1st Place Winners: Tom Cooke, Tom Kane, Joe Galligan, Alex Flocas
It was a beautiful day on the Stanford University Golf Course and as soon as Tiger clinched the 108th U.S. Open the players of the 17th Annual Legal Aid Golf Classic were ready to leave the clubhouse’s television and get on the green. Almost 140 players teed off and made the 2008 Golf Classic a smash hit, bringing in $145,000 to support Legal Aid’s programs. As always, everyone had a ball riding the golf carts and enjoyed the iced beverages generously sponsored by Wells Fargo Bank throughout the day.
Cocktail hour wine, generously donated by Committee Co-Chair Ron Garrity of Simpson Garrity & Innes, and hors d’ouvres were served as players came in after an exhilarating 18 holes. Tom Vacar, Consumer Reporter at KTVU/Fox 2 returned this year for a repeat performance as the tournament’s MC and auctioned off exciting prizes. Some of the prizes this year included TaylorMade Tour Burner and Nike Sumo2golf clubs and golf at Stanford Golf Course, Kris Moe Golf Schools in
Sonoma
,
Crystal
Springs
, and Half Moon Bay Golf Links. Other prizes included tickets to Disney’s “Mary Poppins” in NYC and wine from award winning vineyards Trefethen Family Vineyards, Joseph Phelps Vineyards & Joseph Family Vineyards. If you want to make sure you get early information about next year’s event, please contact Asya Sorokurs at info@legalaidsmc.org.
Next year Legal Aid will celebrate its 50th anniversary and you can be a part of it, just contact Asya Sorokurs at info@legalaidsmc.org to get involved!
SMALL WAYS TO HELP LEGAL AID
Every penny counts! Legal Aid earns a penny every time you search the internet! Just use goodsearch.com as your search engine and feel good every time you surf the net. Click on the link above to start helping Legal Aid!
Spread the word about Legal Aid. You can help others learn about our work by sharing your story. Take a minute to write a review about your experiences with us. Simply click on the link above and it will take you to Legal Aid's page on greatnonprofits.org where you write your review.
Your review will raise our visibility, allow others to hear from a real person about their experience and give us helpful feedback on what you like about our nonprofit and what may need improvement.
And Justice For All...
12th Annual Awards Luncheon
50th Anniversary Celebration
March 27th, 2009
Four Seasons Hotel Silicon Valley at East Palo Alto
SUMMER ASSOCIATES ASSIST WITH HEALTH CARE DIRECTIVES
Last summer seniors in
Pacifica
and
Belmont
were delighted to meet volunteer attorneys who helped them fill out their own Advanced Health Care Directives (AHCD). An AHCD is a document that allows an individual to prepare themselves in the event they become incapacitated. To complete the AHCD you must choose a health care agent who will make health decisions for you when you can no longer do so. Realizing they had discovered a pressing community need, this summer Legal Aid Pro Bono Director
Janet Seldon
and Legal Aid staff attorneys presented a total of four Advanced Health Care Directive clinics to seniors in
San Mateo
County
, and had record turnouts at each one. Clinics locations included
Half
Moon
Bay
Senior
Center
,
Pacifica
Senior
Center
,
Doelger
Senior
Center
in
Daly City
and
Fair Oaks
Community Center
in
Redwood City.
Volunteer attorneys were trained at the offices of Weil, Gotshal & Manges and later attended one or more of the clinics to help clients fill out the Advanced Health Care Directive forms. In total 32 attorneys volunteered from the law firms of Cooley Godward Kronish LLP, Davis Polk & Wardwell, DLA Piper US LLP, McDermott Will & Emery, Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP, and the company AES. With new Advanced Health Care Directive forms coming out this year, seniors could also bring their old AHCD’s and get a better explanation of the language on the forms, ensuring that their own AHCD reflected their wishes.
Seniors we met at the Half Moon Bay clinic mentioned their enormous relief at finally filling out an AHCD form. Each senior had concerns about the issues such as choosing an individual as an agent to make health care decisions for you if you are not able to make them for yourself. Not many seniors talk about the possibility of becoming ill or entering a vegetative state with their families but it is important to make their wishes known to those around them. Thanks to Legal Aid’s volunteer attorneys, seniors got the peace of mind and opened up channels for discussion with their family members.
