MOUND CITY BAR ASSOCIATION

President’s Message

It is with pleasure that I serve as the 65th President of the Mound City Bar Association (MCBA). Thank you to my colleagues for trusting me to set the strategy for our beloved association for this leg of our 100+ year journey.

My sincere hope is that through the work of the 2025-2026 Executive Committee, with support from the general body, we will turn up the lantern of the Association’s legal light and broaden the scope of our reach in meaningful ways to benefit the communities we serve.

The apothegm for this bar year, is one tied to my time as a young student at the Berkeley Institute, where my brother preceded me in studies. Following his school orientation, I remember him reciting, with conviction, the school’s motto, “Respice Finem—Keep the End in View.”

My younger mind grappled to understand the meaning in those words. “How could I keep the unseen in view? How?”

Time. With its instructive hand, time taught me that in those words, lies the charge to each of us to think of the ultimate consequence and purpose of our actions, with forethought of our accountability.

Upon acceptance of this Presidency, I became tied to MCBA in a way that alters my accountability to it and the community. In this new role, I charge us to be focused on community education, to lean-in to equipping our senior and caregiver populations with information needed to safeguard their autonomy, to educate our small businesses for generational success, and I charge us to be involved with shaping civic minded and informed young students.

Let us move together in the direction of the unknown, by having the resolve to improve environments by the actions we take. Paulo Coelho, the author of one of my favorite books, is credited for these words, “The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion.” May those words be a good reminder to keep us focused on doing the work rather than simply talking about what must be done.

The law shapes the future through jurisprudence and precedent. In this moment, we are creating the history of Mound City Bar Association. We are legacy in training in 2025. Collectively, we are architects of the blueprint for what is coming.

Respice Finem—Keep the End in View!