Disability Access in the Practice of Law – Begin Making Your Law Firms More Accessible for Disabled Employees and Clients with this Simple Checklist

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Derek, a white man with blond hair, stands before a sunny window and wears a black suit and gray plaid tie over a white shirt.By Derek J. Dittmar

You may be unintentionally excluding a quarter of your clients and coworkers.

Twenty-six percent of adults living in the United States live with some sort of disability. However, fewer than one percent of American attorneys report having a disability, which can include sensory, physical, emotional, cognitive, and psychological conditions, many of which are not immediately perceivable by the public. It is unsurprising that most legal providers do not know how to make their services, offices, and products accessible to persons with disabilities (PWDs). When our profession is not conducted with a focus on accessibility for clients, and when we lack disabled coworkers to provide their lived and learned expertise, we are giving up, or greatly limiting, the chance to work for, and with, PWDs. Obviously, law schools have a vital role to play in expanding opportunities in the practice of law for PWDs, but that is the subject of a different post. Today, I am going to focus on why ensuring accessibility is both a legal and ethical obligation for attorneys and firms, in addition to simply being good business sense. Read more

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Cleo Le Anne Ackerman – The Winner of the Spring 2022 Paralegal Division Student Scholarship

Cleo Le Anne Ackerman

Cleo Le Anne Ackerman

By the Scholarship Committee

The Scholarship Committee had an amazing selection of student essays submitted for the Spring 2022 Paralegal Division Student Scholarship. The topic, “What do you envision your day-to-day life of a paralegal to be?” allowed for students to outline their expectations of the paralegal career, and for some, detail what it can offer them for a brighter future. While each essay was fantastic, there was only room for one winner.

We are excited to announce that the winner is Cleo Le Anne Ackerman! Cleo is a student at Johnston Community College’s Paralegal Technology Program. Her essay not only offered her personal insight as to what the paralegal profession would be like day to day, but also showed the challenges she has faced and those she hopes to overcome with a career as a paralegal. We hope you will take the time to read her essay below and congratulate her for her award!

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Key Takeaways from the IAPP Global Privacy Summit 2022

Will QuickBy Will Quick 

After two-plus years of mostly attending CLEs, webinars, and other knowledge-building events via Zoom, Teams or some other virtual platform, it was great to get together with like-minded privacy professionals in Washington, D.C., April 10-13 for the 2022 IAPP Global Privacy Summit. I’ll be honest, I did not know what to expect from an actual in-person conference and networking event, but the IAPP and its speakers and sponsors did not disappoint.

From headliners like Apple CEO Tim Cook and FTC Chair Lisa Khan to a plethora of informative breakout sessions, GPS was a great way to brush up on a variety of current topics. Throw in getting to spend some quality time catching up with folks I have not seen in several years (or in some cases had only met virtually over the last two), and it was a good time all around. One pro tip on navigating the large crowds at GPS is and always has been to find a few folks you know to pal up with for sessions and networking events. As the only person from my firm at GPS this year, it was great to have folks from our NCBA Privacy and Data Security Section family to team up with on occasion  —just one more reason to be active in the section!

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Why Do We Make Such a Big Deal about Awards?

By the Communications Committee

The practice of law is many things – challenging, intellectually stimulating, problem solving, creative (and fun). At its best, the practice of law is built upon the shoulders, and with the help, of those who have gone before us, as well as our peers.

Giving Bar Association awards is a way to celebrate all of us who work to further justice and the rule of law by singling out a few to represent the best of us.

Administrative law and its practitioners serve the high purpose of protecting the ability of government to effectively function while protecting the constitutional rights of those entitled to due process and equal protection of law. Administrative law, well practiced, is vital to the rule of law and administration of justice.

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Pro Bono Spotlight: Kayla Britt

Kayla Britt

Kayla Britt

By Kaitlyn Fudge

Kayla Britt is the example of a what everyone strives for in a great lawyer: dedicated, professional, passionate, humble.

A recipient of the NCBA YLD Young Lawyer of the Quarter for October through December 2020 and July through September 2021, Kayla has been working hard to serve those in North Carolina. Since law school, Kayla has made it a priority to focus on pro bono work.

