We are pleased to honor Ropes & Gray as our 2011 Partner of the Year.

Ropes & Gray is a leading global law firm with offices in Boston, Chicago, Hong Kong, London, New York, San Francisco, Shanghai, Silicon Valley, Tokyo, and Washington, DC. Built on a foundation of over 140 years of dedication to forging strong client relationships, they represent a broad spectrum of industries in corporate law and litigation matters.

But at the inaugural Masquer-Aid Ball, it is for their pro bono activities that we honor Ropes & Gray as our Partner of the Year. Their lawyers have fashioned careers that have enabled them to do top-notch paying-client work while at the same time to participate meaningfully in a wide array of public service activities. This tradition is rooted in the example set by its founders in 1865 and has remained a hallmark of lawyers at Ropes & Gray since. In fact, in 2010 alone, 948 attorneys, summer associates, paralegals and staff dedicated over 84,000 combined hours to pro bono clients, ranging from transactional work for nonprofits to cases for individuals referred by nonprofit legal service providers. At Ropes & Gray, client service and public service go hand-in-hand.

An Exemplary Partnership

Ropes & Gray was one of the first firms to participate in the “Adopt a Health Center” program sponsored by Medical Legal Partnership | Boston (MLP). This innovative program allies health care providers with lawyers to improve the health and well-being of vulnerable populations. Through MLP | Boston, and with its expert mentorship, Ropes & Gray “adopted” Dorchester House Multi-Service Center (DHMSC) in January 2009, staffing weekly legal clinics and providing ongoing representation for patients referred by the center’s medical staff. To date, Ropes & Gray lawyers have assisted more than 120 low-income families with over 200 legal matters including basic needs such as housing, public benefits, immigration, family, and education – issues that were undermining the clients’ well-being.

For Dorchester House patients like Hawah Jackson, access to legal assistance from Ropes & Gray has been more than a blessing. After receiving a shut-off notice due to overdue electric bills, Jackson was concerned for Binah, her 22-year-old daughter, severely disabled by autism, who often calms herself by switching on lights in the middle of the night. Binah’s pediatrician, Dr. Peter Loewinthan, referred Jackson to the Ropes & Gray legal clinic. Within days of their intervention, the electric company acknowledged that because of Binah’s disability, the account could not legally be shut off. Again, as Binah’s 21st birthday approached, Ropes & Gray assisted by helping to ensure a smooth transition from her specialized school for adolescents into a day program for disabled adults. Jackson’s story is evidence that good health — particularly for people with modest financial resources — can be as much about legal issues as medical ones.

Ropes & Gray also worked with MLP | Boston to perfect the “adopt a health center” program at Dorchester House, ultimately creating an easily replicated model for other law firms to use and area-specific pro bono practice manuals. In addition, Ropes is currently working on strategies for providing culturall-competent legal services to DHMSC’s diverse patient populations, and is developing a family law systems change project based on a need identified by a DHMSC provider. For this groundbreaking work, MLP | Boston presented Ropes & Gray with its 2010 Pro Bono Innovator Award. In May 2010, the partnership between DHMSC and Ropes & Gray was featured in The Boston Globe and in September 2010, Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly honored Michele Garvin and Dorchester House CEO Joel Abrams with an Rx for Excellence award, as one of its “Heroes From the Field.” Ropes & Gray so values the work it does with DHMSC families and staff that in 2010, the firm presented its Ropes & Gray Award for Outstanding Pro Bono Service to Michele Garvin, who oversees a team of devoted lawyers and paralegals.