SeNIOR ADVOCATES ADDRESS SENIOR FINANCIAL ABUSE
 Senior can be easy targets for financial abuse and cases are unfortunately on the rise. According to
San Mateo
County
’s Aging and Adult Services, only 1 in 6 cases of elder abuse is reported. For example, sixty-six year old Jill believed she had put herself on a waiting list for a below-market rate apartment. Contrary to the apartment complex’s policy for below-market rate units, the apartment manager collected a $400 security deposit. Jill had a limited income and was on Social Security so the deposit was a substantial part of her income. Jill was not given an apartment and was repeatedly told one would be available “next month”. A year and a half later, still with no apartment, Jill came to Legal Aid and met with attorney Amanda Barden, who negotiated the return of the security deposit, plus interest. Jill was relieved to get her money back to be to put towards another apartment.
To try to reduce the rising tide of stories such as Jill’s, Legal Aid’s Senior Advocates program developed and is distributing a brochure to educate seniors about the different ways financial abuse can happen to them. The goal is to make seniors aware of financial abuse and take precautions in advance of disaster.
The brochure includes descriptions of financial scams such as home improvement and contractor scams, telemarketing, identity theft, predatory lending and relatives taking advantage by obtaining power of attorney or deeds in their name from seniors. Senior Advocates is distributing the brochure through a number of local non-profits like the Meals on Wheels program. The brochure lists
San Mateo
County
resources so seniors can report abuse and scams as well as take legal action when appropriate against scammers and abusers. Should financial abuse occur, Senior Advocates stands ready to assist seniors with a variety of issues including restraining orders against abusers, and possible representation in financial abuse cases, and other legal assistance for seniors.
CAREGIVERS COLLABORATIVE 
Sometimes a family member becomes a caregiver in an instant. There’s a car accident or a death. Other times a family member becomes a caregiver because of a chronic or progressive illness of a loved one. However it happened, caregivers need a variety of services to help them meet the challenges of their new role.
The Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County has joined with seven other non-profit organizations have formed the San Mateo County Caregivers Collaborative. The goal of the Collaborative is to educate caregivers and their families about support services available throughout
San Mateo
County
, through an extensive media campaign. The Collaborative received a limited one-time grant from the
County
of
San Mateo
to conduct the campaign.
The Collaborative organizations include: Alzheimer’s Association, Seton Medical Center Coastside, Mills-Peninsula Senior Focus, Rosener House Adult Day Services, Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County, Family Caregiver Alliance and Pathways Home Health, Hospice & Private Duty.
Of course, the Collaborative hopes to publicize that Legal Aid offers legal services for caregivers that include benefits expertise for seniors and persons with disabilities, guardianships and advanced health care directives. For more information, please contact the Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County at 650-558-0915.
FUND FOR JUSTICE ENDOWMENT HITS $2 MILLION MILESTONE Thanks to hard work by its Endowment Board, Legal Aid’s Fund for Justice Endowment Campaign has surpassed the $2 million dollar milestone. Although establishing an endowment is a daunting task, Campaign Co-Chairs
Joe Cotchett
of Cotchett, Pitre and McCarthy and Mike Callahan, Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary of Yahoo!, never doubted continuing success. “Since 1959, the Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County has been helping hundreds of thousands of low-income people improve their lives through equal access to justice” says Cotchett. “Mike and I wanted to make sure that this will always be so. We decided to do something that had never been done in this community before. We would establish an endowment to serve as a base of discretionary funds that over time will become a major source of dependable, continuing support for Legal Aid for years to come.”
Take a bow: members of the Fund for Justice Endowment Board!
Co-Chairs:
Michael Callahan
Executive Vice President, General Counsel & Secretary, Yahoo
Joseph W. Cotchett
Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy
Board Members:
George Corey
Corey, Luzaich, Pliska, de Ghetaldi &
Nastari LLP
Boris Feldman
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Renee Lanam
Chief Development Officer & Secretary, Equinix, Inc.
Janette Leonidou
Leonidou & Rosin
James E. Lyons
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP The Fund for Justice continues to grow and through pledges from prominent law firms and leading individuals, and cy pres funds. If you would like to make your gift for justice, please contact mstorch@legalaidsmc.org.
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