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Oral History of Katherine Mazzaferri
This interview is being conducted on behalf of the Oral History Project of The Historical
Society of the District of Columbia Circuit. The interviewer is Annamaria Steward, and the
interviewee is CEO Emeritus of the D.C. Bar Katherine Mazzaferri. The interview took place on
Tuesday, August 29, 2023. This is the eighth chapter.
MS. STEWARD: We are on the Leadership Development and Leadership Academy part of
Katherine Mazzaferri’s oral history. Katherine, tell me about the creation
of one of the signature programs of the Bar, the Leadership Development
Committee.
MS. MAZZAFERRI: Before Kim Keenan became president in 2009-2010, she mentioned that
she was interested in leadership, and I was so excited because Cynthia Hill
and I had been talking about leadership for a long time. Along with Lalla
Shishkevish, then-CLE director, we had gathered information about
leadership institutes that other bars were doing. We had done some
leadership training for the Bar staff already, so we were primed to take this
leap for Bar members. We were hopeful that after talking to the Board of
Governors, we could actually have a leadership academy, but first things
first.
In November of 2009 we created a task force to study how the Bar
should approach leadership, how we could promote leadership. That task
force recommended a standing committee on leadership, and I knew that
would be key for continuity — to have a committee that would always be
there keeping an eye on this important issue.
That committee not only would develop the leadership academy,
but it also would identify ways to recruit volunteers, to train the Board, to
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train committee members and to work with Section leaders (now
Communities leaders), because everybody benefits from understanding
about leadership. You don’t train as a lawyer and instantly know how to
be a leader.
In June of each year, we held a meeting of the past presidents to
talk to them about what the Bar was doing and to ask their input. That was
one of John Payton’s ideas. I believe it was at a meeting in 2009 that one
of our past presidents, Philip Lacovara, asked me, innocently, whether
there was anything he could do for the Bar, and I knew there was! I asked
him if he would be chair of the Leadership Development Task Force.
Philip had been a general counsel of the Bar, and he had been a past
president, so he knew the Bar well. I knew that he was a superb and
admired lawyer and having him in that role was to me just the icing on the
cake.
We asked Eileen Sobeck to be vice chair. Eileen had been chair of
the Sections Council, had been on the Board, and was a government
lawyer. I thought it was important to have a government lawyer in the
leadership of that task force because I believed it would say to our many
government lawyer members that we valued them and that they too could
benefit from training and leadership opportunities.
So, the Board created a Leadership Development Committee in
June of 2010, and the initial appointments happened in July. Philip was the
first chair, Eileen was the vice chair, and the committee submitted its
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report to the Board in 2012. The committee developed plans for a
leadership academy to identify and train leaders. Committee members
developed orientation modules and templates for members of the Bar’s
committees and for Section leaders, kind of the whole range of issues. So
that was our first round.
MS. STEWARD: After the task force was created and the committee was launched, what
happened next?
MS. MAZZAFERRI: The very first meeting of the potential leaders subcommittee of the
Leadership Development Committee was held on May 18, 2011. It was a
daunting task to decide what to teach, to create a curriculum, to find
faculty, and to decide how to recruit people to participate in the academy.
As the chair of the subcommittee, Annamaria Steward was up to the task.
She had a wonderful staff person from the Programs Division, Rebecca
Gilliam, who, in addition to being an attorney, had a background in
education. Rebecca and Annamaria made a terrific team.
We decided to build a requirement into the Leadership Academy
for pro bono service because pro bono is fundamentally important to the
D.C Bar. On the Saturday morning of the training, each Leadership
Academy class member was expected to participate in the Pro Bono
Center’s Advice and Referral Clinic. This reflected good leadership by our
new potential leaders in providing pro bono service.
One of the most exciting meetings for me during this long process
was the meeting at which we reviewed potential leaders for the very first
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academy class. Annamaria was at her best. She had reviewed the
applications carefully. I almost felt like she knew all these people. She
described them in such detail and depth and analyzed their potential. The
other members of the subcommittee, of course, also were well prepared,
but she led this meeting. The result of the subcommittee’s diligent work
was a class that represented a very good cross section of our membership.
The table was set, and on March 1, 2013, the first class of the Leadership
Academy was launched.
