D.C. Bar President-Elect Candidates Discuss Priorities at Forum
May 04, 2023
D.C. Bar president-elect candidates Shaun Snyder (left) and Alexander Reid.
Increasing member engagement and strengthening access to justice were the two main talking points of the two candidates running for D.C. Bar president-elect for the 2023–2024 term.
Speaking at a candidate forum at the Bar’s headquarters on May 3, Baker & Hostetler LLP partner Alexander Reid and National Association of State Treasurers Executive Director Shaun Snyder laid out their priorities if elected to lead the Bar’s 115,000 members.
“This is not my first rodeo,” Reid opened, reflecting on his run last year but also noting the low turnout of voters. “That speaks to the enemy,” Reid said. “The enemy is the feeling that one doesn’t have to vote in the election.” Reid vowed to address the enthusiasm gap among members by bringing in “cutting-edge legal scholarship.”
“We have unprecedented access in D.C. to the foremost practitioners, government policymakers, regulators, judges,” Reid said. “This is where the law happens — in our nation’s capital. [Recruiting that legal expertise to the Bar] is the way to bring the sizzle to the D.C. Bar.”
Reid’s involvement with the Bar includes serving as chair of the Communities Committee and leading the former Taxation Section’s Steering Committee and the Taxation Community’s Tax-Exempt Organizations Subcommittee.
Reid also mentioned that providing access to justice to the District’s most vulnerable communities is another mission that’s dear to him. Reid said he would work toward increasing membership participation and closing the access to justice gap by bringing an interdisciplinary approach to solving problems he developed from his law firm experiences.
“Usually the hardest issues to solve in science, the law, and many other areas are the places that don’t fit into one expertise but are multifaceted,” Reid said. “We at the D.C. Bar are able to be a central body that can help coordinate among different branches of law and practitioners who bring multiple insights into solving problems.”
Snyder, current D.C. Bar treasurer, has served on the executive, budget, and finance committees of the Bar’s Board of Governors. Like Reid, Snyder also expressed concern about the low involvement of Bar members.
“What concerns me is the number of people who are actively involved in the Bar. That number is just too low; it’s around 5,000, 6,000,” Snyder said. “That’s about the number I would use if you looked at the election turnout. We can grow that number. And by growing it, we can bring about more diversity, more diverse opinions, more people to shoulder the work among our membership.”
By increasing member engagement, the Bar would be strengthening its ongoing mission to provide access to justice throughout the District, particularly as the city moves beyond the pandemic, Snyder said.
“A lot of people were very active during COVID trying to provide pro bono services,” Snyder said. “But as they feel that pandemic is waning, they think those needs are winding down. But, in fact, they're winding up in many ways. A lot of the services and benefits and moratoria that you see at the federal level are disappearing. So, people who had some protection during COVID no longer have that. We're seeing a greater need for pro bono work than we have in a long time.”
The 2023 D.C. Bar general and Communities elections are open until June 1. Voting is exclusively online. For information on all of the candidates, visit rise.dcbar.org.
