Every lawyer needs a disaster plan for their practice. Not only to save their livelihood but also to continue to meet their ethical obligations to the clients. Winter Storm Uri taught that no area in Texas is truly safe from the danger posed by disasters. It’s not a matter of if your office is affected it’s when your office is affected. Listen to our very own hosts from LANWT, LSLA, and TRLA to learn everything you need to know to be prepared.
Visit our website at https://texasdisasterlegalhelp.org/
Music Credit: Track: Travel With Us — Vendredi [Audio Library Release]Music provided by Audio Library Plus Watch: https://youtu.be/o-rpKzt4KSYFree Download / Stream: https://alplus.io/travel-us
Every lawyer needs a disaster plan for their practice. Not only to save their livelihood but also to continue to meet their ethical obligations to the clients. Winter Storm Uri taught that no area in Texas is truly safe from the danger posed by disasters. It’s not a matter of if your office is affected it’s when your office is affected. Listen to our very own hosts from LANWT, LSLA, and TRLA to learn everything you need to know to be prepared.
Visit our website at https://texasdisasterlegalhelp.org/
Music Credit: Track: Travel With Us — Vendredi [Audio Library Release]Music provided by Audio Library Plus Watch: https://youtu.be/o-rpKzt4KSYFree Download / Stream: https://alplus.io/travel-us
Recorded June 3rd, 2021
Speakers: Stuart Campbell - LANWT Belinda Martinez - LSLA Pablo Almaguer - TRLA
Transcript
hello folks uh this is Pablo
00:41
Almaguer from Texas RioGrande Legal Aid
00:43
welcoming you to
00:44
another episode of our podcast here for
00:46
texas disaster legal help
00:48
uh this is an interesting one. We’re
00:49
going to do it's actually going to be
00:51
the
00:51
moderators or the hosts here that are
00:53
going to be giving the presentation
00:54
it'll be an interesting one
00:55
uh that'll be described to you soon
00:56
enough here by belinda, but first of all
00:58
let me tell you what we do who we are
01:00
and why we're here
01:01
we are a coordinated project between
01:03
legal aid of northwest texas lone star
01:04
legal aid and texas riogrande legal aid
01:07
aimed at improving access to justice for
01:08
those affected by disasters
01:10
our project allows both disaster
01:12
survivors and pro bono attorneys to
01:13
access critical resources in one place
01:15
while at the same time
01:16
making it easier to connect disaster
01:18
survivors needing help
01:20
legal help with the volunteer attorneys
01:22
willing to provide it
01:24
in this way the project team hopes to
01:25
increase the number of disaster survivor
01:27
clients who receive high quality legal
01:29
assistance
01:30
as they continue to navigate the
01:31
recovery process after a disaster
01:33
and provide the support mentorship pro
01:35
bono attorneys need to achieve
01:36
success with that introduction let me go
01:39
ahead and go over to belinda to tell us
01:40
what we're going to be doing today
01:43
all right thank you as always Pablo
01:46
this episode is going to be about
01:48
preparing your law office for disaster
01:50
every lawyer needs a disaster plan for
01:52
their practice
01:54
not only to save your livelihood but
01:56
also to continue to meet
01:57
the ethical obligations to your clients
02:00
winter storm uri taught
02:01
everyone that no area in texas is truly
02:03
safe from the dangers posed by various
02:05
disasters
02:07
it's not a matter of if your office is
02:09
affected here's what you do
02:11
it's when it's affected this is what
02:13
you're going to do
02:15
lawyers need to think not just about
02:16
saving their building but how are they
02:18
going to rebuild how will they handle
02:19
communications document handing
02:22
how to operate if your staff doesn't
02:23
have access to the equipment
02:26
this podcast is going to cover a lot of
02:27
that how to create an emergency plan
02:30
Plan for disaster minimize the damage
02:32
how to make sure you have proper
02:34
coverage to rebuild and attorney's
02:36
ethical obligations to their clients
02:38
during these periods
02:40
to start us off here's our own stuart
02:42
campbell
02:43
with a little bit more on emergency
02:44
planning stuart
02:46
hi everybody i'm stuart campbell and i'm
02:50
a housing attorney i am by no means a uh
02:53
disaster recovery expert um nor have i
02:56
ever owned my own law firm so
02:58
uh take that the way you will but um
03:01
i'm gonna be relying heavily on the
03:03
disaster resource guide from the aba the
03:05
american bar association
03:06
and the most recent texas bar journal
03:08
that just got published on june 1st
03:11
we are recording on june 2nd 2021
03:14
there's a great piece called are you
03:16
prepared by john browning in the most
03:18
recent version of the journal
03:20
and we're going to link to both of those
03:21
resources in our notes but also on our
03:24
website
03:24
just so if there's something that i miss
03:27
which i undoubtedly will
03:28
you can refer back to the source
03:30
material
03:32
for what we are talking about but
03:35
i want to talk to you about knowing your
03:37
risks and that kind of falls down into
03:39
two different categories
03:41
one of them is emergency planning and
03:43
the other one is how to minimize damage
03:45
and restart your normal business
03:47
operation so let's start
03:48
let's start talking about emergency
03:50
planning
03:52
this might come as a surprise but
03:54
everyone should have a
03:56
I almost said discovery control plan
03:58
disaster recovery plan
04:01
for their office, you should absolutely
04:03
have that ready
04:04
and if you don't have it now you need it
04:07
because you never know when the next
04:08
thing is going to happen
04:09
we just experienced three months ago
04:13
a once in a century ice storm that
04:15
knocked down communications and like
04:16
electricity for over a week and some
04:18
and there's actually some of my clients
04:20
still not having water
04:21
because of this and so and here we are
04:24
in june
04:24
and so it's really important to know uh
04:27
what to do in
04:28
the in the case there is a crazy
04:30
disaster or not so crazy disaster
04:33
um uh and I’m going to try to set out
04:35
some key priorities that you need to
04:38
establish and have ready to go for your
04:40
own disaster recovery plan
04:43
it is really important that you have one
04:45
but if you have one it's really
04:47
important that all employees
04:48
know that you have one know what their
04:50
roles are it's also really important
04:52
that you know
04:53
you know what your partner's roles are
04:54
every employee should know what
04:56
the other group of employees roles are
04:58
that way if someone can't do their job
05:00
because they've been affected by the
05:01
natural disaster which hopefully they
05:03
haven't but it happens
05:05
you can know what needs to be you can
05:07
assess what needs to happen
05:08
and know what your roles may be so how
05:11
do you create a recovery plan
05:13
a disaster plan again setting priorities
05:16
the main priorities are going to be one
05:18
protecting human life
05:20
or in employment terms your personnel
05:23
two communication both with your
05:25
employees and your clients
05:27
three your work your workspace and
05:29
equipment and then four
05:31
those hard copy documents for human life
05:34
you want to establish
05:35
for your personnel you want to establish
05:37
the core group of folks to keep normal
05:40
operations running
05:41
at legal aid that's our IT team and
05:44
key members of our support staff with we
05:47
have five people on staff at legal aid
05:49
that are full-time IT
05:50
that's all they do and without them we
05:52
wouldn't have made it through covid we
05:53
wouldn't even made it to the first month
05:55
of covid
05:56
without them we wouldn't have made it
05:57
through this ice storm and so
05:59
identify the core group of folks that
06:02
you need to
06:04
keep your normal business operations
06:05
running um
06:07
