BARRISTER - Miami

BARRISTER Alumni NewspaperFall 1999Loyalty, Challenge,Potential BringNew Dean to UM LawIn early August, soon after he officiallybecame UM Law’s dean, Dennis Lynchtalked with The Barrister about his decision to accept the position and abouthis expectations for the Law School.Barrister: Why did you decide toaccept the University of MiamiSchool of Law’s offer to return asdean?Lynch: There were a number ofreasons.On a personal level, the Universityof Miami is the school that gave methe opportunity to be a legal scholarand educator. It was very good to meand gave me plenty of support, bothprofessional and personal. It is an institution for which I have a lot ofprofessional loyalty, so the opportunity to come back and lead the schoolis very gratifying.Moreover, it’s exciting to lead aschool with such potential. We haveone of the most pro ductive andscholarly law faculties in the country, and we’re located in the mostdynamic, international city in theU.S. The faculty, the city, a stronglegal community, a carefully selected and culturally diverse studentbo dy, a superb library—they’re allhere. The potential has never beenfully realized, which presents uswith a wonderful opportunity.Barrister: How do you think thatpotential can be realized?Lynch: We need to build on thequality of our educational programs—get the message out to the local andnational bars of just how goo d theyare.We should make more use of a variety of ways for presenting ormarketing our message to potentialstudents, as well as to members of thelegal and international communities.These will include not just brochures,media releases, and other written materials, but also more face-to-facemeetings.Barrister: Do alumni play a majorrole in your plans?Lynch: Absolutely. Alumni are ourambassadors to the world—to potential students, to the legal community,to other alumni. It’s very importantthat we keep them informed, involved with students, and proud oftheir school.Barrister: It may be too early in yourtenure to be asking this question, buthow healthy do you think the LawSchool’s relationship is with itsalumni at this time?Lynch: In terms of financial support,it’s obvious that we’re not at the levelwe need to be. Private law schoolsthat are reaching their potential arereceiving greater financial supportfrom their alumni.However, we do have good supportfrom our alumni in terms of involvement in school activities. They areinvolved with our students in a number of ways, such as mentoring,2participating with moot court activities, and helping students find jobs. Weneed to take even more advantage oftheir eagerness to be involved in thoseways.Also, we need our alumni to haveconfidence in our educational mission.It is important that they understandhow much our faculty cares about educating students. Alumni should takepride in the quality of our faculty andtheir commitment to teaching.Alumni have strong views. Theycare about the school, and we must listen to them and to the rest of the legalcommunity and take their suggestionsto heart. What our alumni have to sayis very important. The fact that ouralumni population is so large—approximately 14,000 altogether—andsuccessful is a real asset for us.Barrister: What do you think areother strong assets of UM Law?Lynch: The most obvious is our faculty. We have one of the top facultiesin the country, as measured by the volume of their publishing and thefrequency with which their articles andbooks are cited by others. The facultyhas an incredible range of interests andexpertise, and they are especiallystrong in the areas of international lawand social justice. Moreover, they arean excellent teaching faculty.Our distinctiveness is a major asset,particularly in regard to our multicultural location, student-body, and faculty. This is the place to come to studytransnational law, and we are one ofthe main educators of bilingual lawgraduates. Moreover, not only are weat the main point of contact betweenthe U.S. and Latin America, our SouthFlorida location also brings us considerable legal interaction with Europe.Barrister: What are the primarychallenges facing the Law School?Lynch: At this point, the most imminent challenges are probablyfinancial—taking the School throughthis period of student body downsizing,with its accompanying drop in revenuefrom tuition. It is crucial that we beable to maintain a good studentfaculty ratio to ensure that studentscan have the interaction they needwith faculty members.We need to generate strong financial support from sources other thantuition to maintain and build on thestrength of our programs. This requiresconvincing alumni and other membersof the legal and business communitiesof the importance of our goals.Other challenges are to take greateradvantage of our faculty’s wide-ranging legal expertise and to ensure thatour students and graduates have excellent job opportunities.The challenges are significant, butthey pale in comparison to our potential. As the world moves rapidlytoward a truly global economy, we arein a far better position than most lawschools in our ability to capitalize onthat evolution.Volume LIINumber 2Former UM Law DeanMary Doyle AcceptsInterior Department PostWASHINGTON, D.C.