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President's Reception brings together family, 'extended family'

Thursday, Sep. 19, 2013
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Top: MBA President Douglas K. Sheff discusses his three initiatives at his President's Reception. Middle (from left): Chief Justice of the Family and Probate Court Angela M. Ordoñez and MBA President Douglas K. Sheff. Sheff and Supreme Judicial Court Associate Justice Ralph D. Gants Bottom (from left): MBA Vice President Martha Rush O'Mara, MBA President Douglas K. Sheff, MBA President-elect Marsha V. Kazarosian, MBA Chief Legal Counsel and Chief Operating Officer Martin W. Healy and MBA Treasurer Robert W. Harnais. Photos by Jeff Thiebauth.

In an evening that combined heartfelt admiration with good-natured teasing, more than 100 friends, family members and colleagues gathered on Sept. 12 at the Liberty Hotel in Boston to laud Douglas K. Sheff as president of the Massachusetts Bar Association.

During the President's Reception, which marked the opening of the 2013-2014 association year, Sheff discussed how his three initiatives -- Working Families, Consumer Law and Justice for All -- will help restore attorneys' reputations as community caretakers and champions of justice.

"We represent the under-represented; that's what makes us different," Sheff said. "That's what makes us truly great."

MBA president-elect Marsha Kazarosian and Donald Grady, Sheff's partner at Sheff Law in Boston, kicked off the evening with glowing introductory remarks about Sheff, their close friend. The amusing anecdotes they shared helped set a convivial tone for the reception, which continued outdoors in the Liberty Hotel courtyard.

With both Sheff's mother, Maxine, and his sister, Jody, present, Grady attributed Sheff's success as a lawyer and leader to his family's support. Sheff in turn thanked his fellow lawyers -- whom he called his extended family -- and his actual family, particularly his father, the late Irving "Chick" Sheff, founder of the personal injury law firm that bears the family name, for inspiring him to become a lawyer.

"This is for you, dad," he said.