Around the firm
The Causes We Support
Most of what appears on a law firm’s website is about the law firm. This one is not. It is about a 1920s movie palace, a legal clinic, and a shelter that helps people get their birth certificates — and how a Phoenix disability lawyer ended up caring about all three.
Read the video transcript
Transcript of the video above, lightly edited for clarity.
What causes and organizations have you supported in the community?
I’ve been really lucky since I’ve moved to Arizona — I’ve had opportunities to be involved in this community right from the beginning. In my early days, I was in Junior League, which is a fantastic organization for women under 40. And back in the day when I was under 40, I had so much fun as a Junior League member helping with UMOM and charities. The one that was closest to my heart was getting the Orpheum Theatre on its feet. The Orpheum Theatre had been started in the ’20s and was a beautiful atmospheric theater in downtown Phoenix, and then it had gone to ruin. Junior League took it on as a special project, and I really took that project to heart and got to be a key part of getting that theater reopened. Now it’s a vibrant, special part of downtown and a really nice theater, and those of us in the Junior League who got to work on it were very proud of that theater — and I hope the whole city of Phoenix is.
Since that time I’ve worked on charities that were closer to my practice area. In particular, the HIV/AIDS Law Project is a wonderful organization that I got to be affiliated with for years, and in some cases I helped their people get benefits on a pro bono basis. I’ve been lucky to work with them — they helped teach me about AIDS and HIV and its effect on the community, and I got to help them get benefits.
At other times I’ve worked with organizations like the Sjögren’s Syndrome Foundation, and groups that were working with fibromyalgia and Tourette’s syndrome. At some point I realized I needed to make my efforts more specialized, and ultimately I decided I really wanted to focus on a group that was focused on the people I mainly help in my practice.
So now I’m really focused on CASS. CASS stands for Central Arizona Shelter Services, and I just think the world of this group. I hope everyone will join me in supporting them. I donate to this group, I hold fundraisers for this group, and I think they get the biggest bang for the buck in the way they help the homeless, help the disabled, and really help people get back on their feet — they try to provide housing, dental care, help people get birth certificates, help people find work. They’re making a huge impact on our community every day, and without them there are a lot of people who would not have any way of getting their lives back together.
It started with a theater
Long before any of this was about disability law, Stephanie joined the Junior League of Phoenix (opens in a new tab) — a volunteer organization that has been putting women to work on this city’s problems for the better part of a century. She describes it, cheerfully, as something she did “back in the day when I was under 40.”
The League took on a great many things. One of them was UMOM New Day Centers (opens in a new tab), which provides shelter, services and affordable housing for families experiencing homelessness in Phoenix — still one of the most important organizations in the city.
But the project that stuck was the Orpheum Theatre.
The Orpheum, which very nearly wasn’t
The Orpheum opened in downtown Phoenix in 1929: Spanish Baroque, gloriously over-the-top, and built as an atmospheric theater — the kind with a ceiling painted to look like an open evening sky, complete with drifting clouds and stars. It is the last surviving movie palace in Phoenix.
By the early 1980s it had gone to ruin and was for sale, with demolition a genuine possibility.
The Junior League took it on as a project (opens in a new tab) and would not let it go. They campaigned for the City of Phoenix to buy the building, which it did in 1984. They worked to get it onto the National Register of Historic Places. They helped pass a 1988 bond issue that put millions toward restoration, and a foundation was formed to raise millions more privately.
In 1997 the Orpheum reopened — with Carol Channing performing Hello, Dolly!, which is about as fitting a return as a restored movie palace could ask for.
Stephanie was part of that effort, and she is unmistakably proud of it. In her words, those who got to work on the theater are very proud of it, and she hopes the whole city is too.
Then the work got closer to home
As her practice narrowed to Social Security disability, so did the causes.
For years Stephanie was affiliated with the HIV/AIDS Law Project, a Phoenix organization providing legal help to Maricopa County residents living with HIV and AIDS. She helped some of their clients win benefits on a pro bono basis — and she is clear that the exchange ran both ways. They taught her about HIV and AIDS and the effect it was having on the community, and she helped their people get the benefits they were owed.
She also worked with condition-specific groups, including the Sjögren’s Foundation (opens in a new tab) and organizations supporting people with fibromyalgia and Tourette syndrome — conditions that turn up constantly in disability claims and are widely misunderstood outside the people who live with them.
And now: CASS
These days her focus is squarely on one organization, and she does not hedge about it.
Central Arizona Shelter Services (opens in a new tab) — CASS — is Arizona’s largest and longest-serving emergency shelter provider. It has been working with people experiencing homelessness in the Phoenix area since 1984, and it runs Arizona’s first emergency shelter program built specifically for seniors.
Stephanie donates to CASS and holds fundraisers for them, and her reasoning is refreshingly unsentimental: she thinks they get the biggest bang for the buck of anyone doing this work.
What they actually do is a long list, and it is worth reading slowly, because most of it is not what people picture when they hear the word “shelter”:
- Emergency shelter and help finding housing
- Dental care
- Help obtaining birth certificates and identification
- Help finding work
That third one deserves a moment. You cannot file for Social Security benefits, rent an apartment, open a bank account, or start most jobs without proof of who you are. For someone who has lost everything, a missing birth certificate is not an inconvenience — it is a locked door in front of every other door. Quietly helping people get one back is among the most practically useful things anybody in this city does.
It is also, not coincidentally, the point where CASS’s work and ours meet. A great many of the people we represent have been through exactly that.
If you want to help
Stephanie’s own invitation is straightforward: she hopes everyone will join her in supporting CASS. Without them, as she puts it, there are a great many people who would have no way of getting their lives back together.
- Central Arizona Shelter Services (opens in a new tab) — shelter, housing, dental care, ID documents, employment help
- UMOM New Day Centers (opens in a new tab) — shelter and housing for families
- Junior League of Phoenix (opens in a new tab) — still at it, still fixing things
- Sjögren’s Foundation (opens in a new tab) — research, support and awareness
None of this is legal advice, and none of it will help you win a disability case. It is just what we have been up to when we are not doing that.