Via has a 25-year track record of guiding clients through the notoriously complicated Bay Area regulatory environment, with expertise that includes navigating the California Environmental Quality Act plus laws and regulations regarding climate change, redevelopment and successor agencies, waterfront development, housing, historic resources and transportation.
She has shaped marquee projects such as the California Academy of Sciences, the Exploratorium, and the San Francisco Giants' AT&T Park along with major development projects such as the California Pacific Medical Center hospital rebuild and Uber Technologies Inc.'s headquarters in Mission Bay.
"Here in San Francisco, everything is extremely complicated," Via said. "Even people from New York are surprised. Here a single building can be a multiyear process."
For Uber, Via is lead land use counsel in the development of its corporate headquarters. She and Coblentz colleagues represented Uber in the $125 million purchase of the land for its Mission Bay office, which will house 3,000 to 4,000 employees, and for its $123.5 million purchase of 330,000 square feet of office space in downtown Oakland. She was lead counsel in the recently obtained entitlements for the Mission Bay campus and she advises Uber on an ongoing basis regarding various Bay Area land use issues.
"People's eyes can glaze over when you talk about CEQA or the permitting process, but when you see a hospital or the Academy of Sciences or the ballpark, what you do becomes tangible," she said.
Via is co-lead land use counsel to the Sutter Health-affiliated California Pacific Medical Center for its $2.5 billion Long Range Development Plan, approved in 2013 following a multiyear entitlements process. The project includes two new hospitals at the existing St. Luke's and new Cathedral Hill campuses, and three new medical buildings in the center's five-campus system. It's one of the largest rebuild projects in San Francisco history. The implementation of this complex and critically important component of San Francisco's core health care infrastructure will incorporate a broad range of workforce, transportation and health care-related community benefits, she said.
The San Francisco Giants' AT&T Park remains a favorite project. "We almost lost the team, remember?" Via said, recalling its threat to move to Tampa, Florida in the 1990s. "The building of the stadium on the waterfront helped keep them here." She felt a personal investment in the deal along with her professional work. "I come from a baseball family," she said. "Now, sitting with my own sons behind home plate is a proud time for me. In fact, I'm wearing a Giants sweatshirt as we speak today."
— John Roemer
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