–Secretary ofthe Interior Bruce Babbitt has announced the appointment of UM LawProfessor Mary Doyle as Counselor tothe Secretary, a position recently vacated by David Hayes, who is nowActing Deputy Secretary of the Interior.Doyle, who is on leave from her position as tenured professor of law, was deanof the Law School in 1986–94 andserved as interim dean in 1998–99.“I am delighted that someone with thetalent and legal stature of Mary Doylehas agreed to serve in the importantposition of Counselor to the Secretary,”Secretary Babbitt said.“It requires a person with a proventrack record and great commitment tothe vital issues and mission of the Department of the Interior . Mary hasshown this high level of dedication tothe environment for many decades andhas made a sizeable contributionthroughout her distinguished career.”Most recently, Doyle has specializedin research on the legal, political andscientific issues surrounding the restoration of the Everglades ecosystem inSouth Florida. Following her initialser vice as dean of the School of Law,she took a leave of absence to be deanin-residence at the Association ofAmerican Law Schools in Washington,D.C. for one year . Her expertise involved legal education and thedevelopment of an environmental lawcurriculum in Russia and the Ukraine.During the 1980s, Doyle served as aprofessor of law at the University ofArizona College of Law, specializing inwater, land use, local government andproperty law and subsequently served asboth a professor of law and the associate dean for academic affairs.From 1979 until 1981, she served asan attorney at the Department of Energy, as associate general counsel, thendeputy general counsel at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.Doyle is a graduate of Radcliffe College and attended Boston Law Schooland Columbia Law School, where shereceived her law degree. While attending Boston College Law School, she waselected to the Boston College LawR eview.sucimAeairuC1980–99 YearbooksAvailableThe Amicus Curiae office has a limited supply of unclaimed copies of theLaw School’s yearbook, dating back to 1980.While they last, any alumnus who never received a complimentary copyfor his or her 3L year can get one by contacting editor-in-chief CatherineThan at ct2653@law.miami.edu or executive editor Kira Willig at kw4214@law.miami.edu, or by calling the Amicus Curiae office at (305) 284-1860.Yearbooks for other years are available at 10 per copy.FALL 1999 AL U M N I NEWSP APER V OLUME LII NUMBER 2BARRISTERDEAN Dennis O. LynchASSO CIATE DEAN Richard L. Williamson, Jr.ASSISTANT DEAN, ALUMNI & DEVELOPMENT Stephen K. HalpertASSO CIATE DEAN OF STUDENTS William VanderWydenPRESIDENT, LAW ALUMNI ASSOCIATION Det H. JoksDIRECTO R, LAW PUBLICATIONS & COMMUNICATIONS John BurchDIRECTO R, LAW ALUMNI RELATIONS Cynthia SikorskiBARRISTER is published by the Office of Law Development and Alumni Relations of the University of Miami School of Law. Address correspondence to Barrister, School of Law, University of Miami,P.O. Box 248087, Coral Gables, Florida 33124-8087. Telephone: 305-284-3470. E-Mail:alumni@law.miami.edu, Web site: www.law.miami.edu. Copyright 1999 University of Miami School ofLaw. All rights reserved.www.law.miami.edu.

BARRISTER Alumni NewspaperFall 1999Volume LIINumber 2As Florida Bar President,Osman Aims to Improve Lawyers’ ImageAs the new president of the Florida BarAssociation, Edith Osman, Class of1983, is a woman with a mission: to protect the nation’s legal system by helpingrestore what it needs most to survive—the confidence of the people.“Our legal system survives only because the people let it. If we lose theconfidence of our citizens, we run therisk that lawlessness and self-help willslowly erode the rule of law,” shewarned.In a speech to UM Law’s first-year students during orientation in August,Osman pointed out that “our professionhas faced much ridicule in last two decades. The Florida Bar is working veryhard on many fronts to re-educate thepublic about who lawyers are and whatwe are committed to, and to restore toour profession the respect it deserves.”Osman was installed as president ofthe 65,325-member bar in June, afterserving a year as president-elect. She isthe second woman to hold the position.(The first was Patricia Seitz in 1993.)“As attorneys, we are the guardiansof the laws that define our society,” shesaid at her swearing-in ceremony. “But,conventional wisdom tells us that, in theeyes of the public, we have gone frombeing a source of pride to a source ofpunch lines.”According to Osman, surveys showthat 80 percent of the public perceivesthe U.S. legal system to be the best inthe world. Furthermore, she said, thepeople who claim to dislike lawyers mosthave had the least contact with the legal system. “Put another way,” she said,those who know us best, like us best,and for good reason.”In 1998, she said, Florida’s lawyerscontributed nearly one million hours inpro bono work and nearly 2 million inlegal aid funding. In addition, nearly15,000 Florida lawyers provided morethan 1.5 million hours to local boards,schools, churches, synagogues, charities,civic groups and other organizations.