and uh and for a lowly staff attorney
06:10
like me i was not on that core group of
06:11
people which is probably good
06:13
um i'm curious i'm gonna call some
06:15
people out Belinda
06:18
Pablo did you guys have and were you guys
06:20
a part of the disaster recovery plan for
06:22
your team itself during the ice storm or
06:24
did you have folks already ready to do
06:25
that
06:28
I know at lone star we also have a
06:30
dedicated tech team
06:31
that was already had a plan in place
06:34
because here in Houston
06:36
we'd already gone through Harvey when
06:39
the pandemic hit
06:40
we were a little bit more prepared the
06:41
The only thing that we had to kind of
06:43
scrabble on was the remote access
06:46
we had something in place it wasn't the
06:48
best so we ended up
06:50
you know playing with zoom Microsoft
06:51
teams etc to kind of bring us up
06:54
which means when the winter storm uri
06:56
hit
06:57
it almost didn't affect us as long as
06:59
you had electricity you had access
07:01
so that's awesome Pablo yeah our
07:04
disaster recovery team
07:06
actually kind of throughout the year
07:07
reminds us for example to update our
07:09
disaster uh
07:10
you know recovery plan so we know where
07:12
we're going to be what's going to happen
07:13
and also reminds it for that so
07:16
we come into action and do whatever they
07:18
you know they might tell us you know to
07:19
do and and
07:20
it's sort of like all hands on deck when
07:21
it does happen so they might
07:23
set up a clinic or go to a DRC center or
07:26
need access info or help with
07:28
intake and we kind of take our lead from
07:30
the disaster recovery team
07:32
uh but you know what you just mentioned
07:34
is really important I mean what does
07:35
happen sometimes is that
07:36
and they'd say a disaster does hit close
07:38
to the office, we have to find our
07:40
employees first make sure that
07:41
everybody's safe and if you don't have
07:42
it
07:43
you know a place to locate the contact
07:45
information
07:46
uh you might not be able to do that so
07:48
that's always important to plan ahead of
07:49
that
07:50
once we're safe within the office and
07:51
the program then we move forward and
07:52
help the clients
07:53
you see that's what makes you a good
07:55
co-host because you perfectly segue into
07:56
my next
07:57
my next point uh yeah I knew what's
07:59
going to come out
08:00
it's almost as if there's it's almost as
08:02
if we're sharing a google document right
08:04
now I don't know
08:05
maybe yeah but uh
08:08
yeah so make sure your employees are
08:09
safe that's the next thing right and and
08:11
the best way you can do that is to make
08:13
sure the office itself
08:14
can be is prepared in a case like Pablo
08:17
said a natural disaster
08:19
occurs while you're at the office um
08:21
there's a few things I want to point out
08:22
here there's a great
08:23
checklist that CNN published and we're
08:26
going to link to that as well
08:28
uh that addresses some things that
08:30
you're going to want
08:31
in your office, this list is more geared
08:33
towards the residential protection but
08:35
there's things that you're going to want
08:36
also in your office first and foremost
08:38
i'm going to point out four things
08:39
you're going to want a first aid kit and
08:41
you're going to want fire extinguishers
08:43
and those need to be clearly
08:44
labeled and marked out to where if you
08:46
need to find them with a flashlight you
08:47
can in our office we've got
08:49
big yellow labels on cabinets
08:52
next to our mail room that says first
08:54
aid
08:54
fire and so you can't miss it if you if
08:57
the lights are on it's reflected
08:59
it's blinding so uh those are huge
09:02
extra batteries are huge I’m also going
09:04
to talk about batteries
09:05
when we talk more about tech in a couple
09:07
minutes but having extra batteries both
09:09
for flashlights but also for
09:11
uh different electronics are very very
09:14
very important
09:15
all right so let's move to the next step
09:18
which is communications
09:20
two just short things here you're going
09:22
to want to be able to establish
09:23
communications with your employees
09:26
what we have at legal aid is we have
09:29
these uh
09:30
these lists that they publish with the
09:32
with the employee’s consent
09:34
every employee gets this hard copy list
09:37
of everyone's
09:38
uh at least either cell phone or home
09:42
phone
09:43
and a personal email account it doesn't
09:46
have to be the one you use but it can be
09:47
one that you
09:48
use for everything but one that you can
09:49
at least have access to that way
09:52
if everything at work goes down you at
09:55
least can contact somebody
09:57
using their personal information if that
09:59
needs to happen
10:00
and you should also establish who is
10:02
reporting to who in the event of a
10:04
natural disaster
10:05
right are you going to be reporting
10:06
directly to your supervisor who is
10:08
keeping tab on
10:09
tabs on who and have a backup just in
10:11
case that happens in my case
10:14
i directly report to my supervisor if
10:16
everything shuts down
10:17
i'm calling brent who's my boss and i
10:19
say hey brent everything shuts down
10:21
if i can't get a hold of him it goes to
10:23
the admin secretary
10:24
so have a clear path make sure your
10:26
employees know who they need to keep
10:27
tabs on in the event of a disaster
10:30
and then with your clients and Pablo is
10:32
going to talk about this at length
10:34
there are certain things you need to
10:35
know certain things you need to
10:37
establish early on
10:39
in the in the wake of a disaster one you
10:41
need to let them know if your firm was
10:42
affected and how it was affected
10:44
two you know let them know the best way
10:47
to communicate with you and then three
10:49
when they should expect things to return
10:51
to normalcy
10:53
but again Pablo is going to talk more
10:55
about the ethical considerations of
10:56
communication with your clients in the
10:57
wake of a natural disaster in just a
10:58
moment
11:00
um another key element for your
11:02
discovery
11:03
again discovery for your recovery uh
11:05
plan
11:06
is the workspace and equipment we're
11:09
going to talk about that a little
11:11
at length in about two minutes but uh
11:14
main takeaway there talk to an IT
11:16
specialist to figure out what you need
11:17
again we're very blessed at lone star at
11:19
TRLA
11:20
and at legal aid to have
11:23
good It teams, and so we have those IT
11:26
specialists in-house, but you're probably
11:27
if you're a smaller firm or if you're a
11:29
solo practitioner
11:30
you might want to talk to an IT person
11:32
to figure out what the best plan is for
11:33
your firm
11:35
but for the documents again, the last
11:37
element of your consideration
11:38
on your plan have a
11:42
develop a plan if you cannot access your
11:44
documents
11:45
if you already possess documents during
11:47
a natural disaster or if your documents
11:49
are destroyed by a disaster
11:51
right for us at legal aid, here's an
11:53
example that we use
11:55
and our work from home policy in order
11:57
for us to maintain our work from home
11:58
during covid
11:59
we had to show our admin that we had
12:02
the ability to lock and store
12:04
documents safely they wouldn't let us
12:07
take documents home
12:08
they would let us work from home but
12:09
they wouldn't let us take physical
12:10
documents home
12:11
unless I literally took a picture of my
12:13
safe or a drawer that would lock
12:16
and said this is what we're doing um so
12:18
Personally, I have two fireproof document
12:20
safes
12:21
and so whenever I take a document home
12:23
if I’m not currently using it goes into
12:25
safe
12:26
um so yeah, make sure you have a plan and
12:29
to
12:29
to control your documents if a natural
12:31
disaster strikes
12:32
all right, so minimizing damages
12:36
damages of course legal brain again
12:38
minimizing damage
12:39
and restarting your business after a
12:43
natural disaster
12:44
