Friday, June 28, 2002
Page 4
Krinsky Installed as LACBA President, Urges Lawyers to ‘Serve Community’
By NAZANIN AGANGE, Staff Writer
New Los Angeles County Bar Association President Miriam Krinsky urged lawyers to “endeavor to make a difference.”
The annual installation dinner Wednesday night took on the theme of commitment to service, with Krinsky calling outgoing LACBA President Roland Coleman an inspiration “to do better and to try harder to serve our community” and new LACBA Barristers President Elizabeth Calciano recounting, in detail, the commitment of her group to children, abuse victims, and low-income people.
Krinsky and other executive members of the County Bar for 2002-2003 were sworn in by U.S. District Judge Lourdes Baird of the Central District of California.
After being formally sworn in, Krinsky championed the cause of community service with the story of a grandfather who questions his grandchild’s attempts to save stranded starfish as they stroll along the shoreline. The child’s response to his grandfather’s objection that “there are thousands of miles of shoreline and millions of starfish ... [you] can’t make a difference,” was to say that he makes a difference for each individual starfish.
“I urge all of you to look out and find a single stranded starfish to embrace and save,” Krinsky said. “It may not change the landscape, but it will make a difference for that one life.”
Krinsky also outlined programs she planned for the coming year, which is also the 125th anniversary of the County Bar.
As part of a reflection on County Bar “history, our accomplishments and some things we have yet to fulfill,” Krinsky introduced what she jokingly called “the propaganda you’ll find at your table.”
Among the plans are a six-part program to acquaint young lawyers with “icons of the legal community,” the reinstated “Bridges to the Future” mentorship program to support foster children “aging out” of the foster system, and a series of dialogues between high school students and community leaders.
Former presidential candidate and U.S. Sen. George McGovern, D-S.D., the evening’s keynote speaker, also touched upon the idea of serving the less fortunate. McGovern, the global ambassador on hunger for the United Nations World Food Programme, reminded the banquet hall that hunger is a solvable problem at reasonable cost.
McGovern said the world can gain from eliminating hunger “in ways we can scarcely imagine,” and attributed the outpouring against the United States to hunger and poverty that persists throughout half the world.
The dinner was attended by 750 people, the most in at least the last decade. Proceeds, which have yet to be calculated, will go to Los Angeles County Bar Association Dispute Resolution Services, Inc. and Los Angeles County Bar Association Projects Inc., both non-profit corporation.
Copyright 2002, Metropolitan News Company