“Do you know another profession thathas shown that kind of community commitment,” she asked. “I don’t. I alsodon’t know of another profession thatmore effectively speaks for those whocannot speak for themselves. . . .Wemust let the public know it.“Studies find that the key to turningaround destructive cynicism lies ineducation—encouraging a better understanding of both the system and thepeople who toil in it. We need to bridgethis information gap with the truthabout our profession.”Osman said implementation of acommunications program developedby the Florida Bar’s board of governorsover the past two years is one of her toppriorities. The program centers on anew theme and logo: “The FloridaBar: Protecting Rights, Pursuing Justice, Promoting Professionalism.” Thewords will appear on all Bar materials,letterhead, and brochures and on radioand television announcements.A second major educational goal isto expand the Bar’s professionalism initiative. “We must acknowledge andrespect the diversity within our community,” she emphasized. “We mustrecognize that fundamental fairness isat the core of our judicial system, andwe must treat all people with courtesyand respect.”A third educational tool is the creation of media teams of local lawyers,who will write op-ed pieces for theirhometown newspapers and respond toletters to the editor. Team members alsowill sit down with editors and broadcasters to discuss coverage of legal issues.Moreover, the nearly 800 lawyers whohave volunteered for the Bar’s speakersbureau also will help carry the messageto civic groups and into the publicschools.Another important Bar initiative isthe recently-established Commission onthe Legal Needs of Children, which willstudy how the justice system treats children. Chaired by Circuit Judge SandyKarlan, the commission has 28 members, including Bernard Perlmutter,director of UM Law’s Children andYouth Law Clinic.Asked what issues the Florida Bar willbe dealing with this year, Osman replied,“The multi-disciplinary practice question is the biggest issue on the horizon.The ABA has proposed a rule changeto allow professionals to share fees withnon-lawyers (such as accounting firms).This raises some ethics questions andcould have a major effect on the waywe practice law. The Florida Bar hasproposed keeping the status quo untilthe issue has been more fully explored.We have a committee in place to studythe issue before deciding whether to support the ABA’s proposal or any otherpotential rule change.”A shareholder of Carlton, Fields,Ward, Emmanuel, Smith & Cutler, P.A.,Osman practices commercial litigationand family law in the firm’s Miami office. She joined the firm in 1998, afterrunning her own practice for five years.Edith OsmanAsked whether her Bar activities preclude carrying a full caseload at her lawfirm, she said, “With speaking engagements, writing projects, meetings andgeneral Bar involvement, being president of the Bar is really a full-time job;however, with a lot of help from mypartners and associates, I’m also able tomaintain my practice.” She added thather workdays typically last 12–14 hours.However, long hours are nothing newfor her. She has been working doubletime for two decades, since the day sheentered UM Law as a full-time studentwith two small children.“I’ve been able to work like this because I love it,” she said. “I love the legalprofession—with its countless opportunities to do good—and I really likelawyers.”In her August 14 orientation remarks,she told 1Ls they were “blessed to beable to attend the University of MiamiSchool of Law. It’s a great learning institution, with a stellar faculty.”She urged students to not “let monetary considerations sway you. W orkfor justice, serve your clients, and follow your conscience, and the rewardswill come.”Four Other UM Law Alumni Have Headed Florida BarIn addition to Edith Osman, the current president of the Florida Bar Association, four other UM Law alumni have headed the organization, including:Burton Young, Class of 1950; Edward J. Atkins, ’51; H. Russell Troutman, ’58; and Samuel S. Smith, ’60.Burton YoungSamuel S. SmithA partner in the North MiamiBeach law firm Young, Berman &Karpf, Y oung was president of theFlorida Bar Association in 1970–71and served as president of the FloridaBar Foundation from 1975 to 1977.He also has chaired the 1977 ChiefJustice’s Advisory Committee of theFlorida Supreme Court, the FloridaSupreme Court’s Select Committee toStudy the Florida Board of Bar Examiners, and the Florida Bar’s Family LawRules Committee. In June 1985, anarticle in Town & Country magazineincluded him in its article on “TheBest Lawyers in the U.S.” Similarly,The Best Lawyers in America, 1993–94 , an annual reference guide pollinglawyers nationwide on the top practitioners in their field, named him oneof the best divorce and family lawyers.In 1998, at the Florida Bar’s annualmeeting, he was honored with theFlorida Bar Foundation Medal ofHonor for his service and dedicationto the public and for his administration of justice.President of the Florida Bar Association in 1981–82, Smith