this is all about technology, right tech
12:46
tech tech um again
12:48
consult with a tech guy tech girl tech
12:50
person to figure out the best
12:52
way to
12:55
that your firm needs to address these
12:58
certain issues, but I’m going to hit four
13:00
real quick one is backups
13:03
there's a whole bunch of different type
13:05
of data and email backup systems
13:07
there's both on-site and cloud-based
13:10
there's these
13:11
There are certain types of backups called
13:12
network-attached storage
13:14
and storage area networks that can be
13:16
extremely helpful
13:17
if physical computers are corrupted or
13:20
data is
13:21
uh is somehow compromised
13:24
uh during a natural disaster, these are
13:26
local
13:28
locally held physical backups with like
13:31
terabytes
13:32
on terabytes of information
13:35
those can help a lot if
13:38
they're not compromised themselves that
13:40
they can
13:42
they can get your operation up and
13:44
running a lot faster
13:46
we have those at legal aid, I’m assuming
13:48
you all do, too every big firm has them
13:51
um if something goes down, you can
13:54
very quickly, go back on the backup and
13:56
pull that document or pull that that
13:58
case file
13:59
that said, maybe, for example,, you
14:02
uh work at TRLA old Fannin
14:05
street office, and it goes up in flames
14:06
oh, sorry, not TRLA lone star
14:09
yeah, um, when those are completely gone
14:12
Belinda you want to speak to that real
14:13
quick oh yeah for those in the audience
14:15
that don't know
14:16
uh lone star's main office here in
14:18
houston during harvey flooded
14:20
and then somehow caught fire and burned
14:22
down all right
14:23
so thank god for our backups right
14:26
and here's what again perfect because
14:30
uh those physical backups that are on
14:32
site
14:33
are vulnerable to just like to anything
14:36
physically that can be
14:37
that can corrupt physically just like
14:38
any other computer right if the building
14:40
burns down
14:41
like lone star's location in Houston uh
14:44
well those are gone too so it's really
14:46
important to have online cloud-based
14:47
backups
14:49
um these come with a price right but
14:52
different services
14:53
uh like carbonite iCloud google drives
14:56
we use the ones that are offered through
14:58
Microsoft uh
15:00
and so pretty crucial too, it might take
15:03
longer
15:03
right but it's really important to have
15:05
it just in case
15:07
something really crazy does happen like
15:08
a building getting burnt down
15:10
the next really important thing about
15:12
tech that you that you're going to want
15:13
to
15:13
have in the event of a natural disaster
15:16
is to make sure you have an email server
15:18
that does
15:18
these next four things you're going to
15:21
want to make sure your email can both
15:24
send and receive email while the power
15:26
is out
15:27
now if you're a tech person and you
15:28
heard me say that you're probably like
15:29
yeah duh
15:30
but uh a lot of emails don't have that
15:33
um
15:33
and so if you're operating on an older
15:35
email system
15:37
that only is functional whenever you're
15:38
connected to the internet well be
15:40
careful
15:40
you're gonna wanna you're gonna wanna
15:42
have one that has a cloud-based
15:44
recovery system okay I know ours has it i
15:48
know
15:49
i assume i think we're all on office
15:51
365's right so
15:53
yeah we all use one that has that you
15:55
want to make sure your that that
15:56
backup also can synchronize with your
15:58
mailbox in your calendar once power is
15:59
restored
16:01
and here's a really really important
16:02
thing and I’m going to talk about this
16:03
one just for just a couple of seconds
16:06
you want to have an email systems that
16:08
email system that provides an alternate
16:09
web-based email transport system if your
16:12
normal email server is corrupted now
16:15
this made me uh very angry
16:19
recently because uh it also saved a
16:21
whole bunch of us
16:23
um from probably doing some bad stuff
16:25
but
16:27
we lost our email server whenever the
16:28
ice storm happened completely gone
16:31
um and so for about four days we had no
16:34
16:36
until they clicked in our IT guys
16:38
over the weekend clicked in our
16:40
web-based email transport system
16:41
so instead of having typical outlook or
16:43
office 365 we
16:45
we went back to a web-based email
16:47
transport system
16:48
and saved our firm basically and we had
16:50
to use that for a few
16:51
or for a little bit until our normal
16:53
email was restored that's why it's super
16:55
important it's actually happened to us
16:56
it's happened to me
16:57
and so um not being able to communicate
17:00
with clients in court
17:01
uh is uh pretty scary and as Pablo
17:03
will say can probably get you in trouble
17:05
and so uh super important to have that
17:07
backup system to have that
17:10
um backup email web-based transport
17:12
system
17:13
in the event that your normal email is
17:14
compromised or corrupted
17:16
or hacked in some way all right
17:19
internet access pretty crucial
17:21
everything we just talked about involves
17:22
internet access
17:24
and there's a couple of things I want to
17:26
talk about here we operate under a
17:28
vpn
17:29
is a virtual private network that
17:32
provides
17:33
uh kind of end-to-end encryption
17:36
on communications um through your
17:39
computer
17:39
through uh your email and stuff like
17:41
that so I had a tech guy explain to me
17:44
like if you're on a public wi-fi say for
17:46
your example you're in a natural
17:48
disaster and uh
17:50
your office internet's down well you're
17:51
going to go to what your public library
17:53
sure that's a public
17:55
wi-fi system very vulnerable to hackers
17:58
very vulnerable to people who are going
17:59
to try to steal your data
18:00
if you're on that you better be using
18:03
some type of encryption service
18:04
or a VPN because what a VPN does is
18:08
if you're on one of these public servers
18:09
he explained it like it's one of these
18:11
big
18:11
mixer highway systems so we have all these
18:13
on-ramps and offerings
18:15
well if you're on your own vpn you're in
18:17
the subway by yourself underneath all
18:18
that
18:19
and that's how I described it and so
18:22
it's the best way to protect yourself
18:24
whenever using a public internet service
18:27
um
18:28
and uh another really important thing
18:30
and i know we have these here at legal
18:32
aid for
18:32
internet access and this is not a
18:34
forever fix but it is a temporary fix
18:36
during a power outage
18:38
is what's called an ups right it's an
18:40
uninterruptible power supply these
18:42
are backup batteries for modems routers
18:44
servers and wi-fi extenders
18:46
and so again for the servers they're
18:48
pretty short these
18:49
power these backup power supplies if the
18:51
lights go off they can they only last
18:53
about an hour
18:55
but the batteries for these modems and
18:56
routers can last a lot longer
18:58
and so um you can have
19:01
internet even if there's no power if you
19:04
have these uninterruptable power
19:05
supplies backup batteries
19:07
super important a lot of big firms have
19:09
them a lot of big companies have them
19:11
and so that's pretty crucial to
19:13
maintaining internet access even if the
19:14
power is out
19:16
and then lastly damage control
19:20
and then I’m going to toss it over to
19:21
belinda but damage control this is some
19:24
common sense stuff I think surge
19:25
protectors I don't want to talk too much
19:27
about it I have a few notes here but
19:29
um basically really quick if it if it's
19:32
old
19:32
replace it those things can die if it
19:35
has a flashing light on it it's probably
19:37
dead
19:37
replace it and you can tell by
19:40
if you're in the market for buying one
19:42
they have different joules, joules of the
19:44
whatever the metric for electricity i
19:46
don't know
19:47
i'm not a science guy but they have
19:48
different joule ratings
19:50
uh-oh getting a call ignore
19:54
