Inside the State Bar: A Presidential Perspective

Episode Notes

Transcript

Rocky Dhir:

Hey, Texas lawyers. The State Bar of Texas annual meeting is on June 19th and 20th in San Antonio. Are you registered to attend at annual meeting? You can earn a year’s worth of CLE in two days. Hear from influential keynote speakers and network with Texas attorneys and influencers in the legal profession. Nearly every area of legal practice will be included in our CLE programming schedule. So what are you waiting for? Register to attend now at Texas bar.com/annual meeting. We can’t wait to see you there. Hi, and welcome to the State Bar of Texas podcast. I’ve been hosting this podcast since 2018. It’s been a while, right? And so before that I used to do interviews on Texas Bar tv. It’s been a real blast. I love doing this and I get to meet some big muckety mucks. Like each year I get to interview the president-elect candidates, the outgoing president, the incoming president, the state bar executive director, all sorts of committee heads.

I mean, there’s some important people, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that I don’t know Jack squat about what any of these people do. I mean, look, it’s not entirely my fault. Alright, let’s think about this. You become a lawyer, you go to state bar meetings and everyone just sort of assumes who the big wigs are and what they do. So whenever I meet one, I’d just kind of smile and nod like I understood, but I never understood. I still don’t. I don’t know what they do. If you’re listening then you’re like me. So many questions, but just too afraid to ask. Well listen. Fear no more. Alright, Rocky’s here. I got your back. I have used the power of my pulpit. Well, okay, let’s be honest. It’s less pull and more pit. I called the state bar president Steve Benesh, and I told him I need answers. He decided not to show up alone. He brought along a posse consisting of immediate past president Cindy Tisdale and President-Elect Santos Vargas. But I refuse to be intimidated. So let’s get on with the inquisition. Steve, Cindy and Santos. Y’all decided to actually show up. I’m impressed.

Cindy Tisdale:

If Rocky calls we show up.

Santos Vargas:

Absolutely.

Steve Benesh:

Good to see you again, Rocky.

Rocky Dhir:

You too. Well guys, I’m excited to get this started. So Steve, I’m going to start with you and I’m going to ask the question that is burning at the very front of everybody’s brain as state bar president. What exactly is it you say that you do around here?

Steve Benesh:

That is a wonderful literary allusion to the movie office space. Well done.

Rocky Dhir:

We’re showing our age, man. We’re showing our age.

Steve Benesh:

Great flick. What was the response in the movie? I have people skills. I take care of the people. That is some portion of the role of state bar president. There are a number of regular duties. The state bar president is the official representative and spokesperson for the state bar on all public matters. The state bar president, I chair the executive committee. I make appointments to the state bar board. I make appointments to the Commission for Lawyer Discipline. But a lot of what I do, matter of fact, I’m approaching a hundred now for years old. What? Yeah, I look great. Huh? Amazing. A hundred events I’m approaching for this year as a state bar president. And so a big part of what the state bar president does is travel to where lawyers are people who say, as you said just a moment ago, Rocky. Well, I’ve never met the president of the state bar.

I’ve seen his or her picture in the Texas Bar Journal. I’ve never met the leadership of theBar. But to go to where they are, all kinds of local bar events and section events and specialty bar events and law school events to carry the message of what the state bar does and to hear what their issues and concerns and questions are about the function of our bar. So being the chief ambassador, being the voice and face of theBar both to our profession and to the public is the central role of what the state bar president does.

Rocky Dhir:

Aside from lawyers, do people in the general public actually care about who we are and what we do? Or are they kind of like just stay out of the way? Lawyers,

Steve Benesh:

They absolutely care when they have a question and they don’t know who to call. And Google the state bar of Texas president or something related to that name, my name pops up. My name and phone number and email address are easy to find on my law firm website. So rarely a day goes by that I don’t get a call from a member of the public about some legal related question, either a private matter they have or a more general one. And I try best I can to route each one of them to the appropriate person to answer it.

Rocky Dhir:

Okay, so it sounds like you actually do some things. I

Steve Benesh:

Have my days, I have my days.

Rocky Dhir:

It doesn’t matter. We’re all learning something here. Steve, everybody. Now Cindy, you’re the immediate past president, so why are you here? Shouldn’t you be off sipping a Ma Tai with the dozens of dollars you made as state bar president? I mean, why are you still here with us?

