Executive Board consists of the elected officers, immediate past president and the Parliamentarian. To view a list of the committees as well as their respective duties, please click here.
President
Francie Skaggs
Coblentz, Patch, Duffy & Bass LLP
925- 212-4979
president@sflpa.org
I am looking forward to serving as President of San Francisco Legal Professionals Association for another year. We have some wonderful new Board members who have joined our team. Our Board has many exciting ideas and plans that will help our members soar to their highest potential.
Members are welcome to email me at president@sflpa.org or francieskaggs@gmail.com with any suggestions, educational ideas or topics for Brown Bags . I will try and do what I can to make it happen. I also welcome any members who would like to join our Board to let me know. Since I joined the SFLPA Board back in 2012, I have grown and learned so much. If you are afraid of the “commitment,” or the amount of time, please don’t let that be an obstacle. There are committees that would require about 1 to 2 hours per week. When you step outside your comfort zone, you will grow and only enhance your career, and we have many Board members who are happy to mentor and support your growth process.
Now, let’s go!
Vice President
Leanne Ruesink
First Legal
Leanne has worked in the litigation services industry for over 6 years. She is currently an Account Executive for First Legal, supporting San Francisco, Bay Area, and Sacramento law firms. She has two daughters, Lauren (25) and Alexandra (22), and she strives to be a good example for her girls about work ethic, problem solving, and community outreach. One of Leanne’s biggest pleasures is spending time with her Horse, Blackjack.
Being a member of the SFLPA has afforded Leanne the opportunity to establish friendships with other legal professionals and develop a camaraderie within this organization that focuses on giving back to the community by fostering Excellence through Education. The SFLPA is not only a conduit for these resources in our community but also amongst its members. Leanne first joined the board in 2021-2022, as the Legal Procedures Chair. Fulfilling the duties of that position gently nudged her to learn more about the litigation process as she provided court updates and other legal procedural related issues to the members. This experience, coupled with her soft skills of diplomacy, leadership, and listening, will propel Leanne to succeed in her new position at Vice President and Membership Chair of SFLPA.
Secretary
Lorri Nicolini
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, P.C.
secretary@sflpa.org
Lorri brings 32 years of legal secretarial experience to her role as Secretary of SFLPA and Co-Chair of the CCLS Committee. She has worked primarily in defense-side litigation in State and Federal Courts, including some appellate work. She is a CCLS candidate and hopes to pass the last section of the CCLS exam in September 2021. After her initial legal job supporting a sole practitioner handling all aspects of his business, from bookkeeping to calendaring to court filings and more, she went on to work for various firms – small, medium, and large – honing her litigation skills in a variety of areas including medical malpractice, employment law, construction defect litigation, asbestos defense, and general business litigation. Lorri currently works for Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati, P.C. in their San Francisco office in the Securities and Commercial Litigation Department.
Lorri is a past member of Mt. Diablo LPA and a current member of the San Francisco Paralegal Association (SFPA). Her first article (of hopefully many) for The Hearsay was published in January 2021. Lorri is eager to take a more active role on the Board of SFLPA and form closer bonds with other legal professionals in the Bay Area while promoting professional development opportunities and events. When she is not working, you can usually find Lorri in a tap dance class or taking Zumba.
Treasurer
Sally Mendez Arevalo
Weinberg, Roger & Rosenfeld
415-410-8133
treasurer@sflpa.org
Sally Mendez was born and raised in San Francisco, and is a Past President of the San Francisco Legal Professionals Association. She was also Editor of SFLPA’s monthly newsletter, The Hearsay, for twelve consecutive years. She has held several different Board member positions and was Career Promotion/Scholarship Program Chair for Legal Professionals Incorporated. Last year, Sally was presented with the President’s Award for her above-and-beyond-duty accomplishments which included taking on the new role of Website Editor while serving as Secretary, and later volunteering to serve as pro tem Treasurer using her past experience as Treasurer of this Association to pick up the pieces and run the finances of the Association on a moment’s notice; helping to conduct an audit as a result of the sudden replacement of the Treasurer. There were many challenges during the past year that Sally met and succeeded in.
