SIMON SIDAMON-ERISTOFF

Simon Sidamon-Eristoff is Of Counsel to Kalbian Hagerty LLP. He specializes in the representation of nonprofit organizations. He also oversees investments by several private companies with interests in real estate, renewable energy, telecommunications, broadcasting and transportation.

Simon has served as General Counsel to American Farmland Trust since 1998. He is responsible for all of the organization’s legal affairs, including land conservation transactions, tax and estate planning matters, legislative analysis, employment law matters, litigation, and nonprofit governance.

A nationally recognized expert in the land conservation field, Simon has worked for nonprofit organizations, government agencies, and private landowners in a wide variety of conservation, real estate and tax matters in over 20 years of private and public law practice. His experience in conservation includes 8 years’ work as an in-house attorney at two other national nonprofit organizations, the Trust for Public Land and the Rails to Trails Conservancy.

As Regional Counsel at the Trust for Public Land, Simon was responsible for legal matters throughout a 20-state region, including land preservation transactions, tax planning, subdivisions, financing, litigation, leasing, and nonprofit corporate matters. He also directed the Trust’s New York State program for a year.

He negotiated numerous acquisitions of property and conservation easements from private landowners, and was responsible for conveying these interests to various government agencies, including the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service, and state and local units of government.

As Conservancy Counsel at the Rails to Trails Conservancy, Simon initiated a highly successful land preservation program focused on the acquisition of out-of-service railway corridors. Under his direction, this program preserved more than 900 miles of out-of- service rail corridor for use as public trails in eighteen transactions over four years.

Simon spent the first four years of his career at the New York law firms of Lord, Day & Lord and Coudert Brothers, specializing in real estate matters. He served as Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of Energy for energy conservation and renewable energy in the first Bush administration from 1991 to 1993.