Cindy Tisdale:

Those thousands of dollars? I’ll be right back. I’m going to go get a coffee. I’ll be right back. Why am

Rocky Dhir:

I thousands of dollars will get you one latte.

Cindy Tisdale:

Exactly, exactly. So why am I here as immediate past president? Honestly, my role is to help serve with the president. And if the president is unavailable for something and Santos is not available, then I’m third in line and I get to step into his shoes. But it’s just to provide support for the president. That’s my main role. And I’m still on the executive committee. I still attend committee meetings, but I’m on my way out the door two months. But it’s been a great three years. But as immediate vice president, I would say that’s number one supporting the president.

Rocky Dhir:

So I think that’s a grownup way of saying senioritis rules. Yes, we love it.

Cindy Tisdale:

It’s spring break of senior year.

Rocky Dhir:

It’s the best job anybody could have. That’s why they say it. And Santos, you’re getting ready to start your year. So other than soaking up all the free time before you have to start doing your best. Steve Benish impersonation, what else do you do?

Santos Vargas:

Well, Rocky, only if I had more free time. Much like Cindy said, my number one goal in my job is to support the president in curing out the duties of the office of the president. And that can take lots of different forms. Rocky, anything from acting as a sounding board for the president to covering for speaking engagements to things as simple as offering encouragement whenever things are tough or whenever the president’s doing a good job and just reassuring the president that they are doing a good job. And there’s been lots of opportunities for that. This year. Steve done an incredible job for the state bar, but one of the big things for the state bar, the president elect anyway, is to propose a budget for the next fiscal year.

Rocky Dhir:

When you become president, that’s during your presidential year,

Santos Vargas:

You propose the budget during your president elect year. And so that’s a months long process that involve lots of meetings and a lot of work by both the staff and the president elect that ultimately ends up in a proposal in front of the Texas Supreme Court that either gets voted up or voted down. And so we have to get it right and there’s a lot of work, a lot of hours that go into it. And so that’s really been a big focus of my year so far.

Rocky Dhir:

And where does the money come from for the budget? Is it primarily from member dues or are there other sources of revenue? For our state bar?

Santos Vargas:

As you can imagine, dues are a big component of the budget, but in addition to dues, the state bar puts on first class CLE and CLE. Revenues are a big component of the budget as well as revenue that comes in from MCLE and lots of other kind of smaller sources. But I wouldn’t say boos and CLE are the two big components of revenue from the state bar.

Rocky Dhir:

Okay. I’m just getting word that the answer we were looking for was Bitcoin Santos, and so you’ve got the wrong answer. We need to start our own state bar of Texas meme coin at this point. So here’s one thing I’ve never quite understood is every year I see here’s our nominees for state bar president, and then there’s a voting that happens and then somebody gets Crown President or President elect, I should say. It’s really an election for President elect. So how does our state bar decide who gets to run, who’s nominated? I’ve never gotten a forum saying, do you ever want to run or is there a nomination? It just kind of happens.

Steve Benesh:

Cindy, one of the things Cindy didn’t mention, one of the responsibilities of the immediate past president is to chair or co-chair the nomination and elections committee that participates in that. So Cindy is really the perfect one to answer that question since she’s in the middle of that process this year.

Cindy Tisdale:

And Rocky, I’m going to call you out then. You’re not reading your Texas Bar Journal?

Rocky Dhir:

I don’t read Cindy. That’s why I’m doing a podcast. Okay. This is, I’m

Cindy Tisdale:

Calling you

Rocky Dhir:

Out. This is all verbal and all talk. That’s all I am. I am all talk.

Cindy Tisdale:

Honestly, there’s two ways to get to be a nominee or a candidate for State Bar of Texas president and one of them is what we call petition candidate. Any lawyer in good standing that’s a member of the state bar of Texas, if they get 5% of our active members in good standing, their signatures, they can be placed on the ballot. So that’s the first way to do it. So 5% right now we have,

Rocky Dhir:

That’s roughly 5,000, right? Because about a hundred

Cindy Tisdale:

Thousand lawyers, hundred and 1600 17,000 lawyers now.

Rocky Dhir:

Wow.

Cindy Tisdale:

Licensed in Texas. So anybody that gets 5% of those signatures can get on the ballot.

