Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Page 3
Conference of Delegates Honors Commissioner St. George
By a MetNews Staff Writer
The Los Angeles County Bar Association Delegation to the Conference of Delegates of California Bar Associations has honored Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Mathew C. St. George Jr. with the Charles R. English Spirit Award.
The award, which has been presented annually for the past 11 years, was re-named in 1999 in honor of the long-time delegate remembered by LACBA’s immediate past president, Danette Meyers, for his devotion to the conference and service as unofficial “greeter” of every attendee.
Superior Court Assistant Presiding Judge Lee S. Edmon told attendees that there was “no more worthy recipient” than St. George. “Like Charlie, he always seems to greet you with a smile…can always disagree with you on a resolution without being disagreeable…and makes you feel like you’re just having a discussion with an old friend.”
Laura Goldin, executive director of the conference, praised St. George as one who “embodies all the values of the conference and what it really means to be a conference leader,” while delegation chair James W. Gilliam Jr. opined that the commissioner “breathed life and spirit into the conference” by leading the LACBA delegation the year the State Bar withdrew funding for the event.
He has served as an at-large director of the conference since its incorporation in 2003 and has also served on the LACBA Board of Trustees and as a member of the delegation’s executive committee.
In March, St. George was elected commissioner by the judges of the court after having spent over 25 years with the City Attorney’s Office.
The graduate of the University of Norte Dame and Loyola Law School was admitted to the State Bar in 1980 and made an unsuccessful bid for a seat on the State Bar Board of Governors in 2002.
A founding member of what is now the Lesbian and Gay Lawyers Association of Los Angeles, St. George has been a longtime champion of gay rights.
LACBA Trustee and former delegation chair Duncan W. Crabtree-Ireland opined that the ability for openly gay lawyers to be “out” was due to St. George’s ability to “step up and be out….way before it was cool to be a gay activist.”
St. George remarked that “it was a different world” when he first launched his efforts to secure and increase protections for homosexuals but that it was “love at first resolution” when he joined the conference, and he was “truly honored and humbled” to be recognized.
Copyright 2009, Metropolitan News Company