| Conference Program Description |
|
| The one-day conference format (plus reception) will be highly interactive, and allow participants to discuss best practices in providing municipal legal services and what resources they can share to reduce costs. |
| |
| Conference attendees will also be able to provide input to develop a universal case and contract management/legal resource sharing system to allow cities to leverage their joint knowledge to develop a customized system that addresses the unique needs of municipalities. |
| |
| Morning Keynote: Trend toward Shared Municipal Services |
|
| The first keynote speaker will speak on the trend among municipalities to reduce the costs of providing municipal services through a shared services model and through providing tools to increase productivity and efficiency. |
|
| Moderator: |
| Paul Moore, Director of Shared Municipal Services Initiative, Government Law Center of Albany Law School |
| Morning Keynote Speakers |
| New York Deputy Secretary of State Robert W. Elliott Lester D. Steinman, Director of the Edwin G. Michaelian Municipal Law Resource Center of Pace University |
|
| Program 1: Universal Shared Municipal Legal System and Uniform Municipal Law Department KPIS |
|
| In the first Program, CLS will present the beta version of a Universal Shared Municipal Legal System that will serve as a universal case and contract management system customized for municipal law departments (this system includes other efficiency, knowledge management and productivity tools). |
|
| The Universal Shared Municipal Legal System contains the following features: |
|
- Municipal Case Management System
- Municipal Contract Management System
- Municipal Legal Research Collaborator
- Workflow Management Tools
- Knowledge Management Tools
- Reporting and Metrics Management Tools
- Legal Service Centers for Collaborating with the City Council/Mayor and other
- Other Features to be decided
|
|
| The goal is to create a standard platform containing these features so that interested cities can implement such systems more cost-effectively instead of reinventing the work and technology development performed by other cities. The goal is also to advance a uniform list of key performance indicators tracked by municipal law departments to drive superior legal performance. |
|
| Moderator: |
| Nena W. Wong, Esq., CEO, The Corporate Legal Standard, Inc. |
| Panel Members: |
| David Rodriguez, Senior Deputy Corporation Counsel, City of Buffalo
Foster Mills, Managing Attorney, New York City Law Department |
|
| Program 2: Intermunicipal Law Collaboration Portal |
|
| In Program 2, Dean Salkin of Albany Law School will lead a session on how municipal law departments can share legal content and resources to reduce costs. Dean Salkin will present a beta version of a shared resources feature on the Universal Legal Platform called the Intermunicipal Law Collaboration Portal (the “Intermunicipal Portal”), and discuss the role of the Albany Law School Government Law Center in providing content for access by several municipalities. This program will focus on sharing of non-confidential content resources among municipal law departments. |
|
|
| This Intermunicipal Portal will be a subscription-based portal to be accessed by municipal law departments and will provide them a forum to offer the following: |
|
|
- Create and access checklists for best practices workflows on all aspects of municipal
legal practice. These can, in turn, be inserted into the technology portals used by
participating law departments.
- Contribute towards the largest database of all municipal legal information – extending
beyond laws and statutes – to help municipal law departments operate better, faster
|
|
| CLS, in collaboration with participating municipal law departments, will be developing a standard taxonomy to organize the listing of all legal resources. |
|
| Moderator: |
| Patricia E. Salkin, Esq., Associate Dean, Professor of Law and Director of the Government Law Center of Albany Law School |
| Panel Members: |
Linda Kingsley, former Corporation Counsel for the Cities of Rochester and Binghamton
Kevin Crawford, Executive Director, New York Municipal Insurance Reciprocal |
|
| Lunch Keynote: Case Study on Launching the Universal Municipal Legal Platform |
|
| In the Lunch Keynote, David Rodriguez, Senior Deputy Corporation Counsel from the City of Buffalo, will discuss the City of Buffalo’s experiences using the beta version of the Universal Shared Municipal Legal System. |
|
| In early 2008, the City of Buffalo implemented use of a version of the Universal Shared Municipal System as part of an efficiency grant it has received to promote its goals of increasing productivity and efficiency. Mr. Rodriguez will discuss how the City of Buffalo has used the system and describe early efficiencies and cost savings generated by the use of this solution. |
|
| Program 3: In-house and Outside Relationships: Examining Fees, Services and Quality |
|
| In Program 3, CLS will present several standard alternative and flat fee models for municipal law departments to retain outside law firms and prepare and manage the RFP process to retain such law firms on behalf of participating cities. |
|
| Outside legal expenses generally constitute about 25% to 30% of a law department budget. As private law firm hourly rates increase, these expenses are expected to impact municipal law department budgets as well. |
|
| Conference participants will be able to comment on these proposed models and collaborate to: |
|
- Design a series of standard flat fee and alternative fee arrangement models that can
be used “out of the box” with outside law firms; these models will contain scope of
work, measurement formulas and performance evaluation tools ;
- Create a management system to manage the implementation of such flat fee and
alternative fee arrangement models more efficiently;
- Develop an RFP proposal to solicit bids from interested law firms to participate in these
flat fee and alternative fee arrangement models; and
- Manage the implementation of the flat fee and alternative fee arrangement models.
|
|
| The goal with these flat fee arrangements is to reduce the overall cost of retaining outside law firms. CLS will also orient outside law firms to use the Universal Shared Municipal Legal System to operate more efficiently and to share their knowledge. Under the RFP approach, outside law firms will be incentivized to lower their fees in exchange for greater volumes of work provided to them from participating municipalities. |
|
| Moderator: |
| Ken Bond, Partner, Squires Sanders |
| Panel Members: |
Iris Jones, Esq., Chief Business Development and Marketing Officer,
Chadbourne & Parke, LLP
Howard Protter, Esq., Managing Director, Jacobowitz & Gubits, LLP
Daniel A. Spitzer, Partner, Hodgson Russ, LLP |
|
| Program 4: Law Department Productivity and Efficiency |
|
| In Program 4, noted law department productivity expert Debra Snider will speak on ideas for improving law department efficiency based on ideas she wrote about in one of the few books written about law department productivity: The Productive Culture Blueprint (American Bar Association Career Resource Center, 2003). |
|
| Moderator and Keynote: |
| Debra Snider, Author, Speaker and Former General Counsel |
| Panel Members: |
| DeWitt McCarley, City Attorney for the City of Charlotte |
|
