On June 6, nearly 200 members of the legal, nonprofit, and business communities gathered at the Boston office of Nixon Peabody to help Lawyers Clearinghouse celebrate its 30th year of pro bono service and to honor Eastern Bank Chair and CEO Robert F. Rivers.
Bob was presented with the Lawyers Clearinghouse Leadership Award in recognition of his commitment to social justice and community development, two causes which he has worked hard to promote at Eastern Bank throughout his time there.
The event was also a great success for the Clearinghouse, which surpassed its fundraising goal to raise $160,000 from 100 event sponsors, thanks to an active Leadership Committee chaired by Doug Henry, Managing Partner at Sherin & Lodgen, and Kathy Henry, General Counsel at Eastern Bank.
Jeff Sacks, a longtime member of the Clearinghouse Board and a partner at Nixon Peabody, kicked off the evening’s speaking program, welcoming attendees and sponsors on behalf of Nixon Peabody.
Attendees then heard from Doug Henry, who provided an overview of the Clearinghouse’s work over the past year, calling it “the most productive year to date.”
In May 2016, the Clearinghouse received a $100,000 grant from Cummings Foundation, to be awarded in two $50,000 installments in support of the Legal Clinic for the Homeless. Doug explained how the Clearinghouse had used the funds to expand the clinic program, adding new shelter locations, bringing on experienced attorneys Dick Bauer and Heather Friedman to serve as mentors for clinic attorneys, and recruiting more volunteers from firms like Morgan Lewis and Nelson Mullins. When the clinic year ends in late June, Clinic Director Mia Friedman expects to have connected 250 clients with pro bono lawyers, representing a 62% increase since she took over management of the program two years ago.
Doug also praised the Clearinghouse’s other pro bono programs, the Legal Referral Program for nonprofits, which marked another successful year of connecting nonprofits with free attorneys, and the Access to Justice Fellows Program, which engages retired attorneys and judges in pro bono projects and which will kick off its seventh year in the fall.
Doug closed out his remarks by announcing that the Clearinghouse was recently chosen as a recipient of a Sustaining Grant from Cummings Foundation. Meant to supply local nonprofits with the funds needed to effectively build on past Cummings grants, this grant will provide the Clearinghouse with $500,000 over ten years to continue expanding the Legal Clinic.
The announcement of the Sustaining Grant to support the clinic served as a fitting introduction for the next set of speakers: Attorney Jessica Lisak, Counsel at WilmerHale, and her clinic clients, the Heredia family.
As a longtime clinic volunteer, Jessica has worked with many people and families in need of assistance. She first spoke about why pro bono matters to her and to so many of her colleagues.
“For me, this work truly is about ensuring equity; that all people can be treated equally, have access to equal treatment in the eyes of the law,” Jessica said. “We lend power to our clients’ voices, we help them navigate extremely complex and often overwhelming systems, and we let them participate meaningfully in decisions that have life-altering consequences.”
Jessica then introduced the Heredias, who she met at a Legal Clinic at St. Francis House. Francisco and his partner Yesires came to the clinic after their landlord moved to evict them, claiming the family of six could not legally inhabit the small apartment where they lived. With assistance from other WilmerHale attorneys, a paralegal, and clinic mentor Dick Bauer, Jessica successfully argued in court that the apartment fell a mere 38 feet short of the necessary square footage required by the state sanitation code, and that the family could live there comfortably and should not have to uproot their lives.
Francisco spoke on behalf of his family, with interpretation provided by Fabiana Videla, who coordinates the Clearinghouse’s clinics at St. Francis House. He explained how stressful it had been to receive the eviction notice and said he and his family never expected to receive the help they did.
“It was a huge surprise to realize that an organization like this was supporting us so much and treating us so well when we had no money to afford legal help,” he said. “Since day one, until now, [the lawyers] have never left us by ourselves, always paying attention to me and my family … keep doing what you are doing, because it is an immense help for the community.”
Following applause for the Heredia family, event co-chair Kathy Henry came to the podium to introduce her boss, honoree Bob Rivers. She said that Bob truly does his part to model his actions and words after those of his namesake, the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Under Bob’s direction, Eastern Bank has one of the most diverse boards in the financial services industry, and the bank gives millions of dollars annually to local nonprofits and provides valuable support to small businesses.
“Bob embodies RFK’s commitment to equal rights and opportunity,” she said. “He builds coalitions with community leaders to develop opportunities for those for whom the door of economic opportunity does not just swing wide open … [At Eastern Bank] we’re lucky enough to be led by a good and decent man; a man of values and justice.”
After accepting the Leadership Award from Kathy, Bob provided the final remarks of the evening, inspiring attendees with his timely call for collective action in the face of injustice and inequity. Bob’s words were made even more impactful by the fact that it was the 50th anniversary of Robert F. Kennedy’s death.
Bob spoke of looking around the business world as a white male, and seeing only faces that looked like his own. Like Robert F. Kennedy, he said he reaches out to those not of his own experience, to help them access the rights and opportunities that do not necessarily come to them as easily as they do to someone like him.
“As a person now of relative privilege, I have come to recognize that I have the opportunity, and indeed the responsibility, to help drive necessary change and progress on issues of social justice,” he said. “It is this passion that first drew me to Eastern, with its long commitment to community service and philanthropy, and which fuels my fire in driving our advocacy work today.”
Bob closed his speech by quoting the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy, who, in his eulogy of his brother Robert, asked that people remember him “simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it.”
“Those of you in this room, those of you who volunteer on behalf of Lawyers Clearinghouse, see the suffering and help to heal it and, for that, I thank you very much,” Bob said.
Clearinghouse Vice President, Chris Lindstrom, a partner at Nutter McClennen, then thanked attendees, sponsors, the Leadership Committee, and the Clearinghouse Board and staff for their contributions to such a successful event.
