Yale Law School To Hold Freedom Of Information Boot Camp

Dear Readers,

As some of you may know, I have the great fortune to serve as a supervising attorney for the Yale Law School Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic.  The clinic will hold an FOI boot camp next Monday, February 23, from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at the law school.  Speakers will include David Sobel, senior counsel at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and Lisa Siegel, staff attorney for the Freedom of Information Commission.  The program is free!  For anyone interested in learning more about federal and state freedom of information laws, this will be a great program.

When Lawyers Advise Their Clients To Ignore The Law

Hartford Courant reporter Matt Kauffman has an excellent piece entitled “A Transparency Advocate’s Legislative Wish List.”  As the title suggest, the article contains a list of pro-open government measures that he hopes the General Assembly will consider and adopt this session.  I support every item on the list.

But making that supportive statement is not the purpose of this post.

Read the rest of this entry »

2014 In Review: Thanks To All For Another Fun Year!

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2014 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 28,000 times in 2014. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 10 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Buffkin To Take Bronin’s Spot As Governor’s Legal Counsel

Governor Malloy announced today that Karen Buffkin, currently deputy secretary of the Office of Policy and Management, will become his new legal counsel, assuming the position that Luke Bronin has held for the past two years.

I’ve had the opportunity to work with Karen while she has been at OPM and, before that, when she was legal counsel for the Comptroller (then Nancy Wyman).  She is sharp as a tack and knows, through years of experience, how law and politics work in the Nutmeg state.  She’ll be a source of sound, wise counsel for the governor.

Let me also take this opportunity to wish Luke the best of luck at Hinkley Allen (and beyond).  Our professional paths crossed on several occasions and he never failed to impress.  The governor was very fortunate to have him as his legal counsel.  And if rumors of his political aspirations are true, the residents of the City of Hartford would be equally fortunate to have him as their mayor.

There’s A New Legal Blog In Town. . . .

Fellow appellate advocate Dan Krisch has just joined the legal blogosphere with his new blog, Holding Court.  Dan describes his new blog this way:

Life moves so quickly nowadays that we often fail to observe and analyze what is important. Most of all, we fail to think, to reason, to question and to discuss as the world whirls by us.  This blog is my contribution to remedying that lack — my thoughts on (mostly) legal issues and trends … with the occasional seasoning of references to music, art and pop culture as the spirit moves me.

Dan’s most recent post, “Transparency, Privacy and Prior Restraint,” concerns a small case with which I have some familiarity, one involving a Superior Court judge’s recent decision to grant an injunction–a “prior restraint”–against the Connecticut Law Tribune publishing a story about a child protection matter.

Dan loves the law, knows the law and loves to write about the law.  I look forward to more posts.  Welcome to the blogosphere Dan!

Yes, I Am Ari Klau’s Father, Ctd.

My apologies for another divergence from the usual subject of this blog to give another shout out to my son, Ari Klau, a senior at William Hall High School in West Hartford, CT, who placed third yesterday in the 2014 Foot Locker Northeast Regionals at Van Cortland Park in New York!!!  Ari completed the 5000m course in 15:36.  His third place finish (out of 158 runners) earned him a trip to San Diego in two weeks, where the top 40 high school cross country runners from around the country will compete in the Foot Locker National Cross Country Championships.

Ari Klau Post-Race Interview

Yes, I Am Ari Klau’s Father

This post has nothing to do with the law, but as I own and publish this blog I get to depart from the normal format once in a while.  Today I just want to brag about my son, Ari Klau, a senior at William Hall High School in West Hartford, CT and, as of this past Saturday, the Division LL state cross-country champion.  As you can see, he was quite happy about his 15:48 victory. (The next runner crossed the finish line at 16:11.)  Go Ari!

MANCHESTER 10-25-2014 Hall High Ari Klau celebrates as he approaches the finish lane during a CIAC Class boys and girls cross country championships Saturday afternoon at Wickham Park in Manchester Ari won first place (Marc-Yves Regis I, special to the Courant)

UPDATE (10/31/14): Ari took second place in the Connecticut State Opens, surpassed only by Darien’s amazing Alex Ostberg, who is ranked first or second in the entire nation!

UPDATE (11/8/14): Ari was the runner-up (out of 264 runners!) in the 2014 New England Championships, clocking a time of 15:39 on the 3.1 mile course at Wickham Park in Manchester, CT.

UPDATE (11/13/14): Ari signed a National Letter of Intent, committing to run cross country and track for the University of Virginia!

The Role Of Text And Tradition In The Interpretation Of Municipal Charters

I argued a very interesting case this morning in the Supreme Court concerning how municipal charters should be interpreted when the text of the charter and the actual, longstanding practice (two decades, to be precise) of the local government allegedly conflict. 

The Supreme Court expedited briefing of the case, DeMayo v. Quinn, this summer so that it would be ready for argument in September.  Now we await a decision. . . .

Undergraduate Law Degrees? An Idea Whose Time Has Come (Again)

Check out this thought-provoking article in The Chronicle of Higher Education.  I loved law school.  And I love teaching law (having been on the adjunct faculty at UCONN since 2003).  But law school is too damn expensive.  Law school as a graduate program is a relatively recent phenomenon.  A very good case can be made for offering it as an undergraduate program.

Hat tip: The Dish