Being a bankruptcy attorney was not a decision you needed to make in law school.
Gilberto Vera is this year’s recipient of the Jack Berman Award of Achievement, which the California Young Lawyers Association awards annually to a new lawyer for their distinguished service to the community and the legal profession. Vera, who is a Senior Attorney with the Legal Aid Society of San Diego, Inc., has dedicated his career to assisting financially vulnerable populations.
The Honorable Robert P. Dahlquist has been a judge for North County San Diego Superior Court for 18 years. Judge Dahlquist was born and largely raised near Salt Lake City, Utah. As the middle child of five kids, Judge Dahlquist learned many lessons from his family. He remembers seeing both his parents work hard to make a living, even though there were not many working mothers at that time. Often, his father worked two jobs (one during the day and another part-time at night). Even though Judge Dalhquist’s parents were not college-educated, they impressed on him and his siblings that education was the only way to advance, and always encouraged him to pursue education.
Today’s Gratitude Challenge is to write about a memory I cherish. One of the best byproducts of this action item from the 30-Day Challenge was that I sat still for about half an hour combing through wonderful memories, trying to pick just one. Maybe it’s because I am teaching this semester at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and I’ve had the joy of being around law students again, or maybe it’s because bar results were released this past weekend, but I settled on the day I received my bar results. I vividly remember sitting in front of my laptop hitting refresh over and over again as the deadline approached. I felt sick with fear. And when, suddenly, my result popped up – “The above-named person appears on the pass list,” (or something to that effect) – my whole body went numb. It was like one of those scenes in a movie where everything goes silent. There’s no breath. There’s no heartbeat. Then slowly, the sound came back, muted at first, then becoming clearer and louder until it was crashing all around me with an almost physical impact. I was going to be a lawyer!
With that memory fresh, I want to share my sincere congratulations to those new lawyers who became our colleagues this weekend. We are so proud to welcome you to the profession. ¡Felicidades!
I also want to take a minute to share love and commiseration with those who didn’t pass. This is not the end. I have many dear friends, successful lawyers, who took the bar multiple times before passing. It is challenging. And you are up for that challenge. Keep going.
Whether your bar results experience was recent or long past, whether you received your results by mail or by the internet, and whether it was the first or the fifth time you took the bar, we all worked incredibly hard to earn the ability and honor, as lawyers, to help others navigate the legal system.
What we may not have understood when we first entered the profession is that the work does not stop. We continue that work as we educate ourselves on disparities in the criminal justice system and what we can do to foster and effectuate change. I hope you’ll join us this week for our final 2021 Dialogue on Diversity: The Intersectionality Between Race, Poverty and the Criminal Justice System, featuring panelists Hon. Roderick Shelton, Michael Garcia, and Roxana Sandoval, and moderated by Past SDCBA President Jerrilyn Malana.
The SDCBA also celebrates the announcement of our Section and New Lawyer Division election results, including NLD Chair Jake Zindulka who will serve a one-year term on the Board of Directors. You can find the 2022 leadership here. Thank you for your willingness to serve as volunteer leaders.
Additionally, five lawyers were elected to your 2022 SDCBA Board of Directors. Running for the Board is not easy, and I want to thank everyone who put time and effort into standing up and stepping up to undertake the work. We are pleased and proud to welcome:
At-Large Directors:
This article was originally published in the Sep/Oct 2021 issue of San Diego Lawyer Magazine.
By David C. Carr
Lawyers owe many ethical duties to their clients. Most of these duties are bottomed on the fiduciary nature of the attorney-client relationship. But lawyers also owe ethical duties to the judicial system and other persons arising from their status as officers of the Court and agents of the justice system. The most exciting (sometimes too exciting) problems in legal ethics arise from conflicting duty situations. California’s Rule of Professional Conduct 1.2.1 provides the context for many conflicting duty scenarios. It has been a part of ethical controversies since it became part of the black letter law of legal ethics on its adoption by the Supreme Court in November 2018.
Today’s action from the 30 Days of Gratitude Challenge that I’m doing is to write down something you are thankful for that has nothing to do with worldly possessions. This is an easy one for me as we come off a busy week of bar association dinners; I am grateful for this San Diego legal community. I teared up during the Tom Homan LGBT Law Association’s Gala Dinner while Judge Rubin and Justice Jenkins chatted by the firelight, and I wasn’t alone. I learned so much during the Native American Lawyers Virtual Gala from artist and activist Gerald Clarke Jr. (Cahuilla Band of Indians). I was inspired by the strength of the South Asian Bar Association’s leadership, which was matched by the fearless keynote by Judge Bernadette D’Souza. I cheered to see how many students the Earl B. Gilliam Bar Foundation awarded scholarships to, and how many elected officials honored the work of both the Foundation and Association. At each of these events, I was reminded of how important the work we do is and how fortunate we are to do it together.
This article was originally published in the Sep/Oct 2021 issue of San Diego Lawyer Magazine.
And just like that, it’s November. This month I plan to start each week with something that sparks gratitude within me. In the past, I have engaged in various gratitude challenges and, while they can sometimes feel like work, they have always been worth the effort for me. I found this 30 Day Gratitude Challenge this year, and I’m starting today by sending a positive note to someone – handwritten and snail-mailed, no less! If you join the challenge, I hope you’ll let me know how it’s going throughout the month!
