President’s Message by Edward L. Weiner Continuing to Build on a Strong Foundation As my first President’s Message, I want to share some of my comments from the Annual Meeting in Virginia Beach. I am humbled by the trust you have bestowed upon me and look forward to working with each of you during the next year. In taking the oath of office, I proudly follow the seventy-six distinguished Virginia lawyers who have served as president of the Virginia State Bar. During the last three-quarters of a cen-tury, these seventy-two men and four women have navigated the critical issues facing our bar and have shaped the practice of law in Virginia. These leaders have built the strong founda-tion upon which we all stand today. I am honored to follow in their foot-steps. To Past-president Nelson and President Martingayle, thank you both for your service to our commonwealth, as well as the guidance you have given me during your terms. The Virginia State Bar has a proud history. We succeed, not only because of the skills of our executive leaders, but because of the willingness of hun-dreds of lawyers across our state (many of whom are in this room) to give of their time and effort. While ours is a mandatory bar, we are rooted in volun-teerism. Our mission is more important than ever: 1) protecting the public; 2) ensuring access to legal services; and 3) regulating our profession. We, in Virginia, are privileged to have one of the greatest legal systems in the United States. The Comparative Law Symposium, held during our over-seas midyear meetings, has demon-strated that ours is among the greatest systems in the world. However, we all know, the system still can be improved. There remains much work to be done. Today, the Virginia State Bar has approximately 49,000 member attor-neys. We have four conferences, twenty sections and over twenty-two commit-tees. We employ approximately ninety-five full-time staff people and have a budget of approximately $14.6 million dollars. We are a powerful engine for progress. During my tenure, I ask that we put additional energy into in the following three areas: 1. Improving access to justice by increasing support for legal aid and leveraging technology. 2. Engaging and assisting our strong, yet smaller bars in rural counties throughout the Eastern Shore, Southside and Southwest Virginia. 3. Strengthening the VSB’s part-nerships with business and edu-cation, as well as with voluntary and specialty bars. Access to Justice Ensuring access to justice is a part of the mission statement of the VSB because access to justice is a part of the bedrock of our nation. Access to justice is in the first line of our Constitution and the last line of our Pledge of Allegiance. Unfortunately, for too many Virginians, these are empty words. At a time when Virginia’s legal aid programs are reeling from the double setback of severe federal funding cuts and collapsing revenues from IOLTAs, there is a tidal wave of pressing need for Legal Aid and Pro Bono legal work. As highlighted in VSB’s Access to Justice Committee 2014 report: Over the last three years, Virginia’s legal aid programs have lost more than one-fifth of their attorneys, while the public in need of Legal Aid has increased 32 percent. There is no question that the “Justice Gap” is widening, leaving more and more Virginians on an uneven playing field in our civil justice system. Courts in every county through-out our state are being overwhelmed by unrepresented parties — people who simply cannot afford a lawyer to navi-gate the path to justice. At the recent Judicial Conference, I heard judges from across our state expressing dismay at seeing pro se liti-gants, who have just and proper claims, have “disastrous” days in court because they are unable to properly present their case. The obvious solution is to find more funding for legal aid services throughout the state — not an easy task with our state budget already strained. We must get creative. One approach is through increased partnering programs, such as Jazz 4 Justice and other collaborative efforts (such as Law Day activities) to raise funds and increase social awareness about this public crisis. 12 VIRGINIA LAWYER | June 2015 | Vol. 64 www.vsb.org