August 19, 2011 | By Marcia Heroux Pounds, Sun Sentinel

From boutique offices to South Florida’s top-name law firms, hiring at regional law firms is back. Law firms have been adding litigators and specialists in areas including corporate law, bankruptcy, employment law, and government regulation.

Even real estate law is making a return.

We went from work buying and selling to doing workouts, said Aldolfo Jimenez, partner with Holland & Knight in Miami. The firm’s land-use work continued despite the recession because the firm was involved in the new Marlins Ballpark, and projects such as hospitals and universities.

Law firms are hiring lawyers who can bring their book of business, said Matt Gorson, president of Greenberg Traurig, which has offices in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Boca Raton and West Palm Beach. The firm has hired 20 lawyers so far this year, compared with 14 lawyers in 2010.

Other South Florida law firms have been adding to their legal staffs as well.

Holland and Knight has hired 15 lawyers so far in 2011, up from 11 in 2010 at its Miami, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach offices. Morgan Lewis in Miami hired seven lawyers in 2010, and five so far in 2011; that compares with only one lawyer in 2009, said law firm partner Mark Zelek. Bilzin Sumberg in Miami has hired 9 lawyers in the past month alone, according to a spokeswoman.

Even some firms that were hard hit by the recession are adding lawyers. Fort Lauderdale-based Ruden McClosky, which specializes in real estate and land use, has hired seven lawyers in the past four months, according to a spokeswoman for the firm.

Florida added 3,000 jobs in legal services in July over a year ago, a 3.3 percent increase, according to Florida’s Agency for Workforce Innovation.

Some South Florida lawyers have found opportunities with the mid-sized and boutique firms that actually grew during the recession.

I wasn’t looking to move, said Carla Barrow, 47, a former prosecutor who last June joined Lydecker & Diaz, a Miami firm that has grown from 40 to 60 lawyers. The firm’s offer was attractive: a partnership and ability to focus on her specialty, involvency.

Finding jobs probably has been most difficult for starting lawyers. All the law firms are looking for three to seven years’ out of law school, said Judith Equels, career center director for the Florida Bar Association. Some went solo or opted for corporate jobs, she said.

One reason is the traditional pipeline for law firms summer associate programs — shrunk at many firms.

Law firms are being more careful. When you commit to summer associates, they don’t work for you until September or October of the following year. It’s hard to guess what your needs are going to be, said Gorson of Greenberg Traurig.

This summer, the Greenberg program was only in Miami, not its Fort Lauderdale or West Palm Beach offices. But all six associates wer offered jobs, said Janet McKeegan, head of recruitment for Greenberg Traurig.

Morgan Lewis didn’t have a summer program last year, but this year has three clerks in its program, Zelek said.

University of Florida law school graduate Allison Sirica, 25, saw many classmates a year or two ahead of her unable to find summer associate positions or jobs as they graduated. You start questioning: Did I make the right decision? Sirica said.

Sirica, who says she always wanted to be a lawyer, was one of the fortunate few to be a summer associate in 2010 at a major law firm, Holland & Knight. And in January, she was offered a job in the firm’s real estate practice in Fort Lauderdale.

At Nova Southeastern University’s law school, nearly 81 percent of the 2010 graduates received job offers. While it’s too early for 2011 results, the school is getting positive feedback from recent graduates, said Robert Levine, assistant dean for career development at Shepard Broad Law Center.

We were happy the placement rate went up, as did the average salary, Levine said. The average for new law school graduates increased to $61,770 in 2010 compared with $58,035 in 2009. It had fallen slightly in 2008.