President, LAI Golden Gate Chapter
SAN FRANCISCO, July 31, 2017 - It is with great sadness that Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP reports that Robert A. Thompson, a partner who had been with the firm since 1995, passed away suddenly on July 29. He was 74.
Thompson was a member of Sheppard Mullin's Real Estate, Land Use and Environmental practice group and based in the firm's San Francisco office. He handled a broad range of commercial real estate matters, including investment, development, leasing, financing and land-use approvals for master-planned residential, office, mixed-use, hospital and other project types. He was a leader in the evolving world of crafting "public private partnerships" and nationally recognized for his work on a number of bar association task forces setting standards for legal opinion practice.
Our firm is deeply saddened. Bob was a premier lawyer and first-class person. We will miss him. Bob worked on some of the biggest and most prominent real estate projects in San Francisco. He was universally respected by clients and colleagues alike," said Guy Halgren, chairman of Sheppard Mullin. "Bob also believed that lawyers have a fundamental obligation to do good. His involvement in our pro bono program was long standing and involved activities both internal to the firm and in the larger San Francisco legal community."
"I had the privilege of knowing and practicing law with Bob for over 46 years. Bob was an exceptionally gifted lawyer, but above all else Bob had a generous, caring spirit, always going out of his way to help others," said Randy Short, Sheppard Mullin of counsel. "Bob was a class act, and we are all the better for having known him."
"Bob was a friend, a collaborator and mentor to me for over 40 years. Above all, he 'loved the law' (as those of us of the Joanie Caucus generation would say) for its intellectual rigor, its honesty, its role in protecting our nation's fundamental values and persons of all means, backgrounds and walks of life," said Joan Story, Sheppard Mullin of counsel. "He will be sorely missed, but has left a big footprint."
Thompson received a J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1969 and a B.A. from Stanford University in 1965. Over the course of his career, Thompson acted as counsel to a number of significant San Francisco projects, including San Francisco Centre, the Fillmore Center, Marathon Plaza, 505 Sansome Street, 100 Spear Street, 160 Spear Street, 210 California Street, 345 California Street, 595 Market Street and Embarcadero Center. More recent San Francisco Projects include the Kaiser Permanente Geary Boulevard Campus and the "Macy's block" redevelopment at Union Square.
Thompson's more significant and "public/private partnership" projects include the new UCSF Mission Bay campus, the Westfield/Bloomingdale's shopping center, Pier One and the Ferry Building in San Francisco, and the redevelopment of the Hunters Point Shipyard, Treasure Island Naval Station, and Presidio National Park. His representation of the Presidio Trust has included the Letterman/Lucas Digital Arts Center and the Public Health Service residential project. He represented UCSF with respect to the acquisition and development of its new Mission Bay campus site, as well as the pioneering lease/leaseback development of the Sandler Neurosciences Center at Mission Bay. Other recent projects include the UC Davis West Campus, and the Pacific Union College Eco-Village (Angwin).
Among his many professional involvements, Thompson was a member of the American College of Real Estate Lawyers board of governors, chair of American College of Real Estate Lawyers' Attorneys Opinion Committee, a member of Lambda Alpha Honorary Land Economics Society, chair of the Urban Land Institute San Francisco District Council, chair of the ABA Real Property, Probate and Trust Section's Committee on Legal Opinions in Real Estate Transactions, chair of the State Bar of California's Committee on the Environment, and a charter member of the State Bar of California's Executive Committee of Real Estate Section.
Pat Theopolis
Patricia Ann Theophilos ("Pat") passed away peacefully on Tuesday, June 6, 2017 at age 69, at home in Piedmont, California after a short, but very brave battle with cancer. She is survived by her devoted husband, Tony, their daughter and son-in-law, Wendy and Fraser Coleman, her grandsons, Fraser, Jr, and Theo, her sister, Charlotte Grass, and her sister and brother-in-law, Bobbi Panter and Matthew Arnoux, her mother, Rita Johnson, and, not to be forgotten, her loyal Wheaton, Maggie. She is predeceased by her father, Charles Panter, and stepfather, Calvin Johnson.
Pat was born on April 14, 1948 in Youngstown, Ohio to Rita and Charles Panter. She grew up in Wheaton, Illinois and attended Wheaton Central High School. After graduating high school, Pat attended Iowa Wesleyan College, where on the first day of school she met her future husband, Tony. At the end of Pat's first year, she and Tony eloped to Washington D.C. where they were married on June 21, 1967. Later that year, their daughter Wendy was born. Pat worked to put Tony through undergraduate and law school, after which they moved to San Francisco for Tony's law practice. Pat returned to school and completed her Bachelor of Science in Finance and Business Administration in 1980 at San Francisco State University. At the time of her passing, Pat and Tony were married two weeks short of 50 years.
