Solo and Small Firms
May 31, 2001
School Law Specialist Uyehara Moves to New Firm
SAN FRANCISCO - Liebert Cassidy Whitmore took the first step Tuesday in building its Northern California school-law practice: It lured Emi Uyehara away from Miller Brown & Dannis, one of Northern California's top education law firms.
Uyehara, 46, will join the Los Angeles-based Liebert Cassidy on Aug. 6, after spending more than 17 years as a partner with Miller Brown and its predecessors in San Francisco. She joins Liebert Cassidy as a partner in the firm's 11-lawyer Mountain View office.
Uyehara is the immediate past chairwoman of the State Bar's executive committee on employment and labor law. In the 1990s, she also served on the San Francisco Civil Service Commission. The commission oversees the hiring, classification, eligibility and discipline of the city's approximately 25,000 employees.
Uyehara said she was attracted to Liebert Cassidy by the firm's "top notch" public sector lawyers.
"These are well-known, well-regarded attorneys, which takes nothing away from my partners at Miller Brown," she said. "I'm very fortunate to go from one great firm to another great firm."
Managers at Miller Brown were not available for comment. A spokeswoman at Miller Brown said the end of the school year is a busy time of year for education law specialists.
Melanie Poturica, the managing partner of the 35-lawyer Liebert Cassidy, said she is excited about the addition.
She praised Uyehara's leadership and lawyering skills. Uyehara, she added, will help the firm build its education law practice.
"One of Liebert Cassidy Whitmore's primary initiatives in Northern California is to continue to grow our K-12 education practice," Poturica said in a written statement. "With Emi's reputation and contacts in this arena, she will certainly be instrumental in helping us accomplish that goal."
Statewide, Liebert Cassidy represents public agencies in labor and employment law matters. It also has a significant education-law practice in Southern California.
The firm opened its Northern California office in October, when it merged with the 10-lawyer Whitmore Johnson & Bolanos in Mountain View. The merger brought employment- and labor-law specialists to the firm, but Whitmore Johnson lacked an established Northern California education law practice at the time.
Uyehara will help the Southern California firm bring its education focus north, Poturica said.
Poturica predicted the firm's Northern California education law group will ultimately grow to as many as 10 lawyers. To those ends, the firm is seeking one or two more education-law associates and will add others in the next few years.
In the meantime, Poturica said, Uyehara's departure from Miller Brown will be amicable.
"We do have good relations with the people at Miller Brown," she said. "It has nothing to do with bad feelings. We wish them the very best."
Uyehara earned her law degree in 1982 from Georgetown University Law Center, and has written extensively on Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, childcare legislation and due process. Throughout her career, she has represented public sector clients with employment, labor and education law needs.
Erik Cummins
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