Why Marc Vetri and I Despise Restaurant Week

It’s the waning days of January, which means winter doldrums (notwithstanding this year’s weak snowfall) and Center City Restaurant Week, which started this week and extends through next week. Predictably, I’ve been hearing a lot of buzzing about it. (Except for a friend who complained that its participant list has fewer high-end restaurants. I’m not sure that’s empirically true, but there are plenty of superlative-worthy big names anyway, from José Garces’s Amada to Georges Perrier’s Le Bec Fin to Michael Solomonov’s Zahav). Well, I’m not buzzing. In fact, the last thing I generally want to do during any restaurant week is eat out.

I would tell you why, except that the inimitable Marc Vetri—Mario Batali’s favorite Italian chef and a budding restaurant empire builder—has made my point as well as it can be made, in a rant on his Facebook page. 

An Elegy for JoePa

Kahlil Williams is a 2001 Penn State graduate. He has previously posted on the practice of striking lawyers from venire pools during jury selection and on the public reaction to the executions of Troy Davis and Lawrence Brewer.

I vividly remember the day I decided to attend Penn State. I’d been eight for less than a month when the Nittany Lions played Miami for the national title in 1987, a game that has been described alternatively as the “Game of the Century,” and “The Night College Football Went to Hell.” As much as the drama of the game, the experience stood out because my mother (Class of ’73) considered it totally acceptable to jump on the couch and pound on the coffee table—maybe hell had frozen over?–in order to force Vinny Testaverde to throw a pick. Sure enough, we forced five, and Penn State won 14-10, giving us our second championship in four years. I would have signed my admission letter that evening, but my penmanship needed work, and, thus, I waited a full decade to enroll.

In 1987, Joe Paterno had been the head coach at PSU for 20 years, and some thought that game might be his last. With that presumption, Penn Staters have been forced to contemplate what things would be like without JoePa. And despite the fact that we’ve been bracing ourselves for the inevitable for more than a generation, today, it’s still utterly unthinkable: Joe is gone. We’ve lost our coach, our leader, our mentor. We’ve lost family.

YLD Annual Meeting Attracts More Than 300 Young Attorneys

Connections were made and contributions lauded as more than 300 young attorneys gathered on Wednesday, Jan. 18 for the YLD Annual Meeting and Welcome Reception for New Members at The Ritz-Carlton Philadelphia.

After some meeting and mingling 2011 YLD Chair Carey Chopko called the meeting to order, spoke about the accomplishments of the past year and thanked the 2011 Executive Committee before ceremoniously passing the gavel 2012 Chair Melanie Taylor.

2012 Chair Melanie Taylor Presents 2011 Chair Carey Chopko with a plaque

Taylor spoke briefly about her agenda for 2012 and then called several awardees to the stage for recognition. This year’s honorees were Albertine Y. DuFrayne, Esq. of Sacks Weston & Petrelli, the winner of the Craig M. Perry Service Award; Paul Kaufman, Esq. of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the recipient of the F. Sean Peretta Service Award; and the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office, which received the YLD Vision Award.

Albertine Y. DuFrayne, Esq. of Sacks Weston & Petrelli, the winner of the Craig M. Perry Service Award

Paul Kaufman, Esq. of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the recipient of the F. Sean Peretta Service Award

Philadelphia District Attorney R. Seth Williams was on hand to accept the Vision Award on behalf of the men and women of the DA’s office. He spoke about how everyone can fight crime and encouraged the attorneys in attendance to mentor a young person.

Philadelphia District Attorney R. Seth Williams accepts the Vision Award on behalf of the men and women of the DA’s office

The evening concluded with more time for networking as YLD members started the year renewing friendships and making new connections.

Philadelphia Garners National Attention for MLK Day Service

Philadelphia once again gained national recognition this year as the leader in promoting service on MLK Day. Although the day became a federal holiday in 1983, under President Ronald Reagan, it was made a day of service—a day “on,” not off—in 1994, under President Bill Clinton. In the nearly 20 years since, Philadelphia’s tradition has grown to attract nearly 100,000 volunteers per year. In recognition of Philadelphia’s leadership role (and Pennsylvania’s crucial swing-state status), Vice President Biden visited and spoke at Girard College, on the northern edge of Fairmount. President Obama, meanwhile, did some painting at a middle school cafeteria in Washington, DC.

