Tala A. Woods

Tala A. Woods is a Partner in the Jacksonville office of Shutts & Bowen LLP, where she is a member of the Corporate Practice Group.

Tala focuses her practice on public finance and corporate law. She has experience in a variety of public finance transactions including governmental bonds and private activity bonds. She has represented issuers of certificates of participation, revenue bonds, refunding bonds, variable rate debt obligations and tax-exempt leasing. With regards to private activity issuances, Tala has acted as bond counsel and borrower’s counsel in conduit issuances involving continuing care retirement communities, colleges, hospitals and other 501(c)3 organizations. Her clients have included community development districts, acting as bond counsel, underwriter’s counsel and developer’s counsel. She also has experience representing school districts and other state and local governmental entities including, cities, counties and public utilities. In addition, Tala has represented non-governmental entities on tax-exempt transactions, including banks, underwriter syndicates and trustees.

On the corporate side of her practice, Tala has extensive experience in counseling clients on general corporate matters, including mergers, acquisitions, and both debt and equity financing. She has represented a local solid waste disposal company that rapidly grew by acquisition into a large regional company and handled all aspects of the company acquisitions, including drafting and negotiating asset purchase agreements, stock purchase agreements, employment agreements, non-competition agreements and other related documents.  Her work also included drafting and negotiating franchise and licensing agreements for a major sports association.

Prior to her legal career, Tala worked as an investment portfolio manager for the trust company of a large national banking association.  As an investment portfolio manager, she managed the assets held in trust accounts, including debt and equity investments.  During her tenure in this position, she earned the designation of Chartered Financial Analyst.