One of San Antonio’s most prominent law firms, Oppenheimer, Blend, Harrison and Tate, Inc., will join Strasburger& Price, LLP to create the city’s fourth largest firm with more than 40 attorneys locally. All current practicing shareholders of Oppenheimer Blend will be joining the combined firm, including the three remaining name shareholders, Stanley Blend, Reese Harrison and John Tate.   Statewide, the combined firm will boast over 210 attorneys making it one of the 20 largest firms in the state.  In San Antonio, the combined firm will be known asStrasburger Price Oppenheimer Blend. The combination will be effective at the end of this month.   The firms will initially remain in their existing office spaces but plan to consolidate into a single office in early 2012.

Strasburger is one of the state’s leading law firms with offices in Austin, Collin County, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio.  The firm also maintains offices outside Texas in New York City, Washington, D.C., and through Strasburger & Price, S.C., Mexico City.

Oppenheimer Blend, founded over 40 years ago by Jesse H. Oppenheimer, has an impeccable reputation throughout San Antonio and South Texas.  The firm’s many legacies to the region include representing the investors who brought SeaWorld to San Antonio and the developers of RetamaPark, the city’s first-ever horse and greyhound racetrack.  In addition, the firm assisted one of its former shareholders, Herb Kelleher, a founder of Southwest Airlines, in successfully overcoming legal obstacles which threatened to prevent the airline from getting off the ground.

Today, with offices in San Antonio and Kerrville, the firm represents large public and private companies in complex corporate and tax matters, and influential individuals, ranching families and wealthy foreign nationals with their estate and business planning needs.

Combining their practices in San Antonio results in Oppenheimer Blend lawyers having the ability to bring a wider range of litigation and business services to their clients and to handle larger projects while Strasburger gains the benefit of Oppenheimer Blend’s deep ties to the San Antonio business community and its tax, estate planning, corporate and health care expertise.

Strasburger is focused on growing the firm’s robust healthcare practice because of the continuing impact of governmental and market driven healthcare reform.  Adding the Oppenheimer Blend lawyers will allow Strasburger to expand the regional scope of its representation of hospitals, healthcare providers, physicians and physician groups in transactional and regulatory matters, as well as in qui tam and false claims act cases, fraud and abuse regulation, reimbursement and cost recovery audits, and other affected areas.

According to Marty Roos, CEO for Oppenheimer Blend, “The strengths of the two firms complement one another and will competitively position the firm as the go-to law firm in San Antonio.”  He said, “Both firms concentrate much of their work on representing middle market companies and entrepreneurs, and seek to do so with a value proposition that provides clients with legal services at a lower cost than similarly sized and larger law firms. We did not want to join a firm that would require us to significantly increase our billing rates as a condition to joining.”   Roos sees growth opportunities for the combined firm in complex litigation matters, business transactions, tax, intellectual property, immigration and healthcare.

David Oppenheimer, son of Jesse Oppenheimer and head of Oppenheimer Blend’s Corporate & Securities Practice Group, said of today’s news, “This firm was founded to provide top-drawer legal services in San Antonio for entrepreneurial businesses and individuals, with the belief that every client deserves the best legal advice.” He said, “Joining forces with Strasburger helps our firm further that goal.  We gain expertise that will aid us in addressing our clients’ specialty legal needs well into the future.”

According to Stanley Blend, “The cultures of the two firms are very compatible.  The core principles by which Strasburger operates are very similar to those of our founder, Jesse Oppenheimer.”  Blend said, “As a part of Strasburger’s broad suite of specialty services, we will be able to deliver a wider range of expertise to our clients – such as complex litigation — on a larger platform at competitive rates.   We will also be able to handle larger projects because of the greater depth of the combined firm.”

Dan Butcher, Managing Partner of Strasburger, added to Blend’s comments, saying, “Strasburger will gain the benefit of Oppenheimer Blend’s unique expertise in a number of key practice areas, such as healthcare and cross border wealth management, which will complement our sizeable practice teams in those areas.”

Carol Glendenning, Chair of the Strasburger’s governing Policy Committee, said her firm looks forward to “continuing Oppenheimer Blend’s heritage of providing outstanding legal representation to the San Antonio community as well as its history of serving in leadership roles in key civic and professional groups in San Antonio.  Adding the Oppenheimer Blend lawyers to Strasburger aligns perfectly with our strategy of being the premier firm in Texas for middle market business and the firm of choice for run the company work for larger national and international companies.”

Marty Roos will join Strasburger’s Policy Committee, while several Oppenheimer Blend attorneys will take leadership roles in the San Antonio office and on various firm-wide committees, such as Strasburger’s Health Care Practice Steering Committee.

According to Ed Valdespino, the Partner-in-Charge of Strasburger’s San Antonio office, “The addition of this talented group of business lawyers is a real game changer for us in San Antonio because it provides us expertise and manpower in specific areas where our client needs continue to grow. The combination will have an immediate impact on our practice and the San Antonio legal community. This new platform will also create the need for additional hiring in key practice areas.”

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