It was wonderful to have as Bar president that year Tom
Williamson, one of our very fine leaders. He opened that first session of
the Academy. Of course, Kim Keenan was the luncheon speaker to the
first class, which was so fitting. And for many years, Jim Sandman,
another of our stellar past Bar presidents, gave a very eloquent
presentation on the importance of civility in the legal profession. It was a
very important, inspiring, and overwhelmingly popular component of the
Leadership Academy.
Annamaria also was one of the speakers for that first class. I had
finally recruited her to be on the Board of Governors. She had been
secretary of the Bar in 2005, but when I asked her after that service to run
for the Board, she said she wasn’t ready yet. She wanted to get some more
experience. So, she became president of the Bar Association of D.C. in
2010. I kept calling her, and, finally, she ran for, and was serving on the
Board when the Leadership Academy was launched.
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MS. STEWARD: In addition to the Leadership Academy as an annual program, there also
was the Judicial and Bar Conference. Can you talk about the continuing
relationship that the Bar had with the judiciary?
MS. MAZZAFERRI: Before 2002, the Bar held an annual winter convention, and the D.C.
Court of Appeals, as required by statute, convened a Judicial Conference
in June of every year. At the request of the Court, the judiciary and the Bar
began holding a joint Judicial and Bar Conference beginning in 2002,
which also marked the Bar’s 30th anniversary. The theme of this first
J&B, as we called it, was Law, Liberty, and Justice after September 11. In
what became a really dynamic collaboration, this joint conference was
held in even-numbered years through 2012, with the stand-alone
conferences continuing in odd numbered years. But in 2013, the timing of
the joint conferences changed to odd numbered years after the D.C. Court
of Appeals obtained a legislative amendment eliminating the requirement
that judicial conferences be conducted annually.
We were really very fortunate to have such a close relationship
with our court, the D.C. Court of Appeals. Those judges worked hard.
They worked with the Bar on all sorts of projects. We made
recommendations for rule changes. We had this joint conference. We
consulted with the Court about all sorts of issues. I always felt that we
were very lucky, very special. When I talked with colleagues around the
country about their relationships with their courts, it was clear that ours
was very different. Ours was very collaborative and productive. Let me
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put it that way: I think it was a real plus for the Bar and the membership
and I hope for the Courts.
MS. STEWARD: In addition to these relationships that were created with various arms of
the legal profession in the District of Columbia, you were also successful
in getting the new headquarters for the D.C. Bar. Can you talk about the
process for getting the Bar headquarters and why you and the Bar
leadership decided it was important?
MS. MAZZAFERRI: When I came to the Bar in 1982, the Bar was in the Woodward building
on 15th Street NW. Because we needed more space and a different kind of
space, we moved several times. Actually, three different times, to L Street
Northwest, to H Street Northwest, and then to K Street Northwest. And
each time we made improvements I thought about the type of space we
had and the use we made of it.
But when we made the move in 2009 to K Street, I was surprised
by how the market had changed. It was a less friendly market for tenants.
The building owners and managements in those days were providing less
money for buildouts, and we were at the end of our dues ceiling, so we
didn’t have a lot of headroom to pay for buildouts. We were able to get a
line of credit with our bank and we managed to make it all work.
But after that move to K Street, I vowed that I never wanted the
Bar to be in that situation again where we didn’t have quite enough money
to do all the important things we needed to do with our space. So, I asked
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the Bar’s Finance Committee, and then the Board of Governors, to set
aside a building fund of about $500,000 each year.
At that point I wasn’t clear in my own head what use we would
make of that money, but I thought it was important to have a fund,
whether we were going to lease a new space in some number of years or
whether we were going to purchase. I wasn’t sure, but I did know that
having the security of funding for whatever purpose the Board decided
was necessary was an important step.
So, we did that. We set aside that money beginning in 2009. And
then in March of 2014, the staff began to explore whether it made sense to
own a building. At that point, Victor Velasquez was the Assistant
Executive Director for Administration and Finance. He was a central
player on the business side of the Bar’s purchasing land and constructing a
building. We gathered relevant consultants, and we consulted with the
Finance Committee. The Bar could potentially save millions of dollars for
the future by purchasing.
Board members had many, many good questions about this
potential action. They considered the issues over several meetings in 2015.
We had three presidents involved in the building project. First, Brigid
Benitez, then Tim Webster, and then Annamaria Steward. All of them
played active roles in the Bar’s undertaking to purchase land and to
construct a building.
MS. STEWARD: All right. That ends this session.