also waspresident of the Florida Bar Foundation in 1989 and secretary of theAmerican Bar Association from 1993–96. Prior to assuming the presidencyof the Florida Bar, he served on theassociation’s board of governors foreight years. A partner in the Miamilaw firm Ruden, Barnett, McClosky,Smith, Schuster & Russell, Smith wasa nationally known probate litigatorand law office management expert. Hewas instrumental in establishing DadeCounty’s model guardianship programand devoted countless hours of community service, usually benefitingprograms helping children. He alsoserved as an adjunct faculty memberat UM Law. Shortly before his deathfrom cancer early this year, the FloridaBar Foundation recognized his manycontributions when it bestowed uponhim its annual Medal of Honor, theFoundation’s highest award for serviceto the public and profession.Edward J. AtkinsH. Russell TroutmanPresident of the Florida Bar Association in 1976–77, Atkins had served asa member of the association’s board ofgovernors for the 10 preceding years. Hepresided over the Dade County BarAssociation in 1965–66 and was amember of the Federal and Americanbar associations as well as the International Association of InsuranceCounsel and the Judge Advocates Association. In 1978, he was presidentof the University of Miami’s LawAlumni Association. Atkins was associated with the Miami firm Walton,Lantaff, Schroeder & Carson. Nearlynine years after his death in 1979, hisson, Michael, died in an automobileaccident just before receiving his JDfrom UM Law.When Troutman was president of theFlorida Bar (1977–78), the AmericanBar Association conferred its Project Excellence Award upon the organizationfor its creation of the first interest ontrust account program for the fundingof legal services to the poor. In 1968–69, when he was president of the OrangeCounty Bar Association, the Florida BarAssociation named it the OutstandingLocal Bar Association. He also has beenon the board of governors of the FloridaBar and chaired the Florida SupremeCourt Nominating Commission. He isa founding partner of Troutman, Williams, Irvin, Green & Helms in WinterPark and Oviedo, Florida.www.law.miami.edu.3

BARRISTER Alumni NewspaperFall 1999Volume LIINumber 2Law Library’s Everglades Collection Is Rare,Valuable Resource(Continued from page 1)million pages of documents and a million frames of microfilm, along withseveral hundred megabytes of scientificdata, deposition transcripts and databaseinformation. Interspersed among formal legal documents such as pleadings,consent decrees, and hearing and deposition transcripts are maps, photographs,and reports, providing insight into thenature of the Everglades and its integral place in Florida’s history anddevelopment.One of nature’s unique and most varied ecosystems, the Everglades has beenrecognized worldwide for its hauntingbeauty. The largest federal wildernessarea in the east, Everglades NationalPark is also of international significance,having been designated as a World Biosphere Reserve in 1976, a WorldHeritage Site in 1979, and a Wetlandof International Importance. It is theonly wetland in the Western Hemisphere to receive these multipledesignations.Decades of governmental and privateintervention in the form of drainageprojects for flood control and agricultural development and increasedurbanization, however, have diminishedthe primeval everglades to half its size.Today the Everglades is one of thenation’s most fragile and threatened ecosystems. Human intervention in thiscentury has also disrupted the quality,timing, and path of the vital water flowing through its remnants.The collection’s materials come primarily from documents filed andproduced in a landmark civil action filedby the United States in 1988 and fromsubsequent litigation spawned by thatlawsuit, some of which continues to thisday. In the original lawsuit, the UnitedStates government sued the SouthFlorida Water Management District andthe State of Florida Department of Environmental Regulation, alleging thatthey had violated state water qualitylaws and contributed to the degradationof the Everglades National Park and theArthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge.The Everglades case spawned thousands of pleadings, hundreds ofdepositions, and over a million pages ofdocuments.After four years of bitter litigation, thecase was settled in 1992, when JudgeWilliam Hoeveler entered a settlementagreement between the federal and stateparties, recognizing the severe harm thePark and Refuge had suffered and wouldcontinue to suffer if remedial steps werenot taken. The agreement set out in4detail the steps the State of Floridawould take over the next 10 years torestore and preserve water quality in theEverglades. It was founded on theMarjorie Stoneman Douglas Act, Ch.91-80, Laws of Florida, developed withthe involvement and consent of agricultural interests.The settlement agreement, however,allowed affected non-signatories topur sue state administrative remedies.Agricultural interests filed several suchchallenges, alleging that they were substantially affected by the agreement’sremedial program, i.e., the final