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Drew Melville

Member

Drew Melville is a Florida-based real estate and land use attorney who represents clients in acquisitions/dispositions, financing, development, leasing, governmental approvals, and public-private development partnerships.  With nearly 20 years of experience in Florida and nationally, he brings a creative, solution-oriented approach to his clients’ diverse real estate investment and development activities across multiple asset classes, including multifamily, office, industrial, retail, hospitality, healthcare and critical infrastructure. Representative deals and projects often involve urban infill, adaptive reuse, affordable and workforce housing, historic preservation, green building, brownfield or gray-field redevelopment and various financing vehicles that incorporate CPACE, tax credits and opportunity zones.

Prior to joining Clark Hill, he was a solo practitioner for several years. He also previously worked as an in-house counsel for a diversified land, agribusiness and development company and as a senior enforcement counsel at the Florida Department of Environmental Protection in Tallahassee. Drew regularly negotiates, documents and closes real estate deals ranging from six-figure land sales to complex, nine and ten-figure portfolio transactions, syndication loans and development financings. He also regularly negotiates project approvals with local governments and appears before public hearings on land use matters, always taking a collaborative approach with the public sector to promote economic and community development.

Drew has served on the city of Fort Lauderdale Historic Preservation Board and volunteers for or supports various community organizations, including Fort Lauderdale’s FLITE Center, whose mission is to provide comprehensive services for youth aging out of foster care. He is also an active member of ICSC, NAIOP and the Urban Land Institute (ULI), serving on ULI Florida’s Urban Development and Mixed-Use Product Council.

*Admitted in Florida and Massachusetts, not admitted in Illinois.

Education

J.D., University of Florida Levin College of Law, Gainesville, Florida, 2006
M.A., University of Florida College of Design Construction and Planning, 2006, Urban and Regional Planning
B.A., University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, 2002, Anthropology/Political Science

Recognitions

AV Preeminent Peer Review Rated by Martindale-Hubbell, 2024

Memberships

Urban Land Institute

International Council of Shopping Centers

National Association of Office, Industrial and Office Parks

Florida Bar Real Estate and Land Use Sections

Massachusetts Bar Real Estate Bar Association

State Bar Licenses

Florida, Massachusetts
  • Represented Vital Pharmaceuticals, Inc., maker of Bang Energy Drinks, in its $110mm purchase of newly completed, multi-building, Class A industrial development in Broward County, Florida. Later represented the company in its purchase of a $42mm industrial property in Georgia and placement of an economic development bond on the property. Also represented the company in the refinance of the company’s entire $300mm+ real estate portfolio as part of a $1b syndication loan. Later represented the company in selling the properties and terminating the Georgia bond in connection with high-profile bankruptcy reorganization and sale of company assets.
  • Represented developer in adaptive reuse and redevelopment of the south end of Manchester, New Hampshire’s historic mill yard (now a burgeoning education and tech hub), for credit tenant Southern New Hampshire University. The project included two components: (i) constructing a new, built-to suit parking garage consisting of 1,700 spaces on a former surface parking lot; and (ii) repurposing the adjacent mill building into SNHU’s administrative offices. Associated transactions included closing the $8mm purchase of the land and mill building, negotiating and documenting two separate, bondable net leases for the garage and mill building, closing a $60mm construction loan from an institutional credit-tenant lender for garage construction and mill rehab, and creating an air parcel for the garage.
  • Represented developer in a public-private partnership with the City of Kannapolis, North Carolina for large-scale, multi-phase redevelopment of the City’s historic downtown, where the site of the former Canon Mills complex is now a growing health education and tech hub. The representation included negotiating and documenting the public-private development agreement, purchase of various parcels of land from the City, various commercial leases and a hybrid debt-equity-opportunity zone financing vehicle with a large investment bank. The project components include several hundred apartment units in multiple newly constructed mixed-use structures, reintroduction of retail to downtown, adaptive reuse of two historic theaters and adaptive reuse of an old armory building, which is now a brewery.
  • Represented developer in a public-private partnership with the City of Concord, North Carolina for redevelopment of three parcels in the City’s historic downtown into mixed use apartment buildings with ground floor retail.
  • Represented developer in public-private partnership with City of Gastonia, North Carolina to redevelop the historic Trenton Mill. Associated transactions and matters included applying for and receiving local and federal historic designation and closing a historic tax credit financing vehicle for construction.
  • Ongoing representation of several clients with single tenant net lease portfolios involving various types of credit-rated retail users, customarily involving 1031 exchange transactions on both the purchase and sale legs.
  • Represented limited partners in equity investments into a diverse real estate portfolio, including a historic office building in downtown West Palm Beach, a net-leased, mission critical aerospace facility in Alabama and a three-state portfolio of Top Golf development sites.
  • Regularly represent clients in development of major flag hotels.
  • Regularly represent clients in development and redevelopment of large-scale retail properties.
  • Represented family-owned distillery in matters related to bringing their Hungarian Pálinka and other liquors to market.

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