Rocky Dhir:

Can I just get one person to sign like 6,000 times?

Cindy Tisdale:

You could, but then you won’t be on the ballot. So

Rocky Dhir:

I could get my own meme coin.

Cindy Tisdale:

You could. The second way is through the nominations of Elections committee. And as Steve just said, the past chair of the board, Ken and Wooten and I are chairing that. So it’s always the past immediate past president and the past chair of the board that chairs this committee. And what we do is we get names two different ways. First is we look at who all has served theBar, who all has shown a passion for theBar and is interested in theBar. And then second of all, there’s a nominations process. You can nominate someone to run for theBar or you can self nominate. And that’s what’s in the Texas Bar Journal. Whenever we start looking at names, we put something in the Texas Bar Journal, Hey, we’re starting to look for the candidates for next year. If you’re interested or know someone that’s interested, let us know.

And through that process, we narrow it down from hundreds of names to a few names and depending on the year, anywhere from six 10 names. And then we interviewed them in person, the entire committee, and it’s kind of like a firing squad. We pepper question at them one after the other. And from all of that interview process, the committee chooses to run against each other. And so that’s the way that works. And then those two names are presented to the board of directors who at that point they go from nominees to candidates if they’re approved by the board.

Rocky Dhir:

And then there’s this whole thing about large metros and then smaller areas. Can you explain how that works?

Cindy Tisdale:

Sure. I have an office in Granbury, Texas. I don’t know if it’s really fair to put someone from Granbury, Texas up against an attorney from Houston, right,

Rocky Dhir:

Steve? Yeah,

Cindy Tisdale:

Steve. So what we do is we rotate and so we have what we call a large county year. So we have five large counties, that’s Paris, Tarrant, Travis Fair in Dallas. We picked two candidates or the nominations elections committee look, exit two candidates from those counties. Then in the next year it’s small county, which means all the other counties that are not one of the next year, the third year, it’s what we call open. So pretty much anybody could run. We try to be fair again, doing open larger, open small, just again not to have someone from a small county up against someone from a large metropolitan county, but we do have every third year an open year.

Rocky Dhir:

I think you touched on this just a little bit, but especially as a committee, as they’re interviewing potential candidates, are there typical qualifications that the State Bar looks for in this process? Do you have to have Amazon Prime? I’ve got my own Netflix subscription. I mean, what is it that we’re looking for when we decide who gets to run?

Cindy Tisdale:

If it was based on Starbucks points, I would get it every year. But they have a Starbucks in Granbury. They do. There’s two. Two, there’s two. I know

Rocky Dhir:

The day you get a Costco, you’re now a big county.

Cindy Tisdale:

Yeah, we don’t have that. We don’t have a Target either, but that’s another story. So you have to be a member of the state bar of Texas and a member in good standing. Right? But past that, what we’re looking for and what I love about this committee is everybody has a different view, but it’s usually someone that has leadership qualities, that has shown leadership qualities in the past that knows the state bar, knows the workings of the state bar, has been involved in the state bar in some capacity, either volunteering or through section work or something to that effect. And who is going to be a good spokesperson for theBar because as Steve said, that’s what the president does. They are the face of theBar and the spokesperson. So you want someone that’s able to do that job, do it well, be the spokesperson, be the face of theBar, have leadership qualities, and me personally, that’s what I look for.

Rocky Dhir:

Interesting. Okay. That helps us understand a little bit about that. But then there’s also this whole thing about the board of directors and what they do, and I want to learn more about that. Before we do that though, we need to get a quick word from one of our sponsors. So those of you listening, stay tuned, listen up. We’re going to come back and we’re going to talk a little bit about the state bar board of directors and what all that means. So we’ll be back with our three special guests who decide to show up all together and try to intimidate me. It’s not working, not working. We’ll be right back. The Texas Lawyers Assistance Program provides confidential help for Texas lawyers, law students, and judges who have problems with substance use and mental health issues. TA offers 24 7 confidential support and can connect you to peers and providers for assistance.

