Bay Area Adaptive Reuse & Repositioning

Mr. Ozturk is a highly experienced real estate investment executive with over 29 years of investment management, marketing and finance experience. He is the co-founder of March Capital Management and has been the Managing Principal since inception. Since co-founding MCM, Mr. Ozturk has successfully raised four equity funds without using any third-party consultants. He has shepherded these dollars into successful strategies, which have consistently returned outstanding IRRs, even during economic downturns. In addition to raising capital, Mr. Ozturk’s key functions include high involvement in acquisition, due diligence, entitlement, permitting, architectural design and contract negotiations. Prior to co-founding MCM, Mr. Ozturk began his career as a management consultant at Monitor Deloitte and as a brand manager at Unilever. He soon went on to manage 500+ employees in the private, retail and business banking channels at Wells Fargo. Mr. Ozturk holds a Master of Business Administration from Yale School of Management and a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering from METU. He was born and raised in Turkey and fluently speaks Turkish and French.

Kim joined Harvest Properties in 2021 and is responsible for managing the entitlements and execution of development projects, as well as sourcing new development opportunities for the firm. Kim brings with her 25 years of experience in in all aspects of the development process, from land acquisition, entitlement processing, community outreach, and project implementation and execution. Prior to Harvest, Kim was Managing Director of Trumark Urban, in San Francisco, where she oversaw all development activities for Trumark Urban’s projects, both in Northern and Southern California. Prior to joining Trumark Urban, Kim was Principal and Co-Founder of 7×7 Development, a community-focused real estate development and investment firm. Kim holds Master of Arts in Urban Planning at UCLA and a Bachelor’s degree from Tufts University, with a concentration in urban design and planning. She currently sits on the Board of the Urban Land Institute’s San Francisco District Council, and served as the Past Chair of the District Council. Kim is also a member of Lambda Alpha International, and was the Chair of the Board for Lao Family Services, a social services organization focused on immigrant and native-born communities across the Bay Area. Kim happily resides with her doughnut enthusiast husband, and two kids in San Rafael. She enjoys hiking, dancing, and exploring all the beauty of the Bay Area.

Eddie Hall, AIA is a Project Architect and senior associate at MBH Architects, a multi-disciplinary firm headquartered in the East Bay. He joined the firm in 2010, bringing a history of hands-on construction experience paired with enthusiasm for design and craftsmanship, emerging material technologies, and digital design practices. As a member of MBH’s Urban Studio, Eddie leads some of the firm’s most complex and challenging projects including the adaptive reuse of the historic Uptown Station / H.C. Capwell’s Department Store in downtown Oakland, now a tech company headquarters with ground floor retail and public amenity space. Eddie is currently managing the construction of a 96,000 square foot life science laboratory on the San Francisco Peninsula as well as the development of a new public landmark project in San Jose, which won an international design competition.

Jim Hakes is a Principal at Handel Architects with 28 years of experience in the design and management of a variety of project types including mixed-use, hospitality, high-end residential, office, retail, museum, and university buildings. Mr. Hakes is currently Project Manager for 801 Blanchard in Seattle, 321 West in Austin, and Angels Landing in Los Angeles. Recently completed work includes serving as Project Manager for Union House, a luxury residential building on the border of the Pacific Heights and Russian Hill neighborhoods in San Francisco. Previously he led The Pacific, Handel Architects’ conversion of an existing building into luxury residences in Pacific Heights. Mr. Hakes was also Project Manager for Ten Thousand, Handel Architects’ luxury residential tower in Los Angeles. Opened in 2016, the project includes 283 units in a 40-story tower. Other recently completed work includes Rowan, an exoskeleton residential building in San Francisco’s Potrero neighborhood, and 450 Hayes, a new through-block residential building in the Hayes Valley neighborhood; the project was a 2017 AIACC Residential Award winner. Mr. Hakes was Project Manager of the Rosewood Abu Dhabi, a mixed-use high-rise on Sowwah Island of 1.1 million square feet with a five-star hotel as its anchor, plus 139 residential units. In this role, which he held for nearly six years, Mr. Hakes served as a primary client contact, and from concept design to the building opening, led a team of up to 25 architects in Handel’s San Francisco, New York, and Abu Dhabi offices plus a consultant team of over 15 firms who supported the project from offices throughout the Middle East, North America, Europe, and Asia. Prior to joining Handel Architects, Mr. Hakes was a Project Manager at GBQC Architects in Philadelphia where he worked on university, hospitality, office, museum, and federal government projects. Mr. Hakes is a licensed architect in California, Pennsylvania, and Washington. He received his Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Michigan and Master of Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania.

