Squillante appointed to bar presidents' executive
council
Massachusetts Bar Association immediate Past President Denise
Squillante has been appointed to serve a three-year term on the
executive council of the National Conference of Bar Presidents, a
voluntary association whose members include presidents, past
presidents and presidents-elect of state and local bars.
Squillante's term begins Sept. 1.
Squillante's Fall River practice concentrates on family law,
corporate law, injury and estates and providing business and legal
consulting services to corporations.
She is also immediate past president of the New England Bar
Association, a member of the Bristol County Bar Association
Executive Board, and a former president of the Fall River Bar
Association.
At the MBA, Squillante has long been active in the Family Law
Section and the House of Delegates. She was instrumental in
establishing the General Practice, Solo & Small-Firm Section
and efforts to assist lawyers who are transitioning in or out of
practice. She is also a Massachusetts Bar Foundation Fellow.
She is a Massachusetts delegate to the American Bar
Association's House of Delegates, was co-chair of the joint
MBA/Boston Bar Association Alimony Task Force and a member of a
legislative task force to study alimony created by the Joint
Committee on the Judiciary.
Squillante was a member of the Probate Court Scheduling Task
Force, the MBA representative on the Equality Commission, a trustee
of Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education Inc. and on the
National Conference of Bar President's Program Committee and
Membership Committee. She also took part in the Supreme Judicial
Court's Steering Committee for Self-Represented Litigants Advisory
Group.
She earned her bachelor's degree from Roger Williams University
in 1980 and graduated magna cum laude from New England
School of Law.
LSC names Broderick, Ryan to national Pro Bono Task
Force
The Legal Services Corp. announced last month that it appointed
Judge John T. Broderick Jr. (ret.) and Mary K. Ryan as members of
its national Pro Bono Task Force, which will help develop
additional resources to assist low-income Americans facing
foreclosure, domestic violence and other civil legal problems.
More than four dozen people were appointed to the task force,
including MBA members:
John T. Broderick Jr., dean and president of the University of
New Hampshire School of Law. He recently retired as chief justice
of the New Hampshire Supreme Court and served for 10 years on the
LSC board.
Mary K. Ryan, partner, Nutter McClennen & Fish LLP. She
serves on the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Pro
Bono & Public Service and is a past chair of the ABA Standing
Committee on Delivery of Legal Services.
The Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit promotes equal access to
justice and provides high-quality civil legal assistance to
low-income individuals and families. About 95 percent of its annual
appropriation from Congress is distributed as grants to 136
independent nonprofit legal aid programs in every state, the
District of Columbia and the U.S. territories.
The task force will "identify and recommend to the board new and
innovative ways in which to promote and enhance pro bono
initiatives throughout the country, including urban areas, rural
areas and areas with underserved populations."
"The Task Force's work is of critical importance," said John G.
Levi, chairman of the LSC Board of Directors. "Studies have found
that only a small fraction of low-income Americans receive the help
of a lawyer in addressing their civil legal problems, and
increasingly, individuals are having to handle their legal matters
on their own. Although pro bono involvement has grown at LSC
programs, we must do more to help ensure access to justice and the
orderly functioning of the civil justice system."