Tila can also connect you to the Sheeran Crowley Lawyer Wellness Trust, which provides financial help to Texas lawyers, law students and judges who need treatment for substance use, depression and other mental health issues, but can’t afford to pay for services. Call or text TLA P anytime at 1 803 4 3 8 5 2 7. The State Bar of Texas Member Benefits program gives Texas lawyers access to free services and discounted products designed to advance and protect their practices, see the full menu of services and learn more at Texas bar.com/benefits. Alright guys, we are back and we’ve got our state bar president, our immediate past president and the President elect. They’ve all taken some time out of their very busy state bar schedules to come and educate us a little bit about how theBar works and the inner workings and all the leadership positions and so on and so forth. Steve, one thing I was thinking about during the break is that I guess I didn’t fully ever appreciate this, but it turns out our state bar is governed. I guess there’s a statute behind this, the Texas Government Code. Can you tell us kind of how that works? I thought it was just something we as a state bar came up with, but we’re official.

Steve Benesh:

The state bar was not just spontaneously combusted by a bunch of lawyers. It actually was created by the legislature back in 1939. The state bar act during the Depression that tells you all you need to know about lawyers. It was a time of dire need. And so we created 1939 and that State Bar Act was codified as chapter 81 of the Texas Government Code. So it’s a statute that governs our creation and function. We actually, it’s kind of interesting. If you look at chapter 81, the state bar was created as a public corporation, which is a corporation created by government for a public purpose. We’re PBS, this is great. Another one right there. And there’s a bunch of ’em around the state. Cities are public corporations, state universities are public corporations. The University of Texas system is a public corporation, public school districts or public corporations, metropolitan Transit Authority.

So they’re very common corporate forms, but we were created under the umbrella of the judicial branch of government. The statute actually calls us an administrative agency of the judicial department of government, and we were created to assist the judicial branch of government in the powers granted to it under the constitution to regulate the practice of law in the state of Texas. And so that is the purpose of our creation back in 1939 is to help the judicial branch in the regulation of the practice of law in Texas. And then one other thing that, well, there’s a lot in Chapter 81, but in connection with that, the legislature granted to the Supreme Court of Texas Administrative control, and that’s the actual phrase, use administrative control over the state bar of Texas. It’s one of the reasons that the state bar headquarters sits right there on the northwest corner of the Capitol grounds right next to the Supreme Court. And so we work closely with the Supreme

Rocky Dhir:

Court. Do we know why there was a need for regulation? Was something wrong or were we running ammuck as a profession and we had to kind of be heralded a little bit or what was going on?

Steve Benesh:

Great question. Prior to the creation of the state bar in 1939, there actually was a voluntary bar association called the Texas Bar Association. The only vestige of that is they had a really cool monthly publication named after their association, the Texas Bar Journal, and we adopted that and have used it ever since.

Rocky Dhir:

I don’t ever read it as Cindy knows,

Steve Benesh:

Well at least get past the president’s page. It’s on the third, the column is on the third page. To regulate lawyers, you have to have authority over them and you have to standardize their conduct and you have to identify who is going to regulate them, how that’s going to occur and how it’s going to be funded. And so the state bar of Texas was created, even though I’ve just described to you that it is a public corporation created by the legislature, that it’s under the umbrella of the judicial branch, that it is under the administrative control of the Supreme Court. We still are self-governing uniquely so among professions in the state of Texas.

Rocky Dhir:

I’ve always wondered about that. Apparently there’s government code but then, and it just doesn’t, apparently we’re governed by the state of Texas, but then we’re also sovereign citizens. I don’t get it. I don’t understand.

Steve Benesh:

It’s a head scratcher for a lot of folks. It’s part of my regular talking points. Wherever I go, I go a lot. And so one of the things that I always help people understand is it’s a pretty word, it’s a pretty phrase. What does it actually mean? I guess first and foremost, as far as importance to a lot of people, we don’t cost the taxpayers of the state of Texas one single dime of taxpayer money. We are entirely self-funded. Lawyers pay for the regulation of lawyers in the state of Texas. And that’s important for folks to know that’s a great and important function of self-governing. But beyond that, there are three things we get to do ourselves that those three in coincidence don’t exist for any other regulated profession in the state of Texas. Number one, we get to choose our own regulators, which is the board of directors of the state bar of Texas.

