W. Thurston "Thurston" Debnam, Jr.

Thurston Debnam is one of the founding partners of Smith Debnam Narron Drake Saintsing & Myers, L.L.P. Thurston is the Section Head of the Business Law practice group and served as the firm’s managing partner from 1992 through 1997. He concentrates his practice in the areas of business and corporate planning and real estate law, including land use planning and zoning. For more than thirty years, Thurston has maintained a broad-based business practice, assisting clients with business and corporate planning and handling land development and real property issues and transactions. In addition, Thurston is certified as a civil Superior Court mediator.

Thurston’s practice has afforded him the opportunity to appear before many administrative agencies, including the North Carolina Utilities Commission, the North Carolina Industrial Commission and the Environmental Protection Agency. He has also participated in trials and appeals in both state and federal courts. These trials included the Town of Zebulon v. United States Census Bureau in which the Town sought and obtained an adjustment to the preliminary census count for the 1980 census.