Andrée M. Blais

Blais, a partner in the infrastructure practice group at Nossaman LLP, is one of the legal minds behind the Landside Access Modernization Program, a multi-billion-dollar effort in which public and private entities teamed up to renovate Los Angeles International Airport.

As counsel to the City of Los Angeles and Los Angeles World Airports, Nossaman advised on the project development, procurement and the selection of developer. Nossaman also advised on the commercial and financial close of a $4.9 billion deal for the automated people mover project, a key aspect of the Landside Access Modernization Program.

“One of the things we try to help the client with is ensuring that the deal is fair and bankable,” Blais said. And what infrastructure attorneys “mean by that is the risk allocations in the deal are reasonable, encouraging private finance to come to the table.”

As part of the Nossaman team advising the city through financial close, her skills helped ensure the city’s payment obligations under the agreement and source of funds supporting those obligations were understood, enabling private financing for the project. It included $1.2 billion in private activity bonds issued by the California Municipal Finance Authority on behalf of the developer LAX Integrated Express Solutions LLC.

Owned by ACS Infrastructure Development, Balfour Beatty, Bombardier Transportation, Fluor and HOCHTIEF PPP Solution, the developer will design, build and partially finance the people mover system, and then operate and maintain it for 25 years.

With such a large-scale project, attorneys had to consider all parties in the deal.

“I would say, for the equity providers one of the most important things is certainty of the revenue stream coming from the project.” she said. “Equity providers aren’t going to bring their money to the table and wait to be paid back over a 25-year period if the source of funds supporting an agency’s payment obligations is not clear.”

Expected to include six stations and up to nine electric-powered trains, the people mover system aims to ease access into and out of one of the nation’s largest airports.

Attorneys were able to overcome the challenges and construction started in March 2019. The people mover system is expected to be up and running in five years.

Now, Blais is working with the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority on the $5 billion Sepulveda Pass Transit Corridor that proposes to connect the San Fernando Valley with Los Angeles’ West Side. The project is in the early planning stage.

“The best part of my job is seeing the public infrastructure projects I work on built and functioning and knowing that I helped to make it happen,” Blais said.

— Carter Stoddard