Attorney Profile
E. J. Strassburger
Education:, University of Pittsburgh, J.D., cum laude, 1971
Admissions: 1971, Pennsylvania and U.S. District Court, Western District of Pennsylvania; 1975, U.S. Court of Appeals, Third and Fourth Circuits; 1996, U.S. Supreme Court
Practice Areas: Commercial Litigation; Real Estate; Municipal Law; Estate Planning; Estate Administration
E.J. Strassburger is president of the law firm of Strassburger McKenna Gutnick & Gefsky, which has offices in Pittsburgh, Greensburg and New Brighton, Pennsylvania.
He is an active litigator who has concentrated for more than 35 years in complex commercial litigation, municipal law and appellate practice. For the past 25 years, he has balanced his litigation practice, with estate planning and administration.
Mr. Strassburger has been the lead attorney in more than 40 cases decided in the Pennsylvania and federal appellate courts, which have included landmark Pennsylvania Supreme Court decisions involving real estate, municipal, employment, mineral and public utility law.
Among other areas, Mr. Strassburger is a pioneer in school choice reform in western Pennsylvania. In one leading example, he represented the Wilkinsburg School Board in the controversial privatization of the Turner Elementary School, which directly led to the passage of the landmark Pennsylvania Charter School Act.
Mr. Strassburger also understands the complex relationships that municipalities have with other government bodies and business corporations. As the long-time solicitor for Findlay Township (the municipality in which the Pittsburgh International Airport is located), he helped secure a ten-year agreement with the County of Allegheny that enabled the Township to collect parking taxes, which led to substantial increases in annual revenues.
He also helped Findlay Township uphold its gross receipts tax in a dispute with a solid waste management contractor.
For the Municipality of Monroeville, near Pittsburgh, Mr. Strassburger negotiated a settlement with a Fortune 500 corporation to pay millions of dollars in business privilege taxes.
On behalf of Sabre Systems and Service, a real estate appraisal contractor, he negotiated a substantial settlement in a dispute with the County of Allegheny, revolving around a court-ordered re-assessment of all 580,000 properties in the county.
Professional Activity
Mr. Strassburger has been involved in the legal professional community for many years. He is a past president of both the Academy of Trial Lawyers of Allegheny County and the Neighborhood Legal Services Association.
Community Service
Active in the Pittsburgh community, Mr. Strassburger currently is president of Jewish Residential Foundation and is also is a board member of the American Civil Liberties Union of Greater Pittsburgh. He is a past president and longtime board member of Jewish Residential Services, which serves the mental health and mental retardation communities. He also has served on the boards of Rodef Shalom Congregation and The United Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh. He is the 2008 recipient of the Sonia & Aaron Levinson Community Relations Award of the UJF.
Personal
Mr. Strassburger resides in Squirrel Hill with Mona, his psychologist wife of 37 years. They have two grown children. He is the third generation of lawyers on both the paternal and maternal sides of his family. His grandfather, the late Eugene B. Strassburger, founded the firm in the early 1900s, and was one of the authors of the Uniform Commercial Code.
