HBa milesTones

houston bar Foundation: The Foundation of Vital Community Programs

By naTasHa Breaux

The Houston Bar Foundation (“HBF”) was established in 1982 as the charitable arm of the Houston Bar Association (“HBA”).1 At that time, the HBA had commissioned a long-range planning committee to consider what should be done to meet the challenges of the future.2 One of the committee’s recommendations was to create a nonprofit charitable organization that could more effectively discharge the Bar’s responsibilities to the legal profession and the community. And so, the HBF was born.

According to the HBF’s first chairman, James B. Sales, it took “shoe leather” and “knocking on doors” to obtain initial donations. The first annual budget was $240,000, which went towards a variety of community service projects.

Sales and John D. Ellis, Jr., who served as the fourth chair of the Foundation, were instrumental in establishing it as a section 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. The Foundation’s directors are appointed by the Houston Bar Association and Foundation board members choose the chair, vice chair, and treasurer. The HBA president and HBA executive director serve as ex officio members of the HBF board, with the executive director also serving as secretary. The HBF has no paid staff; the HBA staff provide administrative and communication services.

From its beginning, the primary beneficiary of the HBF has been the HBA’s Houston Volunteer Lawyers (“HVL”), which provides pro bono legal services in civil matters to low-income residents of Harris County, linking qualified applicants with attorneys volunteering their time on a pro bono basis. Through annual grants from the HBF and other organizations like the Texas Access to Justice Foundation, HVL helps low-income citizens that other programs often cannot serve, such as those who may not meet the financial criteria of other legal assistance programs. HVL volunteers make a difference in the lives of lowincome clients, their families, and communities every day.

Today, the HBF continues to “provide critical funding to close the justice gap across the greater Houston area,” including providing financial support for HVL, says Polly Fohn, the 2021 chair of the HBF.

In 2019, the Foundation created the Kay Sim Endowment for Maintaining Access to Justice in Houston, named after the HBA’s former longtime executive director, who remains a champion of pro bono service. Inaugural co-chairs were David Beck, Beck Redden LLP; Shauna Clark, Norton Rose Fulbright US LLP; Robin Gibbs, Gibbs & Bruns LLP; T. Mark Kelly, Vinson & Elkins LLP; Christine LaFollette, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld L.L.P; Neal Manne, Susman Godfrey L.L.P.; Jason M. Ryan, CenterPoint Energy, Inc.; and John Eddie Williams, Jr., Williams Hart LLP. Along with many other contributors, the Endowment Campaign helped to sustain future annual funding for pro bono legal services through HVL.

Fohn further explains that the HBF’s “success is in large part due to its Fellows Program through which a small number of HBA members are nominated each year to support the Foundation’s crucial efforts.” The HBF, she says, is “proud to have more than 2,000 Fellows, including many of Houston’s most prominent lawyers and judges.” After four successful decades, the HBF investment portfolio has grown to over $18 million. The HBF supports the following programs: • Legal Clinics—An opportunity for low-income individuals to apply for assistance with HVL and receive free legal advice. • Veteran’s Legal Initiative—Service to low-income military veterans. • Consumer, Elder, and Family Law Handbooks—Free printed and electronic handbooks that explain common legal issues and remedies. • Self-Help Divorce Clinics—Assistance to self-represented litigants. • Continuing Education Grants—Education programs, which improve administration of justice for all, for Harris

County court staff. • Texas Children’s Hospital Medical-Legal Partnership—

Legal assistance for low-income patients. • Houston Area Women’s Center—Legal advice and assistance with protective orders for domestic violence victims. • Center for Urban Transformation—The Foundation has made grants the past two years for the juvenile diversion program that seeks to disrupt and end the 5th Ward’s school-to-prison pipeline and build a culture of compassion.

The mission of the HBF “has never been more important to our community as over the past year,” explains Susan L. Bickley, 2020 chair of the HBF, when “many Houstonians found

themselves out of work, homeless, or trapped in painful or abusive relationships.” The community needs, according to Bickley, “only increased as the pandemic continued.” She describes how the HBF was able to continue providing a stable source of funding for all these important programs3:

“Never have I been so proud of lawyers in the Houston Bar as I have been this year. It was immensely gratifying to watch our Houston lawyers answer the call. Because of COVID-19, we were unable to hold our annual Harvest Celebration party, which is the central fundraising vehicle for HBF.” She noted how this, in turn, adversely impacted funds available for HVL and continued, “Against this backdrop, I was overwhelmed by the generosity of our Houston legal community when—even without the Harvest party—the HBF 2020 Harvest Campaign raised a record amount to support Houston Volunteer Lawyers and pro bono legal services.”

Surely the founders of the HBF did not envision a worldwide pandemic gripping Houston. Nonetheless, the foundation they put in place, together with the generosity of so many attorneys, has served Houstonians superbly over this past year. There is no doubt that it will continue to do so for many years to come.

Natasha Breaux is a Fellow of the Houston Bar Foundation and on the editorial board of The Houston Lawyer. She practices appellate litigation at Haynes and Boone, LLP.

endnotes

1. Houston Bar Foundation, HOUSTON BAR ASSOCIATION, https://www.hba.org/?pg=

Houston-Bar-Foundation (last visited February 23, 2021). 2. ERIC L. FREDRICKSON, A COMMITMENT TO PUBLIC SERVICE: THE HISTORY OF

THE HOUSTON BAR ASSOCIATION 147 (1992). 3. Houston Bar Foundation Fellows Program, HOUSTON BAR ASSOCIATION, https://www. hba.org/?pg=Fellows-Program (last visited February 23, 2021).

chairs of the houston bar Foundation

James B. Sales ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1983 *John H. Crooker, Jr.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1984 *Richard P. Hogan, Sr. ,,,,,,,,,,,, 1985 *John D. Ellis, Jr.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1986 * Richard Royds,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1987 Robert A. DeWitt ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1988 Michael Moehlman,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1989 Kenneth R. Wynne ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1990 Donald F. Wood,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1991 *Blake Tartt,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1992 Scott E. Rozzell ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1993 *D. Gibson Walton,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1994 John F. Rhem, Jr.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1995 Paula W. Hinton,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1996 James V. Derrick, Jr.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1997 Otway B. Denny, Jr.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1998 *Mark S. Snell ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 1999 Ronald C. Lewis,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2000 T. Mark Kelly ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2001 *Marcy E. Kurtz,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2002 Frank G. Jones ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2003 Lynn Kamin ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2004 William K. Kroger ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2005 Tracie J. Renfroe,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2006 Karl S. Stern ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2007 Debra Baker,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2008 Stewart W. Gagnon ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2009 Kent W. (Rocky) Robinson ,,,,,, 2010 William C. (Bill) Lowrey,,,,,,,,, 2011 Robert J. McAughan,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2012 Glenn A. Ballard, Jr.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2013 John Eddie Williams Jr. ,,,,,,,,,,, 2014 William R. Buck ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2015 Denise Scofield,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2016 Travis Sales ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2017 Barrett Reasoner ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2018 Travis Torrence ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2019 Susan L. Bickley,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2020 Polly Fohn,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 2021

*Deceased

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