Kay Meyers Pro Bono Coordinator Award

Ethel Wells is the recepient of the 2009 Kay Meyers Pro Bono Coordinator Award. In 2006 and 2007, our program pro bono numbers had fallen and the program needed revitalization. Ethel, working together with new leadership at the Lee County Bar Association, helped take the necessary steps to completely revitalize our pro bono program. Local efforts to publicize and emphasize pro bono work, through the use of meetings, publications and other recruitment efforts more than doubled our pro bono numbers in 2008. Our 2008 PAI recognition luncheon enjoyed the highest attendance in recent record. Furthermore, in 2008, Ethel organized a series of pro bono clinics, largely around the issue of foreclosure awareness and prevention, which enjoyed very high attendance rates as well. Some of the clinics were in communities that had never had a clinic in the past and one clinic was held in a neighboring county that had never previously offered any pro bono clinics. Lawyers were recruited for those clinics that were new to the idea of providing pro bono, and all had a very positive experience while providing some desperately needed information to our client community. 2008 was an excellent year for pro bono in this Circuit and a great deal of the credit goes to Ethel Wells.

The Kay Meyers Pro Bono Coordinator Award honors a pro bono coordinator who is an outstanding coordinator in a local legal services provider as well as an active member of the Florida Pro Bono Coordinators Association.

Named for Kay Meyers, Pro Bono Coordinator for the Polk County office of Florida Rural Legal Services, this award honors Kay's dedication to her job, the volunteer attorneys and clients, as well as her significant contributions to the Florida Pro Bono Coordinators Association. Her untimely death in 1992 inspired the FPBCA to honor her service with this award.