And so that’s one is we get to choose our own. Cindy mentioned a moment ago, we’ve got a hundred, 1600 17,000 actually with the last wave of those we swore in after passing theBar. We’re up to 119,000 now. So we’re growing rapidly as an organization. And I mentioned that because all 119,000 lawyers in the state get to vote for the leaders of the profession. We’re in the middle of the voting period right now, the month of April for two small county candidates as Cindy described for state bar president elect. And so we get to choose our own regulators. Second is we get to approve our own disciplinary rules. Others can draft proposed disciplinary rules all they want, but until the 119,000 of us vote to approve them, they cannot be imposed upon us. And last spring a year ago, there were a set of proposed revisions to the disciplinary rules and some of them we voted for and some of them we voted against. And so we get to impose our own rules upon ourselves and finally we get to vote on our own dues. No one else can swoop in and slap a surtax or an adv valorem on us or anything like that. We all, 119,000 of us agree and vote on our dues. And having those three in coincides and the fact that we are not a financial burden to the state of Texas or its taxpayers in any way are important facets of being self-governing.

Rocky Dhir:

You mentioned the state bar board of directors and that’s been another black hole for me that I’ve just, I know exists. I hear about it and I see stuff about running for state bar director and vote for your directors. Again, I don’t really understand a whole lot of it, but I think Santos, you said as President-elect, I think you do a lot of work directly with the board. So tell us what is the state bar board of directors and why are they important? I guess they govern, but what exactly is involved with that body?

Santos Vargas:

Well, you just alluded to it, Rocky. It’s the governing body that governs the organization that regulates the profession for 119,000 lawyers in the state of Texas. So it’s a big deal and there are lots of issues that come before that body and everything from voting on a budget to approving expenditures, to voting on rules that are recommended to the Supreme Court, a whole laundry list of issues that come before the board of directors. We have 46 voting members. We have members of the public that are part of the board of directors. We have at large directors. We’re very diverse both geographically and by practice area. And we try to cover lots of different practice areas in the state of Texas and these are real issues that hit lawyers in real time. And having a set of elected directors and appointed directors and members of the public that are able to weigh in on those issues, I think helps lead to better outcomes for lawyers across the state of Texas.

And so there’s a lot that the state bar board of directors does. In fact, we have a meeting coming up this week where there will be lots of issues that come up for a vote including a budget for the state bar board of directors. And so lots of issues that come before it and lots of really important work that it does. It also has various subcommittees that do a lot of really important work that ultimately you refer things back to the bigger board to vote on. So lots of issues that it votes on and lots of issues that it considers and works on over the year.

Rocky Dhir:

I think you alluded to this, but you said there’s some that are elected, some that are appointed. And I think if I heard you correctly, there’s 46.

Santos Vargas:

We have a total of 46 voting members. So we have 30 attorneys that are selected from different geographic districts across Texas. And so if you look at a map of state of Texas, there’s 17 different districts and those different districts have different numbers of directors that are elected from that district depending on the population of lawyers for that particular district. We also have public members so that are part of the board. We have at large directors that are appointed by the state bar president. I think Mr. Or President Bennett is just appointed or have a couple of directors that are up for a vote potentially. And then we have officers from the Texas Yellow Lawyers Association also serve on the board as well.

Rocky Dhir:

These non-lawyer members, these public members of the board. Why on earth are they wanting to put themselves through this? Why did they join? How do we select them? Part of

Santos Vargas:

Our mission is protection of the public Rocky. And so of course as lawyers, we can make decisions on what we think is best for the public, but I think it’s important to have members of the public provide input on those issues as well. Right? Some of those members, those public members are appointed by the office of the governor and so that’s where we get those appointments from. But it’s important to have their perspective and they provide a lot of valuable input on lots of different subcommittees that they work on. But because of that protection of the public piece, it’s important to have members of the public be part of the board that governs the organization.

Rocky Dhir:

We do need to take a quick break when we come back. I want to talk a little bit about how you get involved in all this. I mean there’s a lot of opportunities there and honestly I didn’t know there were 46 voting members. That’s a big body. So it sounds like there’s a lot of scope for folks to get involved and it sounds like maybe the state bar needs some help from people to get involved. So I thought maybe we’d talk about that when we get back. But first we’re going to hear from another sponsor and when we come back, we’re going to continue this discussion. This is actually a lot more fun than I thought it was going to be because I thought Who wants to learn about the state bar set? This is actually really cool. Thank you guys. Alright, we’re going to be right back. Stay tuned. See you in just a few. Alright, so welcome back. Look, this has been a fascinating discussion, learning a lot about our state bar of Texas, the presidency, the officers, the directors. One thing I want to talk about though is I didn’t know there was all this opportunity out there, Santos, you talked about 46 voting members and then there’s at large members. So I want to talk a bit about getting involved in state bar leadership. So how exactly does that happen?

