Charles Knight

SENIOR COUNSEL

Charlie joined Milgrom Daskam & Ellis in 2020 and focuses on serving entrepreneurs, nonprofits and affordable housing developers and lenders. His expertise includes startup, venture and public company financing, business transition and succession planning, real estate development and acquisition and, more recently, affordable housing and new market tax credit development and financing.

Prior to joining MD&E, Charlie was general counsel of the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority and previously was the founding partner of Venture Law Advisors, LLC, a law firm focused on emerging Colorado and California enterprises.  He has served as a co-founder, CEO, CFO and General Counsel of private and public companies engaged in renewable energy development, medical device manufacturing, real estate acquisition and development, and retail and wholesale product distribution.   Charlie has practiced corporate securities law in Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and New York City.

Charlie is passionate about innovation, community engagement, and education and has served as an adjunct professor in the Daniels College of Business at the University of Denver, teaching classes on entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation, and career strategy, and with the Université Paris-Saclay, teaching classes in mergers and acquisitions. Charlie is also a board member of Urban Peak, a Denver-based nonprofit providing essential services to youth who are homeless or at risk of being homeless; a Commissioner with the Denver Housing Authority, an affordable housing developer and operator; a board member of the Platt Park Peoples Association, a registered neighborhood association; and the Old South Pearl Street Merchants Association, which operates the Old Pearl Street Farmer’s Market every summer.

Charlie holds a BA in experimental psychology from the University of California at Santa Barbara, MBA and JD degrees from the University of California at Los Angeles, and is a University of Notre Dame Certified Innovation Mentor. Outside the office, Charlie and his wife Suzanne spend as much time as possible playing with their grandchildren, visiting beautiful beaches, traveling the world, and spending time in the Colorado mountains. 

FOCUS AREAS

Business & Corporate Law

Mergers & Acquisitions

Real Estate Transactions

Finance

Articles

Artificial Intelligence

Will Artificial Intelligence Kill All the Lawyers?

A recent article in the New York Times reminded me that more than ten years ago, lawyers were considered an endangered occupational species as our livelihoods were the most at risk from advances in artificial intelligence (AI).
Has AI been reading Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part 2, Act IV, Scene 2 and trying to kill us?
Maybe. But I confidently predict that many of us will survive.

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Business & Corporate Law

Beneficial Ownership Disclosure: New Reporting Requirements for Small Businesses

On September 30, 2022, the U.S. Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) issued its highly anticipated Final Rule establishing a beneficial ownership information (BOI) reporting requirement under the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) of 2019. These rules significantly change the obligations of business entities to disclose previously private information regarding the ownership and control of these entities. The primary purpose of the CTA, enacted as part of the Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2020 is to protect the US financial system from being used for illicit purposes, including preventing corrupt actors, terrorists, and criminals from hiding assets in anonymous shell companies. Background for this rule was addressed in prior blog posts including The Corporate Transparency Act (1/31/22) and FinCEN and Real Estate (8/2/22).

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Work-Life Balance

Not All Who Wander are Lost

When I joined Milgrom & Daskam at the height of COVID, I wasn’t sure what the future would look like for me or this relatively young firm. We were giving up our physical office space in downtown Denver and embarking on a new vision for remote workers. Up until then, much of my professional work life was spent in an office environment, surrounded by colleagues My days were punctuate by in-person meetings–formal, over coffee or meals.in the hallways–and bookended by my daily commute between Denver and Los Angeles which ranged anywhere from just under 30 minutes to more than an hour.

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