New Years Resolution – Find some time to get disconnected

We live in a connected world. The internet, cell phones, the digital age can be a wonderful thing. As a guy with an engineering background, its been especially fun for me to watch. From virtually any location in the world with wi-fi or cellular, we can reach any other corner of the world with a simple click. I can exchange news stories, pictures, movies and music with my friends and family.

The practice of law has been profoundly effected by the internet age as well. Documents and letters from clients that used to take days to deliver can now be sent-recalled-and sent again in mere seconds.

When I finished undergrad and started work, a couple of people at my company knew my number and could email me. But for the most part, when I went home, I was on my own time. When I finished law school, I knew that would not necessarily be the case.

Like many people I’m sure, I have a smartphone, I have a laptop, etc. etc. I sleep with my phone next to my bed, sometimes I’m  woken up by the buzzing or beeping sound of the smartphone .  My phone is my alarm clock, so it’s the first thing I see when I wake up. I can’t help but notice the icon at the top that lets me know I have emails waiting.  Heck, sometimes when I’m waiting in line I’ll even check facebook or play angry birds or something.

I think this year I’d like to spend downtime NOT looking at an electronic device. And it looks like the tourist industry is seeing this as a trend too. Check out the recent times article below “The Joy of Quiet”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/opinion/sunday/the-joy-of-quiet.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&sq=Pico%20Iyer&st=cse&scp=2

The Latest Wave of Cynical Electoral Machinations

The presidential campaign season just kicked into high gear last night with the quadrennial ritual of Iowa’s inscrutable primary caucuses. Getting somewhat less attention is the unfortunate (but typical) election-time legal maneuvering now in full swing: gerrymandering and passage of partisan election laws. Both parties are guilty of these tactics, but in Pennsylvania Republicans are currently driving the bus, due to their control of the governor’s mansion and both houses of the Assembly.

Map of New 7th Congressional District in Southeastern Pennsylvania. Created by Daniel McGlone of Azavea.

Crafting congressional district boundaries to promote favorable election results is old hat, but some boundary redraws stick out  more than others. The Philly suburbs just got a doozy last month. The 7th congressional district is now the eighth least compact in the nation. It stretches from the Delaware border northwest past Reading, northeast past Lansdale and west almost to Harrisburg, with a tiny middle portion only 800 feet wide. If incumbent Pat Meehan wins the privilege of representing this sprawling district in November, it may well be thanks to the redraw, which shifted the district majority from slightly Democrat majority to slightly Republican.

Also on the Pennsylvania Assembly’s agenda is a bill to require photo i.d. at the polls.

Building a Solo Practice: The Power of Yelp

This is the third post in a series on solo and small firm marketing by guest blogger Douglas Greenberg, a successful tax solo based in San Francisco, CA. The first was an intro to the subject and the second examined the promotional power of a legal niche.

In his seminal guide on solo practice, Jay Foonberg predicted that the Internet would change everything about the way consumers shopped for goods and services.  And in his opinion, the practice of law was no exception.  Today, Foonberg’s vision seems to be materializing more each day.  Consumers size up lawyers not just by their artwork and furniture but also by their online reviews at sites like Yelp.com.  Indeed, for some potential clients, searching for an attorney may be just like searching for a restaurant: pick up an iPhone and start perusing reviews (perhaps with Siri as a guide [Ed. note: at least as long as you speak without a Southern or British accent]). In fact, Yelp is one of the three main ways that clients come to me (I’ll leave the other two to future posts).

When I first began my practice, I was ambivalent about having a Yelp presence.  On one hand, I knew it was a great (and low-cost) way to gain much-needed exposure.  On the other, I feared it because it was entirely outside of my control.

