New York State Pro Bono Opportunities Guide
With Full-Time Focus, Firm Doubled Pro Bono Hours in 2006
New York Lawyer
February 26, 2007
By Zusha Elinson
The Recorder
Living in India put a young Amanda Smith in the mind to help others.
Now, the San Francisco lawyer is getting to do just that for a full-time job as the first pro bono counsel at national firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius.
The position, which some other large firms already have, was created at Morgan, Lewis two years ago and is already paying off. The firm reported that its pro bono hours more than doubled in 2006 from the previous year — the biggest jump among firms in the Cal Law 25.
The firm languished in the pro bono column in 2005, but its 76,000 hours last year pushed it past traditional pro bono stalwarts like Morrison & Foerster and Heller Ehrman — though those firms, being smaller, maintained a higher average pro bono load per lawyer.
Smith helped launch a challenge to all Morgan, Lewis lawyers to contribute at least 20 pro bono hours last year. To encourage them, she put the names of attorneys completing their 20 hours in a new internal newsletter dedicated to pro bono matters.
"In the best way, it's peer pressure," she said.
In an effort to lead by example, firm leaders also took on pro bono matters, Smith said. Pro bono committees were revamped and the firm policy that a pro bono hour is treated just like any other billable hour come compensation time was reinforced to attorneys.
All the efforts have yielded results. The number of lawyers doing 20 hours or more — one measure in the annual Am Law survey — shot up from 341 in 2005 to 835, or 74 percent of the firm's lawyers, in 2006.
The firm continued its work on several high-profile cases around the country last year, including a long-running desegregation class action against the Department of Housing and Urban Development, filed on behalf of thousands of black families in Baltimore. It also upped its hours for local nonprofits like the San Francisco Food Bank, with labor and employment lawyers helping to sort out its legal issues.
Smith, an insurance lawyer by trade, has always been drawn to pro bono work. As an associate, she spent around 20 percent of her time on it. She also recently spent two years getting a master's in international human rights law from the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom while maintaining a full-time practice.
She said one of her first inspirations came as a 12-year-old when her family moved to India because of her father's job.
"I think it was an opportunity to see that not everyone has the same opportunities that we have in the U.S.," she said.
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