Kayla shares, “Pro bono work is important to me because it allows me to assist those who may otherwise not have adequate assistance. It also allows me to broaden my experiences beyond the skills I learn in my job.”

Kayla works with the Housing Stability Pro Bono Project (“HSP”), which is a joint effort of the North Carolina Bar Foundation and North Carolina Pro Bono Resource Center in partnership with the North Carolina Office of Recovery & Resilience. This Project works with the Housing Opportunities and Prevention of Evictions Program (“HOPE”) — a program that provides income-based assistance for vulnerable tenants at risk of eviction. Volunteers with this project help to stabilize housing by facilitating agreements between tenants and landlords to accept HOPE terms.

Kayla’s favorite experience with HSP is when she facilitated a landlord-tenant agreement, one that led to helping many others: Kayla contacted a landlord to help a specific tenant. After learning about the program, the landlord wanted to help her other tenants with HOPE. Kayla was able to get a list from the landlord to refer to HOPE, potentially preventing many other evictions.

“The overwhelming joy tenants exhibit when they find out that we reached an agreement with their landlord has been more than I ever expected to experience in a pro bono role,” Kayla said.

Beyond her pro bono service with HSP, Kayla is an Assistant Attorney General with the North Carolina Department of Justice Appellate & Post-Conviction Section where she prepares the state’s criminal briefs, responds to habeas corpus petitions, and appears before both North Carolina Appellate Courts and Federal District Courts. She volunteers with Wills For Heroes, assisting first responders with estate planning.

Kayla is a member of the NCBA Litigation Section and co-chair of Young Lawyers Division Law Student Outreach Committee.

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Golden Parachute Payments – Shareholder Approval Exception

John Hodnette is a man with brown hair and blue eyes. He is pictured wearing a dark blue jacket, white shirt, and pale blue and pink tie. He is smiling and standing against a grey background.By John G. Hodnette

Sections 280G and 4999 impose a 20% excise tax in addition to regular income taxes on individuals who receive an excess parachute payment upon a change of control or sale of a substantial portion of the assets of a corporation. Section 280G also prohibits the corporation from deducting the payment. However, there are notable exceptions to these general rules, including the shareholder voting exception in Section 280G(b)(5)(B).

Only officers, certain shareholders, and the highest paid group of individuals of a corporation are subject to the golden parachute rules. Parachute payments are limited by definition to payments equal to or exceeding three times the individual’s base salary. However, even if the Section 280G rules would generally apply, there may be an opportunity for the corporation to apply the shareholder approval exception. The exception applies only to corporations whose stock is not readily tradable on an established securities market, as defined in Treas. Reg. § 1.897-1(m). A corporation is treated as having regularly traded stock if either (i) it is a member of an affiliated group of corporations and stock of any member of such group is readily tradable on an established securities market, or (ii) its parent corporation has any ownership that is readily tradable on an established securities market and the stock of the corporation constitutes a substantial portion of the fair market value of the assets of the parent corporation.

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Micro Mindfulness For Modern Lawyers

By Colleen L. Byers

We don’t need anything else to add to our to-do list. We don’t need to overhaul our entire practice. Instead, we can do one little thing that could make a big, positive impact through a practice called micro mindfulness.

Micro mindfulness is a practice of interspersing small doses (think less than 0.1 of your time) of attention to the present moment a few times throughout the day. It’s as simple as adding just a pinch of salt to enhance your meal. As my late grandmother used to say, “A little bit will do ya.”

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Who’s New at OAH

By the Communications Committee

The past two years have changed not only where and how we work, but with whom we work. After several employee retirements and departures, the Office of Administrative Hearings has welcomed the following new members to the administrative bench:

The Honorable Michael C. Byrne was appointed and sworn in as an Administrative Law Judge on June 1, 2020. Judge Byrne’s office is located in the OAH Raleigh office. Before becoming an Administrative Law Judge, Judge Byrne was a solo practitioner for many years representing state employees and law enforcement officers in administrative litigation. He is licensed to practice in the State of North Carolina as well as admitted to practice before the United States District Court for the Eastern, Middle and Western Districts of North Carolina and the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. Judge Byrne received a J.D. from Campbell University’s Norman Adrian Wiggins School of Law and received a B.A. from North Carolina State University. Read more

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