Steve Benesh:

Everybody has a different, I guess, description of how we found ourselves serving the state bar for every lawyer. There’s the opportunity to help the state bar to participate in the state bar in a couple of ways. One is if you were to think of the state bar as a building, the cinder blocks that it’s built out of would be our sections. We have dozens of specialty sections and affinity sections of the state bar. Just over 40% of the lawyers in the state are members of various sections of the state bar. And so we encourage folks to become active in their sections. Naturally, people tend to over time to gravitate into positions of leadership and that often leads to leadership or service on the state bar board of directors or other positions of leadership standing committees of the state bar. There are a large number of standing committees of the state bar that are comprised of lawyers who don’t serve on the state bar board of directors.

One of the things that the president elect Santos is in the middle, or I guess towards the tail end of that task right now, the president elect points over 300 lawyers a year to standing committees of the state bar. And so there is that opportunity to get involved. For myself personally and for many it began serving the local bar. I’m in my 38th year with my law firm. First 12 years were in Houston where I was active with the Houston Young Lawyers principally because it was an opportunity to help people who couldn’t help themselves and there was free beer, but life got in the way. And I didn’t get involved with theBar again until we moved to Austin. I was in my late thirties and I thought, I’ve got to get to know local lawyers and local judges. I think I’ll join a section of the Austin bar and just kind of got swept away in service to theBar served as the Austin Bar president, which naturally led to a position on the board of directors with the state bar. And there you go. So it just happens naturally, but it begins with a desire to work with other lawyers for common good and to fellowship with other lawyers who have common interests. The best way for those who want to do it, there are really three ways. Get involved with your local bar or local specialty bars, young lawyer bars, or join one of the many sections of the state bar and get involved there. Or contact the state bar about an interest in serving on a standing committee of the state bar

Rocky Dhir:

Or just stand outside the state bar building. We’ll take that too and just hold up a bar card at some point you’ll get brought in. So Steve, we heard your origin story of how you became the superhero president, but Cindy, what about you? What prompted you to embark on this journey?

Cindy Tisdale:

It was through the sections. Actually, Rocky, I got involved with a family loss section and it was all because of a phone call. I had a good friend call me and say, are you interested in serving on the council for the family loss section? Well, at that point I had two questions, what is it and how much time does it take? And I learned very quickly what both of the answers were. But I got involved with the family law section. I ended up on the executive committee and actually chairing the family law section and that’s what I credit with my pathway to the state bar. After that, I ran of course for the state bar board of directors. I was on the state bar board of directors and then chaired the board later. But I credited all to my section work. And so like Steve said, you don’t have to just run for district director and as your first thing out of the box, what are you interested? Get involved. I promise you just about every section out there needs volunteers doing something. So if you get involved, you let it be known that you’re happy to help, you’re happy to volunteer, that your passion, somebody’s going to put you to work and recognize that. And so that’s how I got involved

Rocky Dhir:

Coming from the woman who’s really into Ted Lasso. So that makes total sense. We’re coming full circle. By the way. I finally watched the entire series. Oh my God, I can’t stop. I keep going back. I keep watching. It’s like little Easter eggs all throughout the series. It’s amazing.

Cindy Tisdale:

Rocky is so good. The final episode of lung. There’s so many Easter eggs in it. You have to watch it many, many times.

Rocky Dhir:

It’s true. Yes. We’ll have to talk about that offline. Santos, you are president-elect, so you were in a position to save yourself most recently, but here you are about to embark on your presidential year. How did you get involved in all this?

Santos Vargas:

I tell the people all the time that my bar journey started with a tap on the shoulder rock and that tap came whenever I was at a brand new lawyer at a law firm in San Antonio, and a fellow lawyer invited me to a San Antonio Yellow Lawyers Association luncheon. Going to that luncheon led me to go to another luncheon, eventually run for a board seat on that board and become its president, and then eventually becoming involved with the San Antonio Bar Association and becoming its president. And then once my term was over, that led to me running for a position on the state bar board of directors. But it all started at the grassroots level with my local bar, the young lawyer affiliate here in San Antonio. And I spent years cutting my teeth on those boards, getting experience, learning how this process worked, learning about the relationship between local bars and state bar, and really kind of getting that experience that helped me get ready to be in a position to run or a director position with the state bar.

