Thomas W. Korver
Partner
Prior to HPK, Tom practiced at Petros & White, LLC and Porzak Browning & Bushong, LLP. He currently practices water law, environmental law, land use and real property law in Colorado and Wyoming. Tom represents corporations, water user associations, farmers and ranchers, recreational property owners, municipal and county governments, developers, industries and environmental interests.
Tom represents clients at the local government, administrative, trial and appellate levels in matters involving water rights and water quality. He advises clients on such matters as acquisition, due diligence and development of water and water rights; changes and exchanges of water rights; maintaining and enhancing the use of water rights; and permitting of water structures. Tom also advises his clients on water quality permitting and compliance; activities involving wetlands; and compliance with associated environmental laws and regulations.
Tom’s real property and land use practices include assisting clients with real estate transactional matters, including drafting and negotiating contracts and documents conveying real property, as well as advising clients on applicable land use statutes, codes and regulations. He has shepherded real estate and associated water purchases and sales for high-end recreational and agricultural ranches as well as smaller residential properties.
Tom’s public and private land practice includes assisting clients with permitting of projects on U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management lands, federal land exchanges, negotiating grazing permits and agreements, road and other access under federal and state laws, and prescriptive and express easements for a variety of projects.
Tom obtained his J.D. in 2005 from the University of Montana School of Law where he was Editor-In-Chief of the Montana Law Review, a Student Clerk for U.S. District Court, District of Montana Magistrate Leif Ericson, and a Prosecutorial Intern for the City of Missoula prosecuting misdemeanor offenses under the Montana Student Practice Rule. After growing up on a farm in Iowa, Tom obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in 1985 from South Dakota State University and intended to eventually obtain a veterinary medicine degree. Instead, Tom went to work for the U.S. Department of Agriculture and then for a large Denver law firm as an environmental paralegal before deciding to attend law school in Missoula, Montana, where Tom was under the mistaken impression that he could attend law school and still fish every day.