Thursday, June 23, 2016
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LACBA Approves Appointments to Executive Posts
Stevens Defends Decision to Name Two Losing Candidates to Positions
By a MetNews Staff Writer
The Los Angeles County Bar Association’s incoming president has made several appointments to executive positions, naming two candidates who lost in this month’s elections as assistant vice presidents.
Current trustees voted Tuesday night, with one dissenting vote, to approve Margaret Stevens’ selections of Duncan Crabtree-Ireland as treasurer and Sarah Luppen Fowler, Annaluisa Padilla, and Roxanne Wilson as assistant vice presidents.
Padilla was the Nominating Committee’s choice for vice president, losing to Tamila Jensen by a vote of 1,180 to 535. Jensen was nominated by member petition and was backed by the Council of Sections.
Wilson was a Nominating Committee choice for one of three trustee positions representing members of sections. She finished fourth with 698 votes, behind third-place finisher William Winslow with 1,205.
John Carson, who helms the Council of Sections, yesterday provided the MetNews with a copy of an email he had sent to other supporters of the successful “reform” slate backed by the council.
Carson said in the email that he found the appointments “very troubling” because “[t]he appointees are all insiders, and you can guess where their loyalty will lie.” The board’s approval suggests “[t]he rollover trustees will presumably be of the same mind as they were last year.”
The appointments, he said, reflect “no concession to or realization of the overwhelming vote against Central or to our mandate.”
He also said, however, that he “would like to believe that they are all well intentioned and willing to open up the doors of Central.”
Stevens defended the appointments, telling the MetNews she respects all who volunteer for LACBA work, regardless of their viewpoints on how business was conducted in the past.
“We’ve got a really talented group of people,” she said. “…The election is over. I think we’re all committed to rolling up our sleeves and [will] consider what s best for the association …I think we’re going to be in agreement on 90 percent of what comes before the board.”
She added that she has other appointments remaining to be made.
Nowland Hong, the incoming chair of the Senior Lawyers Section and a leading supporter of the council-backed slate, said he was “more than a little surprised” at the appointments, but pronounced himself “cautiously optimistic” the appointees “will take into consideration the concerns that the new officers and trustees have expressed.”
Stevens, the current president-elect, becomes president of LACBA July 1, the same day newly elected officers and trustees take office.
Copyright 2016, Metropolitan News Company