different joule ratings on these things
19:56
and so the higher the rating the more
19:57
protection you're going to get
19:59
but make sure you're doing that at least
20:01
the minimum and making sure that
20:02
if there's a power flash you're not
20:04
getting your computer and all your
20:05
backup
20:06
stuff right um that's pretty common
20:08
sense i think
20:10
one thing that we implement at legal aid
20:11
is an inventory
20:13
there is a barcode on every mouse there
20:16
is a serial number on every keyboard
20:18
and monitor and computer that we use
20:22
and so in the event, things are destroyed
20:24
we can quickly identify what we don't
20:26
have and what we do have
20:29
and that way IT knows okay i need to
20:30
order this or
20:32
this data might be compromised or
20:33
someone might have xyz
20:36
once you realize what you do and don't
20:38
have you can then determine what needs
20:39
to happen next
20:40
like I just said either wiping it doing
20:42
a remote wipe which we're going to talk
20:43
about just
20:44
next or purchasing it purchasing a new
20:48
replacement thing so like I just said
20:51
remote wipe
20:52
uh this is a software or a piece of it's
20:55
a
20:55
basically an app you can download on
20:57
your computer um
20:58
your IT folks will probably more know
21:01
more about this but if your
21:03
phone laptop tablet are stolen there is
21:06
an access there is a
21:07
a way to where once it's turned on again
21:10
it can be wiped completely
21:12
so everything in there is gone super
21:14
important because now we're in this age
21:16
where
21:17
especially if you're volunteering as a
21:18
pro bono attorney you're going to be
21:20
helping us
21:20
on either your personal or your other
21:21
work computer and
21:23
um we're in this age where everyone is
21:25
bringing their own devices to work right
21:27
everyone is working
21:29
on their own cell phones or on their own
21:31
laptops and so
21:32
if your client's information is on your
21:34
personal laptop and that thing gets
21:35
stolen during a natural disaster where
21:36
you're going to want to make sure
21:37
they're protected you're going to want
21:38
to make sure you can
21:40
wipe it remotely and then lastly another
21:42
common sense thing
21:44
portable phone chargers I know that
21:45
sounds again like common sense
21:47
that is a lesson I learned hard in
21:49
February whenever we went without power
21:51
for a little bit
21:52
because our phones died and everyone
21:53
freaked out because we couldn't call
21:54
anybody
21:56
and so make sure you have a portable phone
21:58
chargers uh
21:59
ways to prolong your battery life turn
22:01
off Bluetooth turn off location services
22:03
um but uh make sure you have portable
22:05
phone chargers
22:07
and that way you can call your grandma
22:09
or your boss depends on what your
22:10
priorities are
22:11
are and say, hey look, we're good we're
22:13
fine
22:14
um but so those are some damage control
22:17
things again we're going to link to
22:21
these different guides, the aba guide and
22:23
the state bar journal guide
22:25
and also the CNN checklist to make sure
22:27
you everyone listening has access to the
22:29
information that I just gave
22:31
a more detailed access to it
22:34
but for now, I’m going to pass it over to
22:36
belinda to talk more about FEMA
22:38
and insurance thanks, Stuart
22:42
okay so Stuart’s part was basically
22:45
what to do to minimize your damage
22:47
before the disaster hits, okay
22:49
disaster's hit hopefully, everyone is
22:51
safe but
22:53
now it's time to start rebuilding and
22:55
get your business back up and running
22:58
everyone's familiar with insurance if
23:00
you have any type of mortgage on your
23:01
property you
23:02
generally have to have a policy or if
23:04
you rent, you should have renters
23:05
insurance
23:06
and commercial insurance will cover fire
23:08
hail storms
23:09
burglary um some policies will even
23:12
cover the cost of reproducing
23:14
Important documents
23:15
or moving records or files or equipment
23:18
to
23:19
avoid further loss and sometimes pay for
23:21
temporary storage
23:22
depending on your policy, however these
23:26
policies do not cover any flood damage
23:29
and as some of you out there learned and
23:31
some of our own clients learned
23:33
with uri may not cover damage from
23:36
burst pipes either
23:37
so let's get into it basically if you're
23:41
in the market
23:42
for any type of flood insurance, and i'm
23:44
going to talk mostly about flood
23:46
because my agency is in the southeast
23:49
area
23:50
that's usually the disasters we see so
23:55
and once again, um, most people understand
23:57
that
23:58
fire hail storms that's covered on a
23:59
normal policy so
24:03
in the market for flood insurance, two
24:04
major types um
24:06
there's the national flood insurance
24:07
program and private insurance
24:10
uh national flood insurance program or
24:12
nfip
24:13
managed by the federal emergency
24:14
management agency FEMA
24:17
and generally, it's a good
24:20
basic policy very affordable
24:23
and private you can get private flood
24:25
insurance
24:27
it can be more expensive but generally
24:30
you have more damage coverage and
24:32
sometimes better payouts
24:36
nfip's general property form maxes out
24:39
for buildings at 500 000
24:41
and also maxes out on personal property
24:43
at 500 000.
24:45
if you need any additional funds you're
24:48
gonna have to apply for an sba loan
24:50
uh that maxes out at two million but
24:52
that is a loan
24:53
you're going to have to pay that back
24:57
also a big difference is coverage
25:01
and if an nfip policy single-payer policy
25:05
only pays for direct physical loss from
25:08
the flood damage
25:09
you know as defined by the policy and
25:10
basically most of the policies are the
25:12
same
25:13
being the government it covers overflow
25:16
from sea tidal waters that sort of thing
25:19
runoff from any surface water which
25:21
means the lake the river
25:22
the bayou overflows uh
25:25
mudflow like lands collapse
25:29
mud has come into the house or
25:32
really any direct damage from the
25:34
flooding for example
25:35
no flood waters got into your house but
25:38
the flood
25:39
caused the sewer in your area to back up
25:41
and that's what got into your
25:42
office that would be covered as a direct
25:44
result
25:47
however under the FEMA policy
25:51
you can only insure one building just
25:54
like their
25:55
homeowners policy you could only insure
25:58
your home
25:59
no garages no nothing like that same
26:01
thing only the office if you have
26:03
any uh storage buildings on your
26:05
property or any sheds that you keep
26:07
extra office equipment in
26:09
no not covered
26:13
and generally also with that policy
26:16
personal property coverage has to be
26:18
bought
26:18
separate which can be a good
26:21
a bad thing for example if you are
26:24
renting the building and you are
26:25
you just need that coverage you can just
26:28
buy that coverage
26:29
so good and bads on that
26:34
what it doesn't do and private generally
26:36
doesn't do this either
26:37
but it can it will not cover any losses
26:39
from
26:40
business interruptions such as loss of
26:42
income
26:43
if you're a very large firm you can
26:45
probably take the hit for being down for
26:47
a week
26:48
solo practitioner mid-size that could
26:51
kill you
26:52
i mean you still have to pay your bills
26:58
and i know myself i am still working at
27:01
home i have a home office
27:03
uh lone star legal aid still office is
27:06
still not opened up due to the pandemic
27:07
which
27:08
thank you lone star
27:12
so you need to think about possibly
27:13
covering a home office
27:16
if you have one
27:19
even if your home doesn't have any flood
27:22
insurance
27:22
and you're just kind of going to rely on
27:24
fema it will cover
27:26
your office equipment it does cover work
27:29
tools or trade tools
27:31
thing to remember though is that fema
27:33
payout
27:34
for everything maxes out at 33 000.
