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We Will Recover

As is their tradition, the Bars reach out.

By Monica Bay

	Bar Resources New York State Bar Assn. Phone: 877-HELP-321 The Assn. of the Bar of the City of New York Contact LRS: lrs@abcny.org Washington, D.C. Bar Assn. Phone: (202) 737-4700 LawNet Contact: rmayes@io.com Phone: (512) 280-7172

WITHIN hours of the Sept. 11, 2001 disaster, New York's attorneys and bar associations -- as is their tradition -- were collaborating to help distressed colleagues and the general public.

Frank Ciervo, associate director for media services for The New York State Bar Association, says the bar's top priority is to tend to the needs of the families of lawyers killed in the tragedy. Numbers are still very rough, but Bar officials estimate that 300 lawyers may have lost their lives; 1,300 displaced.

The state bar is working with its metropolitan sister, The Association of the Bar of the City of New York, as it has done in other disasters. Unfortunately, the third local bar, the New York County Lawyers Association, is now homeless. Located at 15 Vesey Street, its Web site announces that it "is closed for the immediate future."

Response Team

The N.Y. bars have had a mass disaster response team in place since 1996, when N.Y.C. mayor Rudolph Guiliani sought the bar's assistance after the TWA 800 crash, to provide basic legal services (and secondarily, to ward off vultures who might try to prey on vulnerable families). But the TWA crash pales in comparison to the September trauma. "This is new territory," says Ciervo sadly.

This time, Diane Burman, the N.Y. Bar's director of Pro Bono Services, is coordinating the efforts.

Sometimes, it's the routine, mundane things like helping with getting into bank accounts, that can be the most helpful, says Ciervo. To help the general public, the city bar's Lawyer Referral Service will handle queries from affected citizens, in the areas of insurance, trust-and-estate, and other issues; waiving its customary $25 fee. A toll-free number (1-877-HELP-321) and a Web site have been set up to help families with law-related questions.

Evan Davis, president of the city bar, says bar officials worked quickly with the governor's and mayor's offices to determine what statutes of limitations and other statutory time restrictions needed to be suspended. Governor George Pataki immediately signed an executive order extending deadlines for bringing suits and filing appeals for up