SWIM(Surface Water Improvement) Plan bythe district and DER. These SWIMchallenges were later consolidated intoone action, Cooperative vs. SFWMD,DOAH 92-3038. The United Statesintervened on the district’ s side.Thirty-six collateral lawsuits werefiled in different fora by the agriculturalcompanies.Settlement discussions between thedistrict, the United States, and the agricultural interests eventually led to newstate legislation, the Everglades ForeverAct, Fla. Statute 373.4592, which removed the underlying basis for theSWIM challenges, and most of the lawsuits were dropped. By 1994, the last ofthese actions was withdrawn.In August 1994, the United StatesCourt of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit affirmed the 1992 Consent Decreeand remanded the original federal lawsuit to district court for further consideration in light of the EvergladesForever Act (28 F.3rd 1563 (11th Cir.1994).New litigation, however, arose whenthe Miccosukee Tribe of Indians ofFlorida filed several lawsuits against thefederal and state governments over provisions of the Everglades Forever Act.Generally, the most frequent in-person users of the collection have beenUniversity of Miami undergraduate andlaw students. The Law Library is working with law faculty and faculty in otherUniversity departments to integrate thecollection’s contents into environmental and political science courses.Providing access to the collection’scontents through the internet has become a major focus of the Law Library’sgoal of reaching as wide an audience aspossible. The collection’s Web site debuted in April 1997 after a conferenceon Everglades litigation was held in theLaw Library. Since then the site hasbroadened the scope of its holdings onthe internet making available hundredsof pleadings and deposition and hear ing transcripts.Web site visitors tend to be morediverse than in-person visitors. A representative sample of site visitorswould include: law firms involved incomplex environmental actions, scientists seeking documents related toremote sensing and economic impactsof legislation, environmentalists, andgraduate students writing reports onEverglades hydrology. The site has gotten “hits” from as far away as Taiwan.While it may not be possible to putall of the collection’s materials online,staff members are identifying pleadings,depositions, hearings, exhibits, andother materials that will provide researchers and the general public withan understanding of the issues involvedin the long line of Everglades water quality litigation.Aside from presenting as much of thecollection’s contents online as possible,the staff intends to gather and makeavailable pleadings and other docu-ments from recent litigation, along withnew legislation and links to news articles. Researchers can request hardcopies of materials not available onlinebut listed in indices. Indices and bibliographic databases cover a largepercentage of the collection’s holdings.The Law Library’s goal is to preserveand make accessible a balanced representation of the issues and argumentsunderlying the positions of diverse interests in important battles over thestewardship and preservation of one ofnature’ s most unique and endangeredecosytems.Researchers can visit the collectionat http://www.law.miami.edu/library/everglades /. Anyone who prefers to review the collection in person, shouldcall 305-284-4093 at least 24 hours before he or she intends to visit.To communicate with curator AlbertoMontero-Valdes by e-mail, the addressis: amontero@law .miami.edu3 UM Law Alumni LeadFight to Save EvergladesFrom left: Maureen Donlan,Suzan Hill Ponzoli, and TomWatts-FitzgeraldThree assistant U.S. attorneys whograduated from the University ofM iami School of Law were leadersin the Everglades litigation.Suzan Hill Ponzoli, ’78, was thelead litigation attorney from 1988,when she and a team of attorneys, scientists, and resource managersdrafted the first complaint aimed atrestoring the Everglades, until 1994,when the litigation was settled in theFlorida Legislature through the Everglades Forever Act. She led a teamof U.S. Attorney’s Office (USAO)and Department of Justice lawyersthat included as many as eight attorneys at one point. The large-scaleefforts at restoration that are goingon today are a direct outgrowth ofthat long, difficult litigation.For her leadership, Ponzoli wasrecognized with numerous awards,including a 1994 Department ofJustice Director’s Award, a 1992 Everglades Coalition Public ServiceAward, a 1991 Florida Audubon Society Conservationist of the YearAward, and a 1989 Florida WildlifeFederation Award of Recognition.Currently, she is deputy chief of theUSAO’s Appellate Division.Tom Watts-FitzGerald, ’79, wasa key litigator in the Everglades dis-www.law.miami.edu.pute when the federal governmenthad already settled

BARRISTER 1 Dennis O. Lynch Is Law School's New Dean D ennis O. Lynch, professor and dean emeritus at the University of Denver College of Law and prominent expert on Latin American law, is the new dean of the University of Miami School of Law. He succeeds Mary Doyle, who had been interim dean since the May 1998 resignation of Samuel C .