Emerging Philadelphia Restaurant Empires, Large and Small

Some of Philly’s big name restauranteurs, led by the ubiquitous Stephen Starr and Iron Chef Jose Garces, have already have expanded their culinary reach beyond Philadelphia. For example, New Yorkers have made hits of the NYC incarnations of Morimoto and Buddakan and Garces has a foothold in his hometown of Chicago. But neither is stopping there, with Chef Garces setting up shop out on the West Coast and in Atlantic City and Starr heading into the nation’s capital. Meanwhile, other Philly food luminaries are getting into the mix: maestro Marc Vetri is heading to Jersey, Hiroyuki Tanaka of Zama is going to Miami, and high-end Philly java purveyor La Colombe is hitting the Windy City.

Photo courtesy of uwishunu.com

On the other end of the food snobbery spectrum (although Garces has managed to straddle it with Guapo’s Tacos) are another source of Philly gastronomic pride—food trucks.

PhiLAWdelphia Greatest Hits: Choosing Gifts for Support Staff

From time to time, PhiLAWdelphia will be reaching into the vault to dust off some of its greatest hits over the years. Just in time for the holiday rush, we bring you a holiday season essential–“Shopping For Your Secretary,” by John Encarnacion, a former YLD cabinet member.  And, while you’re at it, consider shopping for a few other people with whom a friendly, respectful relationship can pay big dividends.

Photo courtesy of The In Vivo Blog

It’s a difficult question that most of us face annually at work this time of year.  No, not how many more hours do you need to bill the rest of the year to make your quota.  Rather, what do you get your secretary (and other support staff) for the holidays?

There’s never an easy answer or even basic guideline that applies to all.  Each person’s secretarial situation is different.  Some attorneys have two secretaries who work part time.  Others have a secretary in name only and must do most of their work themselves.

I have run the gamut at my firm in terms of secretarial situations, starting off with two secretaries, then having secretaries who felt pressured to do the work of the sharing senior attorney, to having a part time secretary who worked four days a week, to finally having a full time secretary for the past four and a half years.  It’s been rather a pleasure to have a secretary who is extremely competent and helps me get my work done properly.  In speaking to some friends, I know that others are not quite as fortunate.  As such, I always have to make sure that the holiday present properly reflects my gratitude.

So here are my own personal guidelines I’ve used in terms of secretarial and support staff gifts:

Law Schools Finally Responding to Down Economy, Starting to Help Students Prepare for Solo Practice

I’ve commented previously on the nationwide lawyer surplus. One effect it has had is to make small beautiful. Partners from big law firms have left to go small. A lot of young lawyers, without many appealing employment opportunities— especially because entry-level law jobs are the hardest to get and many young lawyers don’t job hunt effectively—have begun to go solo. Some of those young lawyers are going small or solo after leaving big firms. Some have been laid off, some are exiting because making partner has become a rarity; others might have been inclined towards solo practice before have been encouraged by the current trend towards smaller, nimbler and cheaper. Of course, we’ve been on top of this, featuring advice from successful solos Doug Greenberg and Evan Aidman (and both have new posts coming soon).

Christopher Columbus Langdell, dean of Harvard Law School in the late 19th century, pioneered the case method as a means of elevating the scholarly profile of legal academia. Although it does little to prepare attorneys for the practical aspects of lawyering, it still predominates in law school curricula.

Law schools have been slow to react, but some are adapting to the new realities of the legal profession. In just the last few years, a handful of law schools have begun to ramp up their efforts to support students in preparing for solo practice, with strong encouragement from the ABA, whose powerful accreditation committee has shown a little life lately. CUNY, the first to establish a “solo practice incubator,” has an explicit public service mission and a history of churning out community-oriented attorneys. Georgetown, with its pre-eminent clinical program and Jesuit ethos, has long maintained a stand-alone public interest career office, but now has added career support for young solos, including a solo practice blog. Other law schools making moves in this area include several state schools as well as some lesser known private schools that may be fighting for relevancy or even their very survival. Whatever the case, it’s an encouraging trend—even if a distressingly slow-moving one—in legal education.