Pat lived her life to the fullest and with the utmost energy and grace. She spent over 40 years in the banking industry. Much of her career was at Citicorp in San Francisco, where she rose to become Vice President and Area Director for Citicorp Real Estate, the commercial real estate subsidiary of Citigroup, with responsibility for a $2 billion portfolio of commercial and residential loans located throughout the country. After leaving Citicorp, Pat continued to rise through the banking industry as Executive Vice President and Chief Credit Officer at Pacific National Bank, Senior Vice President and Market Manager at US Bank and Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at Bank of the Orient. Pat was also a principal in Lakeview Ventures for many years with Tony, where they owned and managed multifamily projects in the Bay Area and assembled and entitled a 141 residential site (Symphony Towers)on Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco. For the past several years, Pat was an independent consultant in the financial services, banking and real estate industries. Pat absolutely loved her work and the people she worked with. She was a great leader with the utmost of integrity, who thoroughly enjoyed working on a team and mentoring others. She was fiercely loyal and leaves an impressive real estate legacy throughout the Bay Area and California.
Even more important to Pat than her work was her philanthropy. Pat spent much of her free time giving back and served on the board of numerous non-profits over the span of 30 years. Pat started her work on non-profit boards by serving for over ten years on the board of Bay Area dance group ODC, including four years as Chair. She joined the Cal Performances Board of Trustees in 1996, becoming Vice Chair in 2000 and Chair from 2008 to 2012. Pat helped guide Cal Performances through one of its most challenging fundraising periods in recent memory, and steered the search for the organization's first new Artistic Director in 23 years, MatÃas Tarnopolsky. Pat also served on the boards of the Bay Area Women's and Children's Center, the UC Berkeley ImpactMBA Advisory Board, the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation and, most recently, the San Francisco YMCA.
Pat was a member of Claremont Country Club, where she chaired the Wine Committee for almost a decade. In addition, Pat was recently invited to join Town and Country Club in San Francisco (founded in 1893, the second oldest women's club in the United States) where she was immediately asked to join their Wine Committee. Pat loved gardening and was an active and enthusiastic member of the Piedmont Garden Club. Further, Pat had a deep appreciation of the arts in all forms. She was a long-standing season ticket holder of the San Francisco Ballet and San Francisco Symphony and a long standing member of the De Young Museum, SF MOMA, and the Legion of Honor. Pat also loved traveling the world and spending time with Tony and family at their second home on Anna Maria Island off the Gulf Coast of Florida. Pat was a loving and devoted mother and grandmother who enjoyed socializing with her friends and playing with her weekly bridge group. Above all, Pat loved her family and being with them. She will be dearly missed.
The family hosted a celebration of life at Claremont Country Club in Oakland on Saturday, July 15, 2017. Donations may be made in Pat's honor to the San Francisco YMCA or Cal Performances.
Nina Jaffe Gruen
December 14, 1933 - September 15, 2017
Nina Jaffe Gruen, matriarch, prescient behavioral analyst, pioneering feminist and art-connoisseur, passed away on September 15, 2017. Born on December 14, 1933, to Lester A. Jaffe, a prominent attorney, and Rosa Shor, a respected community leader. She grew up on a 6-acre estate in Amberly Village, a suburb outside Cincinnati. She graduated from Walnut Hills High School, and subsequently earned a BA Phi Beta Kappa and an MA degree in psychology and sociology from the University of Cincinnati.
"Store Location and Customer Behavior," written jointly by Nina and her husband Claude and published by the Urban Land Institute in 1966, was the first of over 80 articles she authored or co-authored concerning the behavior of real estate users, owners and developers. Her first book, "Low and Moderate-Income Housing in the Suburbs," co-authored with Claude, was published by Praeger in 1972. Her most recent book, published by Amazon in 2015, is entitled "Believe It or Not: The Challenges Facing One Professional Woman a Half Century Ago." In the media world, she was known as Ms. Real Estate, writing an advice column for the ALM Media Group since 2014.
In 1970, Nina and Claude founded Gruen Gruen + Associates, which continues to provide research-based consulting and implementation services to the real estate industry and public land use and planning policy makers. Ms. Gruen became the first woman trustee of the Urban Land Institute in 1982, and continued to be active in that organization, serving on ULI's District Council Executive Committee through 2016. In 1984, she became the first woman to be elected President of the academic Western Regional Science Association. An expansion of her presidential address to WRSA, "Sociological and Cultural Variables in Housing" was published in The Annals of Regional Science. Ms. Gruen served on the State of California Transportation Department's Airspace Advisory Committee for 15 years and was its Chair from 2002 through 2005. She was also an active member of the International Women's Forum and President of its Northern California affiliate from 1995-1996.
Nina was an extremely knowledgeable and discriminating collector of unofficial Russian art. She was a long-time Board Member of the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, and formerly served as President of the Richmond Art Center in California.
She is survived by her husband Claude, sons Leslie, Dale, Adam, Joshua, and Aaron, daughters-in-law Kate, Debra, Lisa, and Andrea, and grandchildren Daniel, Sarah, David, Michael, Stewart, Rebecca, Leah, Hannah, Jessica, Justin and Kayla.
A celebration of Nina's life will be held at Temple Emanuel on Sunday, October 15th. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to Temple Emanuel.
