A home for the bench and bar of the nation's capital

Dear Members, Colleagues, and Friends of the BADC:

It is my great honor to serve as the 139th President of the Bar Association of the District of Columbia (BADC).

Founded in 1871, the BADC is the third oldest bar association in the United States, and the first bar association established in the District of Columbia. The BADC is proud of its longstanding commitment to civility, professionalism, and equal access to justice.

This coming year, I have dedicated my presidency to advancing these principles through a focus on disability inclusion and accessibility across the legal profession and in our court system. This priority reflects a conviction I have carried throughout my career in both public service and private practice.

Access to justice is not truly equal unless courthouses and legal services are fully accessible, unless reasonable accommodations and auxiliary aids are highly prioritized, and unless lawyers and law students with disabilities have a clear path to full participation in every corner of the bench and bar.

Working with our Board of Directors, our Sections, our Committees, including the Civil & Human Rights Committee, which I have been privileged to chair since 2022, and our sibling bar associations, this year the BADC will:

• Convene the bench and bar through programming, CLEs, and roundtables focused on the ADA, the Rehabilitation Act, accessibility and accommodations in the courts, digital accessibility (WCAG 2.1 AA), and the emerging role of AI in the law, including specifically related to equal access to justice and disability inclusion.
• Partner with the D.C. courts to identify and share best practices and rule amendments for enhancing accessibility and disability inclusion in the court system and related legal processes and procedures.
• Collaborate with our Young Lawyers Section and D.C. law schools to begin the process of establishing BADC student chapters, which will include a focus on enhancing civility, professionalism, and equal access to justice, as well as disability inclusion and accessibility, in law schools and the legal profession.

This focus is not a single-year project, but I hope this year will mark a lasting deepening of the DC legal community's dedication to disability inclusion and accessibility as a core dimension of civility, professionalism, and equal access to justice.

An Invitation to Join Us

The BADC has always been, at heart, a community, a place where attorneys, judges, and law students come together.

Whether you are a solo practitioner or a partner at a global firm, a government or in-house attorney, a nonprofit or public interest lawyer, a judge, a law professor, or a law student or young lawyer just entering the profession, we would be honored to welcome you as a member of the BADC. Our members serve through Committees and through our Sections, including the Young Lawyers Section, the Intellectual Property Section, and the Bankruptcy Section, and our Lawyer Referral Service is being revitalized to help District residents connect with qualified counsel.

I invite you to visit www.badc.org to learn more, to join, and to get involved. Please feel free to reach out to me or to any member of our Board of Directors directly.

Thank you for the privilege of serving as your President. I look forward to the year ahead, and to the good work we will do together.