BY JEN COATSWORTH
It’s been a busy month for our community, full of end-of-year celebrations and events. As I attended our Section holiday parties and other gatherings, and our recent Annual Meeting, it has been a privilege the celebrate the end of a successful year. It has also made clear the significant positive impact our Association has had over the past 12 months. Our volunteer leadership has worked hard to serve the legal profession and our broader community and has advocated on behalf of the clients that we serve.
As my time as Chancellor comes to a close, I want to thank all of our members for their support and commitment during 2024. No matter the level of your involvement, you have helped us to continue to offer outstanding events and insightful education programs, and to advocate for important issues that impact our profession and our community.
Please allow me to highlight just a few specific successes from the past year:
- We instituted a program with many Association members participating in small group discussions about how we can measurably move diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging forward in all types of office environments. The ideas from these groups will be published in a toolkit or resource guide on the Association’s website.
- A small group of Association leaders and volunteers did significant work on creating a proposal to update and modernize the Association’s bylaws and the bylaws of the Commission on Judicial Selection and Retention. While this work is still ongoing, we are confident it will result in creating greater efficiency and allow us to be nimbler in meeting the constantly evolving needs of our membership.
- In partnership with the Pennsylvania Bar Association, the Committee of Seventy and the Pepper Center, we worked to train and recruit poll workers for all 67 Pennsylvania counties and to educate our membership on critical issues related to ensuring free and fair elections.
- We also held several highly regarded events, including co-presenting an important election-focused Law Day program in partnership with American Bar Association’s Task Force for American Democracy and the Pennsylvania Bar Association. We also held Quarterly events focused on diversity, equity and inclusion, and on the current historic slate of female legal leaders in Pennsylvania.
- We held a Chancellor’s Forum on an important recent study on the impact of parenthood, and specifically motherhood, on legal careers and explored ways to overcome the “parenthood penalty.” We also held a Dec. 16 Chancellor’s Forum on judicial security, and how we can come together to protect our courts against an alarming rise in threats and violence.
- We further expanded our institutional membership program to include public interest agencies in addition to law schools and city departments. This highly successful initiative has allowed us to grow and diversify our membership, helping us to speak out with an even stronger voice about issues impacting the legal profession in Philadelphia and beyond.
- We enhanced our relationship with City Leadership by welcoming Mayor Parker at our Large Firm Management Committee’s annual Mayor’s Breakfast and hosting forums featuring City Council President Kenyatta Johnson and Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel. Following the Forum with Commissioner Bethel, we convened a meeting with City leadership to address the issue of child custody withholding that was raised by our members, and there were key take aways and commitments from this meeting on which we will continue to work collaboratively.
- We spoke out on behalf of our community and delivered testimony before City Council committees in support of providing permanent funding for the city’s eviction diversion program and of legislation to provide for licensing of people responsible for performing tenant evictions at residential properties. Both measures were ultimately successful. I also had the chance to provide commentary at a recent En Banc argument session on PCN, providing explanation for lay members of the community on the cases heard by the Court.
- Our Board of Governors passed a resolution in support of Project Litigate, an effort to provide young attorneys with more comprehensive courtroom experience and a resolution in support of updates to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court rules regarding name changes that would provide greater clarity and consistency in the process. The Board also passed resolutions related to intent-based parentage and of proposed legislation that would prohibit conversion therapy for those under 18. The Board also passed a resolution in opposition to the Disciplinary Board’s proposed rulemaking regarding succession planning, and suggesting amendments to the proposed rule.
While 2025 is sure to bring its share of challenges, I am confident that our Association stands ready to continue to fulfill our mission of supporting the rule of law and advancing equal access to justice. I look forward to working with 2025 Chancellor Katayun Jaffari and our other incoming leaders.
I hope you will continue to engage with our Association and to consider making 2025 the year that you commit to greater involvement, either by joining a Section or Committee, speaking at a CLE, or volunteering your time as part of our judicial election efforts.
Thank you for all of your support in 2024. Wishing you a happy, healthy New Year!
Jen Coatsworth is 2024 Chancellor of the Philadelphia Bar Association. You can email her at chancellor@philabar.org.
