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 on the links provided.
President
May Sene
415-379-3692
president@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.”
Vice President
Francie Skaggs
925- 212-4979
vicepresident@sflpa.org
I am delighted about the next year in the San Francisco Legal Professionals Association and my new role as Vice President! I have many events planned in order to make our association fun as well as continuing with educational events for our members and to make this year an even better one.
In my role as Vice President, I will work closely with our new President, May Sene while we help the SFLPA Strive for Excellence! I will be scheduling some after work events in some of San Francisco’s favorite locations where members can renew their membership and bring friends and co-workers, where all can network and socialize to build relationships in the legal community. At these events I will make sure there are lots of opportunities to win raffle prizes. The first one will be scheduled in June – so be on the lookout for that event on our website at www.sflpa.org/sflpa-events.
I will continue with educational events as one-third of our newly formed Educational Committee, along with President May Sene and Day in Court Chair Lillian Wong. We will continue to schedule our popular Brown Bag events on the fourth Tuesday of every month, which will offer our members education as well as continuing educational certificates needed. We are working to offer education, not just in the litigation field, but also in trademark, estate planning, family law, corporate and other areas of the law.
Members are welcomed to email me at vicepresident@sflpa.org or francieskaggs@gmail.com with any suggestions or requests for Brown Bags or events that we have not offered. I will try and do what I can to make it happen.
Now, let’s have a wonderful year together!
Treasurer
Sally Mendez Arevalo
415-421-7151
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 Secretaries 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 Senior Secretary at Altshuler Berzon 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 women in the Mission District.
Secretary
Kristen Craig-Reed
415-972-9160
secretary@sflpa.org
Kristen Craig-Reed is thrilled to be a member of the SFLPA board in the role of Secretary. This year marks Kristen’s 10th year as an Account Executive at Barkley Court Reporters and 9 years as a member of the SFLPA. As a very active member of the organization, she has helped to orchestrate many membership and fundraising events such as BINGO nights, Silent Auctions, Happy Hours and she regularly assists Francie with her education programs. Kristen’s goal for the 2019-2020 fiscal year is to encourage members to get more involved in SFLPA activities. Let’s have fun together!
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 (LSI) 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 LSI quarterly conference and reporting back to the membership what was discussed upon her return from each LSI 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 LSI 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 LSI 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 LSI. Chapter Achievement Awards are presented every year at LSI’s Annual Conference in May and it Chris’ hope that SFLPA will earn an award for its participation at the next annual LSI conference.
Immediate Past President
Carol Romo
415-365-7471
pastpresident@sflpa.org
Carol Romo began working as a legal secretary in San Francisco twenty years ago. She currently works at Crowell & Moring LLP where she assists three partners and two associates in civil litigation and trial practice. She joined San Francisco Legal Professionals Association (SFLPA) in 2012 and was appointed program committee chairman her first year and served as delegate at her first Legal Secretaries Incorporated (LSI) conference during that year as well. She has since attended LSI conferences regularly where she has made many acquaintances and frequently represents SFLPA at neighboring Association events. Carol served as Program Chair for three consecutive years, organizing membership dinner meetings, installations, and Holiday Parties at local restaurants; and introduced Special Guest Speaker nights featuring local judges.
Carol was elected as Secretary in 2015 and Vice President in 2017 during which time she organized an Open House which introduced LSI and SFLPA to many new members who joined during that event. The following year Carol became President and focused on using the experience and knowledge she had acquired the past years to reestablish SFLPA to better comply with the basic fundamentals of LSI guidelines and restore the business of running the association back to its membership, “This will draw more interest and participation to enable future Presidents to fill the committee chairs with new faces and bring in new ideas necessary for an organization such as ours to thrive in this city filled with vast resources of prominent law firms.” Carol currently chairs the bylaw revision committee started during her term as president which will complete its mission of drafting new bylaws to present to its members and LSI after the LSI conference in November which Carol also is co-chairman of organizing and planning this much anticipated event.
“I love being a part of this institution of dedicated legal professionals and I know there are more like me out there who haven’t heard about us yet; we just have to find them like they found me seven years ago. I am told that SFLPA was once the ‘wanna-be’ association of the organization and I am dedicated to seeing it return to that state of popularity again.”