Richard brings over 40 years of architecture, design and development experience to Forge. An acclaimed Bay Area architect and serial entrepreneur, Richard leads the Forge team, driving the creation and implementation of our solutions model for innovative, impactful, sustainable and affordable residential real estate development. Under Richard's leadership, Forge currently has over $500 million in development and almost 1000 units in the current pipeline. The entire portfolio is targeted to Essential Housing and Impact investment. Richard has been on the leading edge of sustainability and innovation throughout his career. In 1978, Richard served as the interior architect for 505 Sansome Street, the first “fresh air building” in the U.S. Even today, the building operates so efficiently that it was recently recertified as LEED Platinum. Similarly, Richard designed and delivered as Executive Architect, the first pre-fabricated concrete office building in Northern California, 1101 5th Avenue in San Rafael, CA. As an early LEED AP professional, his projects have looked to advance the implementation of new technologies in sustainable building practices. Richard’s innovative efforts in architecture and development have paved the way, numerous times, for record-breaking profits. For example, Richard served as the Executive Architect for Belvedere Place, a 103,000 square foot office complex in Marin County. The project sold in November 2016 for $46.75M, or $454 psf, one of the highest prices ever paid in Marin County. Similarly, Richard served as the Design Architect for Piers 1.5, 3 & 5 in San Francisco managing the architecture and redevelopment on behalf of Pacific Waterfront Associates and CalSTERS. The award-winning $50M mixed use renovation of the Piers was sold in March 2017 for $103M or $1,250 psf, a record high for office space in San Francisco at the time.

Tina Chang is a Partner at Associate Capital, where she leads design and master development efforts at the Power Station. In this capacity, she selects and partners with the globe’s most talented and innovative designer professionals to deliver world-class, sustainable and intentionally-crafted buildings. Prior to Associate Capital, Tina spent nearly a decade in the public sector. She managed large-scale entitlement projects as a Senior Planner with the San Francisco Planning Department, and she master-planned US Naval installations in the Middle East and Washington, D.C. region during her time with the US Navy. She earned a Master of City and Regional Planning from the University of Pennsylvania and B.A. in International Development Studies from the University of California, Los Angeles. Tina serves as a Commissioner on the San Francisco Board of Appeals and as Board Chair of the Homeless Prenatal Program, a nationally-recognized family resource center that empowers women and families by facilitating housing security, healthy babies and economic sustainability. She lives in San Francisco with her family.

Matt Weber joined Ellis Partners in 2011. Matt manages development projects and provides expertise on entitlements, design, and construction matters throughout the greater San Francisco Bay Area. Prior to joining Ellis Partners, Matt led development projects for several firms including The Olson Company and the Alameda County Redevelopment Agency. At these firms, Matt was responsible for projects from due diligence through project delivery across a breadth of product types including mixed-use, retail, hotel, civic, and multi-family residential. Matt received a B.S. in Business Administration from the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served on the Board of Directors for Habitat for Humanity and formerly served as a Steering Committee member for the Urban Land Institute.

Charles “CJ” Higley is a real estate generalist. His practice is focused on real estate development, land use entitlements (a notoriously complex undertaking in the Bay Area), and construction law. With respect to the latter, CJ has a particular expertise in negotiating contracts, ranging from architect’s agreements to the contracts with consultants and contractors that are typical for a development. The projects in which he’s been involved have been equally diverse, including large-scale residential, commercial, industrial, and institutional developments. Sixteen years of experience have also given CJ an intricate matrix of relationships in the political, administrative, and real estate communities of San Francisco that has inured to the benefit of his clients. City planning staff, the Board of Supervisors, and the larger community find him relatable and pragmatic. He’s someone they can work with to find common ground, and help move a project forward. CJ's knowledge of the real estate and construction players in San Francisco saves his clients time and money, and improves the odds of success. He knows the issues that are sensitive, and can either avoid or prepare for them, depending on the situation. The acuteness of the Bay Area housing shortage has altered the process of permitting and obtaining the necessary entitlements for construction projects, particularly for developers engaged in affordable housing projects. The ability to delay, or in some cases, stop a project through a prolonged environmental review process is decreasing, and the political landscape is shifting towards streamlining the process, and sometimes exempting it from environmental review altogether. In this context, an experienced entitlement attorney with relationships throughout the various administrative bodies involved in the development process is invaluable, particularly when augmented by expertise in environmental law. By integrating experience, expertise and the versatility of an attorney who’s been actively engaged in a wide variety of projects, CJ is a significant competitive asset for his real estate and construction clients. CJ serves on the Housing Policy Board for San Francisco Planning and Urban Research (SPUR) and is a member of the Legislative Committee for San Francisco Housing Action Coalition (SFHAC). He has served on the Legislative Committee of the Environmental Section of the State Bar of California. He was recognized in The Legal 500 United States 2016 Land Use / Zoning practice area. He was recognized among the Northern California Super Lawyers - Rising Stars 2013. CJ has been selected for inclusion in The Best Lawyers in America in the area of Real Estate Law (2021). CJ received a J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law in 2002, where he served as an articles editor for Ecology Law Quarterly, and a Masters of Studies in Environmental Law (M.S.E.L.), magna cum laude, from Vermont Law School in 2001. He earned his B.A. from the University of Virginia in 1995.