Rocky Dhir:

I want to ask maybe the question that you’re not supposed to ever ask, maybe I’m being a bit crude, but hey, do you expect anything more from me? Here’s the big question. If you’re going to do all this state bar work and get so involved, how in the heck are you paying your mortgages?

Cindy Tisdale:

Teamwork makes the dream work, and I’ll just jump in. I have a great team around me at my practice, right? And you have to have that team, but you also have a great team with the state bar staff. They support us, they help us, but at the end, it’s our time. We take away from our practice and so you make it work. I was a solo when I was running and trying to travel the state of Texas and Campaign and being president-elect, and you just find ways to make it work, but the team at the state bar staff really does help tremendously too.

Rocky Dhir:

Did you have a full caseload when you were a solo and you’re still doing your state bar work? Or did you cut back on your caseload at all?

Cindy Tisdale:

No, I still had a full caseload. I met with every client, let them know what was going on in my life and my workday then turned, it was 7:00 PM to midnight. It was my workday and Saturdays and Sundays, and I met with clients on Zoom. My judges were very gracious in giving me leeway when I needed it. Of course, I still had to show up in court sometimes. I just kind of shifted my focus to my clients were my nighttime and weekends. That used to be my free time. And yeah, what was that? I don’t have free time anymore, but just kind of shifted and I made it work and it was fine.

Steve Benesh:

To echo what Cindy said, it’s the same for me as well. Being self-governing. The organization is led by a president and executive team and board members who don’t do this for a living. We practice law. And so having the support of our law firms or companies if they’re in-house counsel or agencies, if it’s in government lawyers is essential. Just the law of probabilities tells us that every once in a while a firm is going to have someone who’s going to rise up and be asked to serve in a position of leadership with theBar. And it’s a chance for law firms to put their money where their mouth is with regard to being a believer in the importance of self-governance. It’s just our turn. My law firm had had one state bar president before 21 years ago, Kelly Frills.

Rocky Dhir:

Oh, sure.

Steve Benesh:

We’d had a couple of decades without anybody serving as state bar president. And so it was just our turn. My firm has been extraordinarily understanding of the amount of time this takes. As Cindy mentioned, my first couple of hours in the morning, our billable work, my last couple of hours before I go to bed, our billable work, everything in between is running the practice of law in the state of Texas, being the president of Law Incorporated in the state of Texas. And Sunday afternoons after I get out of church and have lunch, then I kind of look at what the week ahead does. But also, as Cindy mentioned, we’ve got a staff of 264 people in a six story building on the northwest corner of the Capitol grounds who go to work every day. And their job is maintaining the operation of the regulation of lawyers in the state of Texas. And it’s an incredible staff. We’re served by an executive director, Trey Appel, who himself is a former state bar president, so he gets it. But it’s an incredibly wonderful staff and they are at it full-time every day, all day.

Rocky Dhir:

Santos, how about you? How are you managing to balance all this and how do you plan to do it next year when you’re president?

Santos Vargas:

Not too different from what Steve and Cindy said. I’ve got really good partners and associates at my firm who help me juggle my cases and my caseload and kind of keep things moving for me when we’re out of the office. But I also have an incredible wife who happens to be my law partner as well. And so without her support, I couldn’t do any of this. I mean, she’s been just so valuable, not just as a wife and a mother of my children, but as a law partner in helping me kind of keep all the balls in the air when I’m doing this. And so I couldn’t do any of it without her. So I’m very, very fortunate to, I have such a supportive wife.

Rocky Dhir:

Cindy, I wanted to come back to you for a quick second because one thing we’ve heard from both Steve and Santos and from you is really it’s about the support of other lawyers in your firm. But you mentioned being a solo when you started this journey. How do you make something like this work? If you want to get involved in theBar, you really, you want to get more involved in the state bar, but you’re a solo, you don’t have any other lawyers who can really help you with your caseload. It’s all on you. I can imagine there’s a lot of lawyers who are reluctant because of that hurdle. You seem to have managed it. And other than being superhuman, how else have you threaded that needle?

Cindy Tisdale:

Caffeine. Caffeine works.