Today, Sally is the permanent Treasurer and has already handled a variety of new tasks that fell to her under the office of Treasurer including reestablishing new bank accounts, coordinating online credit card payments, and serving as the Advertising Marketing Chair to sell advertising space on SFLPA’s website. Sally currently works as Legal Secretary at Weinberg, Roger & Rosenfeld and has been working in the legal profession for twenty years.
Sally has dedicated her time to Civil Rights and Peace Advocacy since her early childhood upbringing in the Mission District in San Francisco. She is a past member and current advocate member of the Mission Girls Services program which is dedicated to empowering young women in the Mission District.
Governor and Parliamentarian
Christine J. Flores, CBA
415-773-5566
governor@sflpa.org
Christine Flores is a Certified Bankruptcy Assistant and is employed at Orrick Harrington & Sutcliffe LLP where she has worked for many years. Chris has been a member of San Francisco Legal Professionals Association (SFLPA) since 1990. Since that time she served as President of SFLPA from 1993-1995, 2000-2002, and 2010-2015. She has been Governor for the past five years and served in other capacities such as Vice President, Historian, and Legal Procedures Chair, and member of the Education Committee. Chris was also President of an East Bay chapter of Legal Secretaries Incorporated (LPI) and served on the Bay Area Legal Forum as Secretary and Second Vice President.
As Governor, Chris represents the members of this Association at general assembly meetings held during each LPI quarterly conference and reporting back to the membership what was discussed upon her return from each LPI conference and casting the vote of the Association in accordance with the wishes of its members. The Governor is the liaison between the Association and its corporate parent; passing information between the two entities such as news of upcoming events and any other pertinent matters presented at each conference. The Governor is also responsible for managing the timely responses from the Association officers and committee chairman to the directives issued by their counterparts at LPI on a quarterly basis.
Fianally, it is Chris’ duty to keep track of the Association Chapter Achievement points which are part of a contest between other Associations under LPI that are comparable in the number of members and are determined by membership participation in a number of activities in support of neighboring Associations under LPI. Chapter Achievement Awards are presented every year at LPI’s Annual Conference in May and it Chris’ hope that SFLPA will earn an award for its participation at the next annual LPI conference.
Executive Advisor
May Sene
Paralegal
415-379-3692
executiveadvisor@sflpa.org
May was born in Hong Kong to a large Asian family of eight children. When she was about six years old, her family immigrated to the United States. May’s siblings grew up in the heart of San Francisco’s Chinatown.
May has been in the legal field for about 18 years assisting estate planning sole practitioners with their probate cases. She began her own freelance probate document business in 2010, when she first joined the SFLPA.
“SFLPA has enriched my life, both personally and professionally. The members of SFLPA are wonderful, decent, fun and yet hardworking individuals. It is always a joy to attend SFLPA events and to spend time with my esteem colleagues. I credit SFLPA for helping me launch my freelance business for which I am eternally grateful. Now is the time for me to give back to the SFLPA organization. I look forward to serving as SFLPA’s Parliamentarian, and to contribute to the continuing success of SFLPA in any way that I can.”
Advertising Editor of The Hearsay
Kate Cochran
Coblentz, Patch, Duffy & Bass LLP
editor@sflpa.org
Kate Cochran is a legal secretary at the law firm of Coblentz Patch Duffy & Bass LLP. She is delighted to join the SFLPA Board as the Co-Editor of The Hearsay. Kate wears many hats and loves to host Spa Day as a beauty consultant—just one of her side hustles! Kate lives in downtown SF with her husband Eric, 6-year-old Izzy, and grouchy old cat, Tulip. You can usually find them taking snapshots of local graffiti art, looking for bugs at local parks, and running around Union Square at night.