Moira O'Neill

Bio

Moira O’Neill (UC Law SF ’06) joined the faculty in 2025. O’Neill is a public law scholar focused on climate resilience, equity, and democracy. O’Neill writes in the areas of environmental law, land-use law, housing policy, and state and local government law using interdisciplinary and empirical methods. Much of her work explores how state and local governments regulate land-use to address climate change while also tackling spatial inequality. Major media outlets, including The New York Times, Bloomberg, The Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, KQED (San Francisco), KCRW (Los Angeles), and The Wall Street Journal have also reported on O’Neill’s research or sought her opinion on land use law topics and environmental review. O’Neill teaches environmental law, land-use law, and property courses.

O’Neill is also a Faculty Research Affiliate at the Terner Center for Housing Innovation and the Institute of Urban and Regional Development, both housed in UC Berkeley’s College of Environmental Design, and an affiliated scholar of UCLA’s Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies in the Luskin School of Public Policy.

Before joining UC Law San Francisco, O’Neill was a research associate professor of law in the University of Virginia’s School of Law where she taught land-use law, state and local government law, and housing policy courses. O’Neill also served as an associate director of the University of Virginia’s Environmental Institute. Prior to her time at the University of Virginia, O’Neill was an associate research scholar in the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia Law School. She also previously taught land use law and state and local government law courses at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, UC Berkeley’s Department of City and Regional Planning, and at Berkeley Law.

O’Neill’s prior professional and legal experience includes representing California public entities in appellate matters, writ proceedings and complex litigation. Her professional consulting practice included public policy analysis and the design of participatory processes around public works projects.

She graduated from UC Law SF in 2006 with academic honors and awards, including recognition through the Order of the Coif and membership in the Thurston Society. As a student, she was the executive managing editor for the UC Law Journal and worked as a teaching assistant in the Legal Educational Opportunity Program for first-year civil procedure, property and environmental law courses. After graduating law school, O’Neill clerked for Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

O’Neill is a member of the state bar of California and admitted to the Ninth Circuit, Northern, Southern, Eastern and Central Districts of California.

Selected Major Research Reports for Government Agencies:

Evaluating the Potential for Housing Development in Transportation-Efficient and Healthy, High-Opportunity Areas in California. Prepared for the California Air Resources Board and the California Environmental Protection Agency (Final Report April 30, 2024).

Examining Local Law, Policy, and Planning Practice on Development in San Francisco Using CALES: Report in Support of San Francisco Policy and Practice Review. Report to California’s Department of Housing and Community Development (Final Report September 2023) available at https://www.hcd.ca.gov/sites/default/files/docs/policy-and-research/plan-report/ucb-examining-local-law-policy-planning-practice-on-development-in-sf-using-cales.pdf.

Factors Affecting Development Decisions and Construction Delay of Housing in Transit-Accessible and Jobs-Rich Areas in California, The University of California Institute of Transportation Studies. UC-ITS-2021-37, DOI: 10.7922/G2ZG6QKD (July 2022) available at https://www.ucits.org/research-project/2021-37/.

Examining Entitlement in California to Inform Policy and Process: Advancing Social Equity in Housing Development Patterns, Prepared for the California Air Resources Board and the California Environmental Protection Agency (Final Report March 18, 2022). Report informs the 2022 Scoping Plan for Achieving Carbon Neutrality (2022 Scoping Plan) that implements the Sustainable Communities and Climate Protection Act (SB 375).

Selected Scholarship

• Just Look at the Map: Bounding Environmental Review of Housing Development in California.
  With Eric Biber, Christopher Elmendorf, and Nicholas J. Marantz. , 54 Environmental Law 221 2024

• Perspectives or Misperceptions? Why Better Land Use Data is Critical to Housing Policy Debates.
  With Giulia Gualco-Nelson and Eric Biber., Journal of Planning Education and Research 2024

• Measuring Local Policy to Advance Fair Housing and Climate Goals through a Comprehensive Assessment of Land Use Entitlements Study.
  With Eric Biber and Nicholas J. Marantz., 50 Pepperdine Law Review 505 2023

• Do Land Use Plans Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing?
  With Paavo Monkonnen, Michael Lens, Chris Elmendorf, Greg Preston, & Raine Robichaud., Journal of the American Planning Association, 90(2), 247-60. 2023

• Small Suburbs, Large Lots: How Local Control of Land-Use Harms Housing Affordability, Equity, and Climate.
  With Eric Biber, Giulia Gualco-Nelson, and Nicholas J. Marantz., Utah Law Review 1. 2022

• “I Would, If Only I Could”: How California Cities Can Use the State Law to Overcome Neighborhood Resistance to New Housing.
  With Eric Biber, Christopher Elmendorf, and Paavo Monkkonen. , 57 Willamette Law Review 221. 2021

• State Administrative Review of Local Constraints on Housing Development: Improving the California Model.
  With Eric Biber, Christopher Elmendorf, and Paavo Monkkonen., 63 Arizona Law Review 609. 2021

• Building to Burn: Permitting Exurban Housing Development in High Fire Risk Zones.
  With Eric Biber., 48 Ecology Law Quarterly 943. 2021

• Sustainable Communities or The Next Urban Renewal?
  With Eric Biber and Giulia Gualco-Nelson., 47.4 Ecology Law Quarterly 101. 2020

• Making It Work: Legal Foundations for Administrative Reform of California’s Housing Framework.
  With Eric Biber, Christopher Elmendorf, and Paavo Monkkonen, 47.4 Ecology Law Quarterly 973 2020

• Increasing community engagement in collective impact approaches to advance social change.
  Community Development, 51(1), 17-35. 2020

• Developing Policy from the Ground Up: Examining Entitlement in the Bay Area to Inform California Housing Policy.
  With Eric Biber and Giulia Gualco Nelson., 25 Hastings Environt. L. J. 1 . 2019

• The Important Role of Government in Comprehensive Community Initiatives: A Case Study Analysis of the Building Healthy Communities Initiative.
  With Jovanna Rosen and Malo Hutson., Journal of Planning Education and Research. 2018