27:38
that may not be enough money to cover
27:40
office
27:41
and still get beds new couches
27:44
drywall etc um
27:48
so you're really going to want to look
27:49
to possibly getting your home
27:52
flood insurance coverage for that
27:57
so you have insurance how much am i
28:00
getting
28:00
that's usually the first thing i know
28:02
our clients come in
28:03
how much am i getting okay for an nfip
28:07
policy
28:08
it's basically just actual cash value
28:11
which if you think back to law school
28:13
that's basically just replacement costs
28:15
minus depreciation or if you
28:18
had to sell it tomorrow how much would
28:20
you get for it off of ebay
28:23
that being said i know a lot of offices
28:26
out there working on 10 year old
28:28
desktops and you know eight-year-old
28:30
printers so
28:34
what you get from your policy may not be
28:36
enough to actually purchase
28:38
new items and really get you up and
28:40
running again so it's something to think
28:42
about when you're thinking about
28:44
policy limits
28:48
and that's kind of where the real
28:52
difference between nfip and private
28:55
you're really just going to have to take
28:56
a good look at your office
28:58
good look at your equipment what are you
29:00
going to need
29:01
is that 500 000 going to be enough to
29:04
get you up and running again or do you
29:05
need more
29:06
um and also look for the actual cash
29:10
value
29:10
how much would you get would that be
29:12
enough to get you back in business
29:15
now that being said i said generally
29:18
private and nfip doesn't cover business
29:21
interruption
29:22
there is a separate type of policy
29:24
called business interruption insurance
29:27
insurance agents can cover it all
29:32
it can cover the lost income due to
29:35
being closed
29:38
it can allow you to
29:42
get what you would normally get your net
29:44
profit for your time close continue
29:46
your normal operating expenses including
29:48
payroll
29:49
and it kind of just bases off what you
29:54
normally make so it'll be an average but
29:57
it could be a lifesaver if you're a solo
29:58
practitioner or mid-size
30:00
another thing business interruption
30:02
coverage can also sometimes cover
30:04
is something called extra expense
30:06
coverage
30:08
and i think back to when i said
30:11
you only get actual cash value this can
30:14
help
30:15
cover that gap between what you're
30:17
getting and what it's going to cost to
30:19
get
30:19
new equipment so once again it's
30:23
something to think of um highly
30:26
recommend getting with your insurance
30:27
agent
30:28
even if you don't live in a flood zone
30:31
get with your insurance agent
30:32
take a look at those policies that you
30:34
have see if you need this
30:36
um because and remember also whenever
30:40
you buy policy takes 30 days to kick in
30:43
hurricane season's already here so
30:45
sooner rather than later
30:47
would be probably wise
30:51
all right and enough about the thrilling
30:53
world of insurance policies
30:55
we're going to move on to the ever
30:57
exciting ethical considerations
31:00
of a disaster so pablo if you'll take us
31:02
away
31:04
i don't know if i can definitely say
31:06
it's more exciting but i mean it's going
31:07
to be a lot more interesting if you end
31:09
up
31:09
so you know bumping into an issue
31:11
ethical watch during the disaster but
31:13
but thank you they mentioned a couple of
31:15
things it's going to segue over to the
31:16
discussion
31:18
uh something i'm going to talk about
31:19
later on here and uh it's very
31:22
sort of been mentioned here earlier
31:23
cyber security
31:25
one of the biggest things that come up
31:26
recently and it's in the news is the
31:28
ransomware happening to several
31:30
different companies even the office of
31:31
court administration
31:32
uh insurance purposes you might want to
31:34
be looking into these issues that
31:36
belinda mentioned there's also
31:37
apparently ransomware insurance to cover
31:39
you whenever there is a ransomware
31:41
attack
31:41
in case you want to pay that off just
31:43
something small but minor you might want
31:44
to look into it if your size is a
31:46
your firm is a large mid-sized one that
31:48
might need something like that
31:49
another other minor point for the solo
31:52
small firm practitioners and local bar
31:54
associations out there
31:56
the texas bar foundation and during
31:58
hurricane harvey after hurricane harvey
32:00
actually provided some grants and monies
32:01
to the local bar association i think it
32:03
was jefferson
32:04
i'm not sure which one it was to help
32:07
some of the with you know a low
32:09
amount or some amount of money for like
32:11
four members to recover from
32:14
from a disaster maybe something just
32:16
getting back on their feet whether it be
32:17
a small amount of equipment or
32:18
you know something to help them recover
32:21
a small little option to a
32:23
gap filler if you will the texas bar
32:24
foundation provides that to you
32:27
so before i get into the i mean the
32:29
first thing you're going to talk about i
32:30
guess when you do ethical considerations
32:32
is about the client safe or the client's
32:33
property or safe keeping right because
32:35
there's your property
32:36
concerned about things we talked about
32:37
here that are going to matter for you
32:38
and your office and your employees
32:40
but there's also of course the property
32:42
of the client um before i get into that
32:44
because there's a discussion about
32:45
money i want to give you a few tips
32:47
about this because you don't think about
32:48
it until
32:49
it happens just so we talked about right
32:50
now that um you know when
32:52
a disaster hits we have to kind of be
32:54
scrambling looking for each other at the
32:55
office making sure everyone's safe
32:57
if you have a plan accordingly ahead of
32:58
time you know how to get a hold of each
33:00
other and you can get one
33:01
less thing out of the way not to worry
33:03
about and what i want to recommend to
33:05
you all is considering your business
33:06
operation
33:07
the basics of it you want to have cash
33:09
money in hand
33:10
you want to have travelers checks
33:11
prepaid phones maybe prepaid charge
33:14
cards because
33:15
um when the power goes down banks close
33:17
you can't get
33:18
you know access to one or the other
33:21
atms are unusable or atms run out of bills
33:24
for money and you know it's hard to
33:25
restock them
33:26
so you have to pay some bills you have
33:28
to pay employees you have to do some
33:30
of these uh overhead costs and having
33:32
some money around
33:33
or some cashiers and travelers checks
33:35
would be good to prepare ahead of time
33:36
if you know there's a hurricane coming
33:38
for example
33:38
some of the things you want to consider
33:40
are those or
33:42
a giant ice storm apparently and i've
33:43
got a warn about that i forgot
33:45
we've got ice storms to worry about too
33:48
um on savings it's usually recommended
33:51
about three or six three to six months
33:52
of money to cover overhead and bills if
33:54
you do that that'll give you
33:56
a good cushion there to recover from
33:58
whatever kind of disaster might hit
33:59
and that's exactly what was discovered
34:01
during this past pandemic
34:03
when the quarantine started it took
34:06
people about maybe you know
34:07
two to three months to just kind of get
34:08
their you know affairs in order and
34:11
be able to shift into the more virtual
34:13
um
34:14
a remote uh advocacy and working from
34:17
you know the
34:18
out of the office and if you have that
34:20
cushion of money set aside yes one again
34:22
one listing to worry about and
34:23
it also lets you focus on your clients
34:26
and your clients um
34:27
files one thing you want to keep also is
34:30
a list of payment obligations you'd be
34:32
surprised just how many you know