Rocky Dhir:

All the Starbucks points. We’re coming back full circle.

Cindy Tisdale:

We’re coming back to it. It’s all full circle if you have the passion and the heart for it. My whole point sounds, but it’s so true, is I wanted to give back to this profession. This profession is giving me and my family everything. And you make time for what’s important to you. We all do whatever that happens to be. You make time for your family, you make time for your work. And for me, it was making time for this profession. And as a solo, like I said, it was, oh, trust me. I thought about it long and hard. I bet said yes. What’s that going to look like? Am I going to be able to pay my electric bill or put food on the table and what’s going to

Rocky Dhir:

Happen? Tell the collection agency. I’m the state bar president,

Cindy Tisdale:

Let’s not go there. But getting those pink slips in the mail, but you just make it work. And as attorneys, that’s what we do. We find time, we manage a hundred different clients, all the different dockets, and we juggle. That’s what we do as lawyers. This is another ball in the air. Can you handle one more ball in the air? And again, as lawyers, that’s what we do for a living. That’s what we do in our daily practice. And this is just adding another ball. Now it’s a beach ball, don’t get me wrong. It’s not a ping pong ball, but can we manage it? And you have to look at it. And if that’s something important to you, if I can do it, anybody can.

Rocky Dhir:

I’ve seen what you do, Cindy, and I can’t. But I’m sure there are other Cindy Tisdale’s out there who could probably be just as amazing as you are. Speaking of amazing, I want to talk about the most important people in this discussion. We’ve alluded to them and know it’s not the lawyers of Texas. They’re great. But I’m talking about the state bar staff. I think all three of you have alluded to them in some form or fashion. Can we just talk quickly as we close about, we’ve talked about how the staff supports you, but what are the different departments that are comprising the State Bar of Texas staff? What do they do and how do they interact with the leadership to kind of make this whole ship run from year to year?

Steve Benesh:

Well, it depends on the leadership role. There’s a department for every function of the state bar, continuing legal education, and the Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel and the Texas Bar Journal staff and the editors of that particular publication, our social media presence, our online presence, the maintenance of the state bar website, which is currently being overhauled and updated. And so it’s a robust staff that is focused on their areas of specialty. I obviously interact with the state bar staff mostly our executive director, tle and our chief of staff, Jennifer Reams every day, as well as the two deputy directors, Kaylin Laney and Lowell Brown on a regular basis. Our Chief counsel, Chris Ritter, on a regular basis, but each member of our board is assigned one or more board, well, more than one board committee to serve on. I’ve talked about standing committees that are made up of both public and members and practicing lawyers of theBar.

But the board also has its own committees in connection with its function. And each committee of the board is assigned a particular staff member as a liaison. And so every director who serves and every director serves on a board committee has the opportunity to liaise with the particular staff member who’s assigned to that committee. They ride to the sound of the guns. They’re available to work with each director, each member of the board of directors, each office to help us to perform our task competently. And the other thing is they’re here from year to year. We come and go. Directors generally serve three year terms. We serve three year terms as president-elect president in immediate past, but they’re the common thread that runs through our incumbencies, through our service to theBar, providing and delivering consistent service and consistency and keeping us on the runway and not hooking or slicing and getting off or away from what our core function is in the regulation of the practice of law. It would be impossible to do what we do. We’re volunteers. We’re amateurs at this, but they’re professionals. They do this for a living, and we would not be able to exist as a self-governing bar without the excellence of the state bar staff.

Rocky Dhir:

Well said. That is absolutely true, and I’ve worked with a number of them. They are absolutely phenomenal people. But guys, I think after talking to all three of you, I think I’ve decided we’ll go ahead and keep you guys around for a little bit and let you guys keep doing what you’re doing. So Cindy, Steve Santos, thank you all for being here, being cross-examined, being part of this inquisition. Of course. Thank you for your state bar service, all three of you, and to everybody that serves alongside you. It’s been a pleasure. Always good to chat with you, Rocky.

Cindy Tisdale:

Thank you so much, Rocky.

Rocky Dhir:

No, of course. Thank you all for being here. And of course, I want to thank you for tuning in. I want to encourage you to stay safe, be well, and keep tuning in. If you like what you heard today, please rate and review us wherever you get your podcasts. Until next time, remember, life’s a journey, folks. I’m Rocky Dhir, signing off. Until next time.

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