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WPCNR WHITE PLAINS LAW JOURNAL. From Pace University. June 23, 2004 – Pace Women’s Justice Center has appointed Susan L. Pollet, Esq. one of New York and Westchester’s most active members of the legal community, as Executive Director, effective June 28, 2004.
SUSAN L. POLLET: Pollet comes to the Center after serving as an Associate Court Attorney in the Westchester County Family Court, and has served as a Court Attorney for the past seven years. Photo, Pace Women’s Justice Center.
Pollet is a 1979 graduate of Emory University School of Law and a 1976 graduate of Cornell University. She graduated as a member of the Mortar Board Senior Women’s Honorary Society and the Omnicron Nu Honorary Society.
She is admitted to practice in Georgia and New York. Susan received the 2004 Marilyn R. Menge Memorial award for service to the Women’s Bar Association of the state of New York and to the Westchester County Bar Association. She received, also, the Joseph F. Gagliardi Award for Excellence from the Westchester County Bar Institute for service to the court system. She is one of two employees of the ninth judicial district (a five county geographic area) chosen in 2004.
Pollet has been practicing law for twenty-five years. She has been in private practice, she has worked in-house for a corporation, concentrating primarily on labor and employment law issues, she has taught law at Mercy College for six years to undergraduates and paralegals, and she has worked in government. Her dedication to the area of family law is long standing.
While in law school, as part of a juvenile justice workshop, she prosecuted and defended juveniles in a local court. As a practicing attorney, she served as a Law Guardian for nine years representing children in Family Court, as an assigned counsel in Family Court, and as a Social Services Attorney for three years handling both child protective and adult protective cases.
She has participated in multiple legal training programs. She is a published author of more than twenty-five legal articles in the New York Law Journal and periodicals about family law, employment law and related issues. She has drafted many decisions and has settled multiple cases daily in conferences as a Court Attorney.
Dynamic next stage.
In making the announcement, Pace Law School’s Executive Director of Academic Programs, said “I am excited about Susan Pollet’s acceptance of Executive Director of the Pace Women’s Justice
Center. Susan brings an impressive list of qualities vital to the Center’s future. These include abundant energy, great enthusiasm, leadership experience, wide recognition in the legal community,
intellectual curiosity and a passion for the work of the Center. Her appointment will enable the Center to continue building upon the creative vision initiated by Vicki Lutz.”
Service.
Susan Pollet served on the Ninth Judicial District Task Force on Reducing Litigation Cost and Delay established by Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye. Pollet has been a Vice President of the Women’s Bar Association of the State of New York, and has been a State Delegate since 1997. She served on the Domestic Violence, Nominations and Legislative Committees, Co-Chaired the Legislative Committee for two years and currently Co-Chairs the Children’s Rights Committee.
Pollet began her involvement with the New York Women’s Bar Association in the early 1980’s, serving as Chair of its Publicity Committee. After moving to Westchester County, she became involved in the Westchester Women’s Bar Association in the late 1980’s. She served as President of
the Westchester Women’s Bar Association, and as Vice President, Treasurer, Recording Secretary, as Chair of the Placement Committee, as a member of the Committee on the Legal Rights of Children and as a member of the Committee on Lawyering and Parenting. She prepared the Souvenir Journal, Chaired the Annual Dinner for two successive years and served on the
Nominations Committee for many years.
She served as Co-Chair of the Legislative Committee, and then its advisor, is a member of the Past President’s Committee, and currently Chairs the Archive & Historian Committee. She served on the Committee for the Joseph F. Gagliardi Award
for Excellence and the Assigned Counsel Panel for Family Court of the Westchester County Bar Association. She serves as a trained legal facilitator in the P.E.A.C.E. Program (Parent Education and Custody Effectiveness), to which parents are referred by judges, provided at the
Westchester County Courthouse.
Affiliations.
She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Westchester Children’s Association. She has served on Governor Pataki’s Lower Hudson Valley Advisory Council to the Division for Women. She serves as a Cornell University Alumni Admissions Ambassador, interviewing prospective students and writing evaluations. She has served on the Board of Directors of the League of Women Voters, the Chappaqua Children’s Workshop, and the Pleasantville Children’s Center. She has served on the nominating committee of Temple Beth El of Chappaqua. She has participated in
multiple educational panels as an organizer, moderator and panelist.
Center Expansion.
Susan L. Pollet, Esq. replaces Victoria L. Lutz, Esq., who has become the Executive Director of Crossroads, a safe-house for battered women and their children in Fort Collins, Colorado. Under Lutz’s leadership, the PWJC has grown exponentially. During her eleven years at the Center, Lutz worked tirelessly to provide the best possible direct legal representation to thousands of victims of domestic violence. Lutz initiated numerous programs and services including; the Family Court Legal
Program, Project Assist and Deter, The Westchester Division, Sexual Assault Programs, and the Teen Dating Violence Institute.
The Pace Women’s Justice Center was founded in 1991 by Michael G. Dowd, Esq. as an educational center for training attorneys in matters of domestic violence. Initially staffed by one attorney and an assistant, the Center now employs 13 attorneys and three support staff.
The Center has sites in both White Plains and Yonkers Family Courts. Since 1999, the Center has offered direct legal representation to thousands of battered women through its Family Court Legal Externship Program. This first of its kind program allows law students, under the supervision of Center attorneys, to interview battered women, draft and file petitions for orders of protection and custody, and represent clients in court.
Through Project Assist and Deter, Center attorneys accept referrals from Westchester County police departments on a 24/7 basis. The Westchester Division provides legal information and referrals through a telephone help-line. Center attorneys respond to over 1,200 calls per year through this help-line and provide information on a range of topics such as divorce law, elder law, domestic violence law, child support and child custody laws as wells as sexual and employment discrimination laws.
The Center has also expanded its training into such areas as Sexual Assault, Gender Violence, Sex Discrimination, Stalking, and Teen Dating Violence. Through these programs, Center staff train attorneys, judges, law enforcement officials, advocates and medical professionals as well as high school and middle school students.
