Alternative Project Delivery Methods Authorized for Repairs at 25,000 NYC Public Housing Units

Bill Estes focuses on large-scale alternative project delivery, including design-build and public-private partnerships (P3/PPP), and counsels on all stages of infrastructure development and construction. He brings to every engagement his insight gained as chief counsel to two project owners. During more than 20 years of experience in both the public and private sectors, Bill has worked on transactional, litigation, legislative, and policy matters for alternative project delivery and conventional infrastructure projects in the transportation, social infrastructure, renewable energy, broadband/telecommunications, and water/wastewater sectors. His clients include public entities/owners, private concessionaires/contractors, and financing parties in the procurement, negotiation, financing, and administration of P3 and infrastructure projects. Before joining Ballard Spahr, Bill served as Vice President and General Counsel of the New York City School Construction Authority (SCA), which builds and renovates the 1,800 schools in the nation’s largest school district. As the authority’s chief legal officer, he counseled executive management on all legal aspects of delivering the Authority’s $19 billion, five-year capital plan, including advising on procurement, contracts, litigation, regulatory, environmental, insurance, labor, legislative, governance, MWBE, and other commercial matters. Bill also served as General Counsel and Secretary of the New York State Thruway Authority and Canal Corporation from 2009 to 2015, one of the nation’s longest tolled highways, which at the time also operated and maintained a 500 mile-long navigable waterway. He advised on the Authority’s procurement of the $3.1 billion contract to replace the Tappan Zee Bridge, the State’s first design-build project, which was financed through a record-setting $1.6 billion federal Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) loan. He also counseled on matters involving food and fuel concessionaires, a P3 fiber-optic contract, and renewable energy generation. Bill served for over two years in the New York State Governor’s Counsel’s Office, where he worked regularly with the legal and executive staff of the State’s infrastructure agencies and authorities in carrying out the policy programs of the administrations of two governors. Bill has also worked in a boutique infrastructure firm, where he advised state and local governments and private utilities and contractors on the procurement, construction, and financing of transportation, water/wastewater, and public building infrastructure. Earlier in this career, Bill worked for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, during which time he was cross-designated as a Special Assistant United States Attorney (E.D.N.Y.). He began his career in the New York State Attorney General’s Office (Investor Protection Unit).

Teri M. Guarnaccia has a particular focus on the public finance area, where she has acted as underwriter's counsel, borrower's counsel, and bond counsel in numerous tax-exempt and taxable bond financings. Teri is the Practice Co-Leader of the firm's Public Finance Group, Co-Leader of the firm's Municipal Securities Regulation and Enforcement Team, and currently serves as the President of the National Association of Bond Lawyers. Teri has experience with a wide range of financing structures, including traditional fixed-rate, variable-rate, and multimodal structures involving various forms of credit enhancement and liquidity support, and is also known for her work on real estate finance transactions, including representation of large institutional lenders.

John P. Smolen counsels public entities, private concessionaires/contractors, and financing parties in large, complex design-build and public-private partnership (P3/PPP) civil and social infrastructure projects across the country. John Co-Leads our P3/Infrastructure Group. John has played a leading role in the procurement, negotiation, financing, and administration of several P3 and design-build projects in the transportation, transit, social infrastructure, and maritime/riverine port spaces. John has represented public clients in Maryland, Virginia, Missouri, Indiana, Nebraska, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Alaska, among others. John has represented lenders, as well as developer consortia, in several horizontal and vertical infrastructure projects from statutory drafting, through pre-procurement, deal structuring, procurement, and negotiation, to post-selection commercial and financial close, with additional experience in implementation and administration. John also has considerable experience in general construction and EPC contracting in the energy, renewable energy, and emerging technology spaces. He has led project developments involving wind, solar, geothermal, and waste-to-energy resources, and he has helped private clients commercialize energy-related technology. Before becoming a lawyer, John served for more than a decade in the U.S. Navy as an officer, aviator, flight instructor, and Naval ROTC instructor at Virginia Tech.

Steve T. Park is a co-leader of the firm’s P3/Infrastructure Group and is a partner in the Public Finance Group. He is a public-private partnership (P3) lawyer who routinely advises public entities, private developers, and lenders in all phases of transportation, infrastructure, energy, social infrastructure, innovative delivery, and P3 projects. Steve is based in Philadelphia and has significant experience advising issuers, developers and lenders in connection with project financings for utilities (including water, wastewater and energy facilities), solid waste disposal facilities (including waste to energy facilities), and transportation and infrastructure facilities. Steve routinely represents insurance companies, finance companies, and institutional investors in connection with the private placement of debt. Steve works on capital market transactions advising issuers, underwriters, borrowers, and purchasers in connection with the structuring, issuance, offering, and restructuring of tax-exempt and taxable securities and other debt instruments and derivatives. He serves as bond, borrower's, and underwriter's counsel to various clients, including investment banking firms, higher education institutions, health care institutions, cultural institutions, and municipalities.

Amy M. McClain represents housing authorities and affordable housing developers in the context of mixed-finance transactions. She is the Chair of the firm's Real Estate Department. Amy is based in Baltimore and is a lawyer who closes affordable housing transactions involving a variety of funding sources, including Low Income Housing Tax Credits, the Rental Assistance Demonstration program, public housing and Section 8 funding sources, HUD-insured loans, tax-exempt bonds, state housing finance agency loan funds, and conventional financing. These transactions have provided her with the opportunity to negotiate issues among the financing parties, housing authorities, and developers while also coordinating various U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development review and approval processes. Amy also addresses traditional real estate issues intertwined with affordable housing development.