LOS ANGELES-Elkins Kalt Weintraub Reuben Gartside LLP adds John Bowman as partner to its law practice. Bowman is a land use attorney with more than 20 years of experience in real estate development and permitting. He joins the Century City-based firm to grow its practice in all areas of land use law.

Partner Keith Elkins notes that the firm’s clients include “major players” in the real estate industry and that Bowman “can provide the specialized land use expertise that our clients need.”

Bowman has experience representing clients in administrative proceedings before state and local agencies, obtaining government entitlements for commercial, residential, industrial, institutional and mixed-use projects throughout Southern California, and representing clients in litigation involving challenges to land use decisions.

Bowman tells GlobeSt.com that what attracted him to the firm was that it offered him an opportunity to grow his land use practice “alongside the company’s already robust real estate practice.” He continues that he was also attracted “by the fact that Elkins Kalt is populated by exceptional lawyers, each of whom has the credentials and experience that you would normally find only in the largest and most well-known firms in Los Angeles, who have joined together to form a unique firm that is able to provide ‘big firm’ services with ‘small firm’ attention to the individual needs of each client.”

He also has particular expertise in matters involving compliance with the California Environmental Quality Act. In addition to knowledge and experience in all aspects of land use law, according to a prepared statement, “Bowman brings a long track record of obtaining favorable results for his clients in both the trial courts and the California Court of Appeal.”

Like the firm’s founding partners—Keith Elkins, Scott Kalt, Bill Weintraub, Jeff Reuben, Fred Gartside and Jeff Riffer—Bowman is a former partner of the firm Jeffer Mangels Butler & Marmaro LLP, where he practiced for more than 12 years.

Some of Bowman’s past representative experience includes: Obtaining zone changes and other land use entitlements for large mixed-use projects in Hollywood and Westchester; Overseeing the preparation and processing of a joint EIR/EIS for a major expansion of a wallboard manufacturing plant in Imperial County, and represented the plant owner in connection with a legal challenge to the County’s approvals brought by a well-known environmental organization; Successfully defending an EIR for the demolition of apartment buildings and construction of a new residential condominium project on property located within an historic district in Beverly Hills; Obtaining entitlements for a retail center in the mid-city area of Los Angeles involving the reconstruction and integration of a Metropolitan Transportation Authority bus terminal into the project; and successfully represented a national grocery chain in administrative proceedings involving appeals of permits to renovate and convert a former theater building for use as a drug store in Westwood.