Buchalter

William J. Gelm is a shareholder resident in the Scottsdale office and serves on the firm’s Board of Directors. He is also the chair of the Charter School and Education industry group, the chair of the firm’s Diversity, Equality and Inclusion Committee and is a member of the real estate, commercial finance and corporate practice groups.

In his practice, Mr. Gelm works almost exclusively with nonprofit organizations that operate charter and private schools in connection with corporate structuring and governance, real estate and real estate finance, and other general business law matters, with an emphasis on the acquisition, development and financing of educational facilities using tax exempt bond structures and other sophisticated structured finance products.  Mr. Gelm has been involved in over 250 tax-exempt bond issuances in his career placing over $1,000,000,000 in taxable and tax exempt bonds.   In addition, Mr. Gelm acts as general counsel to a large number of charter school operators relating to general corporate work, including board composition and governance issues, tax exempt formation and compliance issues, facilities leasing and conventional financing matters, and state and federal regulatory issues.  To this end, Mr. Gelm frequently conducts board training seminars for nonprofit clients to educate them regarding individual board member fiduciary responsibilities, board procedures, and conflicts, taking into consideration limitations imposed upon nonprofit boards by corporate law, tax law and, if applicable, charter school laws.

Mr. Gelm also represents commercial banks as lender’s counsel when making loans to nonprofit corporations, investment banking institutions as disclosure counsel in bond financing transactions, and corporate trust departments of major banks in connection with charter school bond financing transactions.

 

Bar Admissions

• Arizona
• Ohio

Education

• Case Western Reserve University