members advocate for their clients at city hall, helping them navigate the complex world of land use entitlements for all types of developments, including residential (single and multifamily), commercial, office, industrial, and others. Taylor Earl has earned a strong reputation in the industry and is regarded as an effective, smart, and creative adviser and advocate for his clients.
Professional advice: “If you work hard and commit to being a good and kind person, success will follow.”
Larry S. Lazarus
Partner
Lazarus, Silvyn & Bangs
Lazarus has lived and worked in the Phoenix metropolitan area for more than 40 years, during which time he has earned the reputation of being one of Arizona’s most talented and well-respected land use attorneys. His success is due not only to his promotion of sound land use principles and good public policy but to the basic respect he shows to people from all walks of life. In 1979 he was chairman of the Urban Form Directions for the City of Phoenix and was significantly responsible for establishing the Village Concept Plan — the most comprehensive set of land use policies of its kind in the state at that time and even today.
Wendy Riddell
Founding and managing member
Berry Riddell
Riddell specializes in land use and lobbying at a local level. She represents a multitude of development clients throughout the Phoenix metropolitan area from major national homebuilders, Fortune 50 retailers, multifamily developers, resort, hospital, office and industrial builders, advising and guiding on such significant projects as Westgate, HonorHealth campuses, the I.D.E.A. Campus in Tempe, The Preserve at Goldfield Ranch and campuses for the Diocese of Phoenix.
Leadership style: “My leadership style is direct, honest and trusting. If we work together, it is because I believe in your talents, your intelligence and your ability to grasp the entirety of any given situation. I am a delegator, and I trust the people around me to see a project through.”
Lindsay Schube
Member
Gammage & Burnham
Schube focuses her practice primarily in the Zoning and Land Use group, with an emphasis on both the legislative and administrative levels representing land owners and developers. She regularly attends neighborhood organizations, planning commissions and city councils and other regulatory bodies to obtain land use entitlements on behalf of her clients. Schube also assists clients in the marijuana industry with a primary focus on land use and permitting issues with local cities, counties and the Arizona Department of Health Services. She also represents landowners and businesses, handles property violations matters and has experience practicing in the area of homeownership association law.
Surprising fact: Schube is fluent in French and she likes to travel to her home country of Canada whenever possible.
Darin A. Sender
President and CEO
Sender Associates
Sender is an AV-rated zoning attorney and president and founder of Sender Associates, a law firm specializing in zoning entitlements based in Tempe. For more than 26 years, Sender has helped clients obtain zoning entitlements for mixed-use, residential, commercial and industrial projects.
Source of pride: “I am most proud of our work in Downtown Tempe that has resulted in its transformation from a village of single-story buildings when I first arrived in Tempe in 1989, to today’s high-rise economic engine supporting light-rail, streetcar, job creation and urban living.”
Professional advice: “Create a list of all the things you enjoy doing — your passions. Then figure out a way to work in those industries.”