34:34
different kind of folks you have to pay
34:37
on a monthly basis from book
34:38
subscriptions to you know utilities and
34:40
other matters if you have that available
34:41
somewhere your assistant does that
34:43
good for you then you know who is going
34:45
to get paid and when
34:47
so the the money when it comes to
34:50
clients we know it now as we go into the
34:52
ethical aspects of it
34:53
uh texas disciplinary rules of professional
34:55
conduct 1.14
34:57
is the safe keeping of client property
35:00
that's the title of it and if you look
35:01
at it carefully that is a trust account
35:03
rule
35:04
that's the one that requires you and
35:06
labels the clients
35:08
money as their property and you have to
35:09
save you know keep it safe of course and
35:12
separate and apart from your operating
35:13
costs
35:14
so you want to make sure that that trust
35:16
account um
35:17
is accessible if for any reason during
35:19
this you know remote uh
35:21
work from you know home or other places
35:23
or um you can't get to your office you
35:25
still can get access
35:26
at least to the records that we trust
35:27
accounts for your clients purposes
35:30
and for their money all together and
35:32
make sure that it is safe
35:33
and that you can be used for litigation
35:36
when you
35:36
get up and running again
35:39
we mentioned also cyber security issues
35:41
you want to consider to get carefully
35:43
what you have out there and a stuart
35:44
gave you a good listing of some of the
35:46
things you want to
35:47
you know consider for your office
35:49
whether it be small
35:50
or a solo small firm and uh he mentioned
35:54
also it just so happened we're recording
35:56
this like early june
35:57
and the june um edition of the texas bar
36:02
journal is actually
36:03
Has three or four articles about
36:05
preparing your law office for disaster
36:07
preparedness it includes cyber security
36:10
issues it includes
36:11
local bar associations how they can help
36:13
and then also how to you know have your
36:14
law office ready
36:15
you want to look at those articles it's
36:16
the june one it's got
36:18
the cover on it about disaster
36:21
preparedness
36:22
and some of the things that stuart
36:24
mentioned are in there you know the
36:25
cyber security
36:26
issues what you really want to know is
36:29
is your office ready for that disruption
36:30
right
36:31
and one of the things you want to know
36:32
about or have readily available as
36:34
mentioned earlier is a redundant or
36:36
backup site for your email
36:37
for your files you know just for your
36:39
you know management in general
36:42
so if something happens to your office
36:43
and you cannot access your server your
36:45
your information there at the office
36:47
there's another site that has it
36:48
available and ready to go if you want to
36:52
look at a
36:53
ethics opinion that gives you really
36:56
clear
36:56
rules that are implicated when for
36:58
example a data breach occurs and that's
37:00
another type of disaster
37:02
a cyber security issue you want to look
37:05
at
37:06
aba article uh aba ethics opinion 483
37:11
uh it's a really good article there that
37:13
i think
37:14
it has not been addressed by the texas
37:16
bar or the
37:17
professional ethics committee but i
37:20
think
37:20
the aba does a good job of letting you
37:22
know what happens if there is such a
37:23
breach
37:24
again we're dealing with a lot of
37:25
Disasters here disater preparedness on
37:27
the natural disaster side but there can also be
37:28
the
37:29
cyber security disaster that can happen
37:31
you know with a ransomware or a breach
37:32
of your data
37:33
and when that happens you know whether
37:35
you have insurance or not uh you want to
37:37
consider
37:38
uh reading aba ethics opinion 483
37:41
as to what your duties are then to
37:43
notify your clients about that breach
37:45
when that happens and how you're
37:46
supposed to notify them uh and what you
37:48
want to be uh
37:50
looking out for in the news lately too
37:54
i was mentioning here to our host uh
37:57
you've heard a lot about ransomware
37:58
uh when i first gave this presentation
38:01
on on disaster preparedness for the law
38:02
practitioner
38:04
the one that had just that happened last
38:05
year was the office of court
38:06
administration
38:07
if you all remember when the pandemic
38:09
hit they had to actually
38:10
have another site all together for the
38:13
office of court administration for the
38:15
courthou
38:15
courthouse closures for the youtube
38:17
listing videos and that was because they
38:19
had a ransomware attack
38:21
uh since we started preparing for this
38:23
cle this time there was another attack
38:25
Happened a colonial pipeline
38:27
about a month ago or so that caused a
38:29
gas storage over in the east coast
38:31
well actually across the nation for some
38:32
reason everybody thought they were going
38:34
to end up
38:34
not having any kind of gas there and
38:36
just uh this week when recording this
38:38
the jbs meat packing
38:40
had us another ransomware attack uh and
38:43
they're all suspected the latter ones at
38:45
least i don't know about three of them
38:46
the latter two are considered to be
38:48
maybe a russian based you know um
38:50
attacks ransomware uh so unless
38:54
you're doing some kind of job with the
38:55
uh
38:56
russian mafia which you have other
38:57
issues to worry about you know be
38:59
careful for these things you might have
39:00
some ransomware attacks that happen
39:02
it might be a low level one employee
39:04
doesn't realize what they've done and
39:05
then they end up
39:06
locking all the files uh you want to be
39:09
ready for that data breach you want to
39:10
be ready to kind of recover from that
39:11
and be able to have an off site
39:13
you know to get to access of the files
39:15
so your client management
39:17
files and other matters that help you
39:18
move your office forward
39:20
that's something new that i think has
39:22
developed in the past few years that you
39:23
want to keep in mind
39:25
some of the protections uh in addition
39:27
to the backups are the ones that
39:28
Stuart mentioned here that come also in
39:30
the article by john browning
39:31
in the texas bar journal talk about
39:34
search protectors
39:35
battery backups for your servers um the
39:37
phone charger for your phone
39:39
and then these personal mifi's or wi-fi
39:41
spots because your wi-fi might go down
39:43
you may or may not know that your phones
39:45
can become a mifi some phones
39:46
actually smartphones have
39:48
availability and your phone service
39:52
provider can actually give you a mifi
39:56
option on that phone if you don't have
39:58
it for a prorated rate you know
40:00
so that you can use it for those days
40:01
that you're out of the office and then
40:02
of course cancel it after that
40:04
that's a great way to be able to get
40:05
online in case you don't have any wi-fi
40:08
at home or at the office um
40:11
there's also several different uh cloud
40:14
computing services mentioned in john
40:16
browning's article that i want to kind
40:17
of tell you all to look for
40:20
uh he on the cloud-based storage ones
40:22
and the texas bar generally talks about
40:24
carbonite google drive icloud
40:26
onedrive dropbox and a few other ones
40:29
you might seem familiar to you
40:31
you might have some of these but there's
40:32
also the cloud-based practice management
40:34
ones and that can include a clio
40:37
rocket matter amicus attorney and clio
40:40
in fact actually has a membership fee
40:44
that can be
40:44
you can get a discount if you're an aba
40:46
member actually it works either way
40:48
you can get a discount for aba
40:50
membership and you can get a discount
40:52
clear membership if you have one in the
40:53
other
40:54
and that's a good uh
40:57
