Levin's longest serving law firm is still very invested in the community they are a big part of.
Levin's longest serving law firm is still very invested in the community they are a big part of.
Over 100 years in the making, CS Law are still going strong, with a hugely experienced team and a real community focus.
The Horowhenua-based law firm first opened in 1906, with one of the founding lawyers, William Park, being admitted to the Bar in May 1908.
In 1937 James Bertram became a partner in the law firm and then in 1938, following William's death, his recently qualified son Ian joined the practice.
The partnership of Park and Bertram was joined by Bernard Cullinane in January 1951; Bertram retired in 1954 and Malcolm Turnbull joined the partnership in 1965.
A 1961 team photo of the then named Park and Cullinane law firm - Ian Park is in the middle of the back row with Bernard Cullinane on the far right - photo supplied by CS Law.
In the 1970s Park, Cullinane, Turnbull & Partners amalgamated with Harper Thompson Steele – creating the new law firm of Cullinane, Turnbull, Steele & Partners and becoming one of the biggest law firms between Hamilton and Wellington.
Cullinane retired from the practice during this time, although his name was still part of the law firm's name, and in 1983 was appointed as a judge to the District Court bench.
Doug Rowan joined Cullinane Steele in 1996 after graduating from Victoria University and in 2003 was offered a partnership by then partners Errol Macdonald and Keith de Ridder.
Rowan celebrated 25 years with the firm this year, and loves the fact that CS Law has been servicing generations of families in the district.
"Elder law is a big part of our firm's business ... offering good legal support to our community is a key priority," said Rowan
In August 2005 de Ridder left the firm to be sworn in as a District Court Judge, based in Whangarei.
2006 saw Cullinane Steele celebrating a century of serving the Levin community's legal needs – sharing the district's 100th birthday.
The appointment of CS Law's youngest director, Hannah Wood (left), being celebrated in style in 2018 with Doug Rowan (right) cutting the ribbon to the newly refurbished client space.
By 2015, when Cullinane Steele won the Employer of Choice Award at the Kāpiti Horowhenua Electra Business Awards, the law firm had become a company, renamed as CS Law, and Rowan was the sole director.
2018 was another big year for CS Law with solicitor Hannah Wood becoming the youngest ever (and only the second female) director of the firm as well as celebrating the opening of the newly refurbished client area within their nearly 50-year-old building.
Wood joined CS Law in 2012, after graduating from Victoria University, because of the firm's wonderful graduate programme.
"Lots of smaller Wellington firms aren't interested in taking on graduates ... you have to go into a big firm like Russell McVeagh where you do a researcher role for a couple of years [before] you get a chance to practise law," said Wood.
At CS Law, Wood had client interaction from day one and got plenty of opportunities to try many aspects of law that she might not have got in a bigger firm.
"We like to offer two summer internships to law school students every year and take on four graduates a year into our graduate programme," Wood said.
These roles are always offered to law students from Horowhenua first as CS Law has an ethos of giving back to the community it's a big part of.
Daniel Vincent - newly appointed director of CS Law and specialist in complex family litigation - photo supplied by CS Law.
In February 2021, Daniel Vincent, a lawyer with more than 20 years' experience in litigation, joined the company and became CS Law's third director on April 1.
Vincent specialises in complex family litigation, often involving international and cross border issues, and is one of only a few lawyers in the country who are experts in the Hague Convention on International Child Abduction.
Heidi Sixtus also joined CS Law earlier this year, in the newly created role of general manager, with the responsibility for the implementation of the company strategy and direction, as well as managing the day-to-day operations of the practice.
The longest-serving current staff member is Janice Wagstaff, who is the client relationship manager for the Estates Team.
"Janice first started working with our firm as a 15-year-old," said Sixtus, "and has come and gone over the past 40 years, so is a fountain of knowledge about both CS Law and the community."
Wagstaff is often utilised to help train new administration staff entering the company as "what she doesn't know isn't worth knowing".