basic cloud-based practice management
41:00
software not necessarily just
41:02
the uh cloud file storage you want to
41:05
look into those services and have those
41:07
available
41:08
real quickly uh earlier in the
41:11
presentation there was a vpn
41:13
acronym thrown at you what that stands
41:15
for is a virtual
41:16
private network if you don't know what
41:18
that is you want to look into it if
41:19
you're doing kind of remote advocacy or
41:21
work you want to have that kind of
41:23
secured access as stuart mentioned
41:25
because you want to be in the public
41:26
network and not have that
41:27
look for a little vpn shield look for
41:30
that option in your phones and your
41:31
services and some
41:32
companies out there offer that app and
41:35
it's just like um
41:36
stuart said it's like a protection
41:37
shield if you will over
41:39
anyone kind of accessing your network
41:41
and what you do
41:42
it might affect some connectivity to
41:44
some of your maybe remote access
41:46
issues but if you work on it ahead of
41:48
time you'll be able to have a better
41:50
secure
41:50
access to your client files in other
41:53
places
41:54
apart from what you're working at so
41:57
let me just kind of tell you there's a
41:59
theme that'll come up you know in
42:00
discussing any kind of technology
42:02
needs or uh ethic issues uh
42:06
and especially disaster assistance i
42:08
always say it's gonna be competency
42:09
confidentiality and safe keeping those
42:12
are the three things you're gonna hear
42:13
one or all of them most of the time when
42:15
you have a discussion like this
42:17
a great resource for you to go and look
42:19
at some of the professional ethics
42:20
committee
42:21
opinions or some just opinions in
42:22
general and some maybe um
42:24
hypotheticals post is the texas center
42:27
for legal ethics
42:28
that's a state bar excuse me the supreme
42:30
court of texas
42:32
agency that collects information that
42:35
does nothing but this and i have to uh
42:37
give it a plug because
42:38
um i am a board member for tcle and i
42:40
can tell you that
42:41
before we can be in a more member i find
42:43
it incredibly uh useful you might want
42:45
to consider going to their site if you
42:46
research
42:47
or look up or google the texas
42:50
discipline rules of professional conduct
42:51
it's probably going to take you to their
42:53
site you have them there
42:55
along with the opinions another
42:58
resource that you also definitely want
42:59
to look into or another aba opinion
43:01
is aba opinion ethics opinion 482
43:05
and those are rules applicable when
43:06
affected by a disaster
43:08
483 that i mentioned earlier when a data
43:10
breach happens 482
43:12
is when a disaster hits and that
43:14
actually that article is anybody ever
43:16
discusses any ethics issues and
43:17
discovery recovery is going to mention
43:19
that
43:20
aba ethics opinion 482. it includes some
43:23
interesting issues like
43:24
multi-jurisdiction
43:25
multi-jurisdictional practice and
43:27
advertisements so
43:28
um i would say you know some other folks
43:30
in the texarkana area maybe the
43:32
panhandle over in el paso who you know
43:34
might cross state borders
43:36
and have multiple uh licensing and
43:38
jurisdictions you know something happens
43:40
in their
43:41
area and they can move on over to
43:43
louisiana
43:44
oklahoma new mexico to open up you know
43:47
continue their practice over there
43:49
uh this so opinion 482 tells you about
43:51
certain things you want to be careful
43:52
for not end up with a upl
43:54
charge against you because you know you
43:55
are in a different jurisdiction
43:57
and you don't want to jump you know step
43:58
into that the supreme court of texas
44:01
what does happen
44:02
here whenever disaster hits you i think
44:04
you'll see those emergency orders that
44:05
come up by the supreme court
44:07
and it allows for attorneys from other
44:08
jurisdictions to practice here in texas
44:10
uh to assist in disaster recovery and
44:13
avoid the upl issue
44:14
you want to look for that you know in
44:16
those jurisdictions and you move out of
44:18
texas or you come into texas you want to
44:20
look for something like that with the
44:22
uniform bar exam now being part of the
44:25
texas bar exam
44:26
i think this mobility is going to be
44:28
quite common so you definitely want to
44:30
look at that opinion 482 and be careful
44:32
to not end up
44:33
falling into one of these traps of uh
44:36
upl issues because you are recovering
44:38
from a disaster and you don't realize
44:40
that you should have probably been
44:40
careful when you started practicing your
44:42
different jurisdiction
44:44
that's just one of the issues in the
44:45
opinion but you definitely want to look
44:46
into the other things mentioned in 482
44:49
uh let me go right into the texas into
44:51
several of the rules that are applicable
44:53
here you want to look into when it comes
44:54
to disaster recovery but before i do
44:56
uh stuart belinda i want to make sure
44:58
you all are awake um any questions you
45:00
all might have or anything that i might
45:01
have
45:01
gone through by too fast anything that's
45:03
scaring you right now you're writing
45:04
down thinking i should go back and
45:06
correct this
45:08
i'm awake and if i was scared i'm not
45:10
gonna comment on publicly on a podcast
45:13
possible deniability oh yeah
45:16
about no no questions and
45:20
just thank you for getting into the aba
45:24
and the texas rules on this uh i know a
45:27
lot of attorneys out there may not
45:28
realize
45:29
that there are rules about that during
45:32
the
45:33
ethical obligations during disaster that
45:35
you have to follow
45:37
they are they are now you know
45:39
disasters happening more often in many
45:41
different ways natural ones uh
45:43
cyber security ones even man-made ones
45:45
as described at
45:46
the local bar services the article in
45:49
the bar journal concerning local bar
45:51
associations talks about
45:52
these man-made disasters which you know
45:54
these uh incidents where you have an
45:56
active shooter you know had some
45:58
community or some place happened in el
45:59
paso in midland there now is a response
46:02
for that it's a
46:02
disaster recovery response where instead
46:04
of having the fema
46:06
application you know being discussed in
46:08
the cle about recovery you talk about
46:10
the
46:11
Crime victims compensation fund to help
46:13
people recover from that
46:15
interesting discussion there that i
46:16
think many of us in the community
46:18
have talked about for a while that is
46:19
now part of the discussion or lexicon if
46:22
you will
46:23
of disaster recovery within when the
46:24
state bar articles
46:26
so let's get into the ethics in the rules
46:29
here
46:29
or disciplinary uh there's so many rules
46:31
of professional conduct there's specific
46:33
rules you want to consider
46:34
uh during disaster recovery first and
46:36
foremost and this is one of the most
46:37
common grieved ones even without a
46:39
disaster
46:41
1.03 communications keeping your client
46:44
you know informs to what's happening you
46:46
know where you're at
46:47
you have to update your client you know
46:49
if you close the office or even move
46:51
that's one of the first things you want
46:52
to do have that listing call them as
46:53
much you know
46:54
send them an email letter whatever you
46:56
can
46:57
you want to also consider and i've done
46:59
this too when the pandemic and we're in
47:00
quarantine and people need to get a hold
47:02
of me
47:03
i went to texasbar.com and i went to my
47:07
texas bar and um i changed the
47:10
information
47:11
on the contact information there so when
47:13
somebody would look me up
47:14
and uh find a lawyer they would have my
47:17
direct number there not just my general
47:19
office number and that way
47:20
they knew how to get a hold of me that
47:22
number you know write it down to the
47:23
home number or my mobile phone number
47:25
uh that's something you want to consider
47:26
doing because the find my
47:29
find a lawyer um link to texasbar.com is
47:32
the most commonly used link in
47:33
texasbar.com
47:34
so your clients the public out there is
47:36
using it often
47:38
and that's a small little free thing you
47:39
might consider about you know doing and
47:41
changing so you can have information
47:43
uh for your clients uh belinda have a
47:45
question
47:46
uh not more so much a question um just i
47:49
know you said
47:50
make sure your clients can get a hold of
47:51
you more than just your office number
47:53
i know a lot of people may not be
47:54
comfortable giving out their personal
47:56
cell phones
47:57
i know for me google voice was an
47:59
excellent solution to that
48:01
because it wasn't my private cell phone
48:04
and i knew if
48:05
if a call was coming in through google
48:07
voice it was one of my clients
48:09
so just a little option out there for
48:11
you that's that's that's a good point
48:12
and i've had google voice for like eight
48:14
years then when i first got it people
48:16
thought it was the fanciest you know
48:18
the tracy james bond looking guy around
48:20
i'm like it's google voice you can get
48:21
it i mean you should
48:22
it's free at least it is a certain
48:24
amount you know and it is you're right
48:26
it's great
48:27
i use that a lot for any online
48:30
sweepstakes you know uh registration
48:32
i'll give my google voice so i can
48:33
screen them all together but that's
48:35
actually a good point you know for
48:36
screening calls or having your clients
48:37
know where to get a hold of you
48:41
the other rule and the other most grieved
48:43
uh you know
48:44
complain is 1.01 it's proper
48:46
communications i'm sorry competency
48:49
when it comes to dealing with your case
48:50
in other words negligence not in the
48:52
malpractice sense but just kind of
48:53
neglecting the case and then not moving it
48:55
forward not knowing what you're doing if
48:56
you will
48:57
that can happen during disaster you just
48:59
go you know forget about it and you
49:00
leave the case behind you don't want to
49:02
do that you want to move it forward um
49:04
you want to know and tell your client to
49:05
look you're going through a recovery i'm
49:07
going through a recovery and i think
49:10
that helps then them understand you know
49:12
what is happening you know to the
49:14
community in general
49:15
the texas bar website will have great
49:18
information about disaster recovery that
49:19
can
49:20
give your client a better idea not only
49:22
to protect themselves from certain kind
49:23
of like
49:24
predatory you know issues but to
49:26
understand that you as an attorney are
49:28
also recovering from all this stuff
49:30
and then that way they know why it is
49:32
that you know you haven't moved the case
49:33
along because the office you know the
49:35
courthouse is closed or you haven't been
49:36
able to file some you know
49:38
transaction documents because secretary
49:40
Of state office is down or you can't
49:42
go to the deed recording office you
49:43
know
49:44
that would help a lot to avoid that 1.01
49:47
uh
49:47
complaint but there's something recently
49:50
too that you want to consider
49:51
looking into that was kind of very
49:53
subtle but um i don't want to scare
49:54
anybody about this
49:56
but you now also have to have some
49:58
competency when it comes to the
49:59
technology that you use
50:01
uh you know competency in general so
50:03
what you do in law practice is just the
50:04
obvious thing
50:06
but if a year or two ago on 1.01 there's
50:09
about eight comments to the rule uh
50:11
comment number eight the last
50:13
sentence had the additional words where
50:16
you need to know the benefits and risks
50:18
associated with the relevant technology
50:21
those few words then added into your
50:23
requirement to know apart from the law
50:25
also the relevant technology so uh it
50:28
can be knowing about vpn networks cloud
50:30
computing uh cyber security
50:32
how to keep your clients information
50:33
safe you know uh encrypted you know
50:35
email so that nobody else can you know
50:36
see them or capture them
50:38
and i i think the fact that you
50:39
listening to this podcast
50:41
uh that you will look these things up
50:43
that you look into kind of these cloud
50:44
services that matter
50:46
is not just it's a good way to start you
50:49
know into that rule requirement
50:51
uh it was a subtle addition to the
50:53
comments but i think it
50:55
i know it is a in compliance with the
50:57
language of the aba model rules
50:59
and so you wanna make sure that you know
51:02
your technology that you know what's
51:03
available that you know what you're
51:04
using
51:05
that it's safe and then it'll help you
51:06
then communicate with your client and
51:08
also
51:09
make you move their case along forward
51:11
so you have i can avoid the 1.01 or 1.03
51:14
uh grievances against you the other
51:17
important one that we i've
51:18
it's mentioned throughout all this when
51:20
it comes to client information it's of
51:21
course confidentiality that's 1.05
51:24
you want you want to know again is your
51:26
email secure is it
51:27
you know encrypted or not your zoom
51:29
video conferencing discussion is it
51:30
being overheard
51:32
when i first gave this presentation
51:34
about
51:35
this part of the presentation about a
51:36
year ago um
51:38
zoom had just started to be encrypted
51:40
because it wasn't as encrypted as it is
51:42
now and what they did they hired the i
51:44
think
51:45
head of security cyber security at
51:46
facebook brought them over and now you
51:49
have
51:50
end-to-end or peer-to-peer encrypted
51:52
securities for discussions
51:53
communications but in the beginning
51:55
you know when zoom didn't expect the
51:56
pandemic to hit they didn't have that
51:58
much of security and now they do
52:00
uh you know when also you share
52:02
documents make sure they're not left
52:03
open in public space for others to use
52:06
uh there are some services or emails
52:07
where you have to probably maybe
52:08
download the document look at it you
52:10
know and then
52:11
you might forget to you know your client
52:12
might forget to delete it wherever it
52:14
might be and it might be a library it
52:16
might be
52:17
you know um at some public access you
52:19
know place where they can actually get a
52:21
hold or see those at
52:22
the business uh center of a hotel you
52:24
know and i've always i'm surprised when
52:26
i go and i print documents there and i
52:27
can find some documents people left
52:29
behind
52:30
you want to delete all that matter and
52:32
you don't want to leave it behind and
52:33
tell your clients to do the same
52:35
um 1.14 the last rule here before we
52:38
finish off is 1.14 again safekeeping
52:40
that's the first rule that i mentioned
52:41
to you and i'll mention to you again
52:43
that is iolta requirement apart from
52:46
keeping your clients properly in a safe
52:47
location
52:48
uh this is the only rule i want to tell
52:51
you that has a time
52:52
requirement of all the disciplinary rules of
52:54
professional conduct none other one will
52:56
give you
52:56
a time requirement except for this one
52:58
which states that
53:00
you must keep your trust account records
53:02
five years after representation has
53:04
ended that's the only rule that tells
53:06
you that about the five rule the five
53:07
years
53:08
that's why a lot of people i think
53:09
follow that rule to keep records you
53:12
know
53:13
five years after litigation is completed
53:15
representation representation has
53:16
concluded
53:17
now with the advent of you know scanning
53:20
the documents you can probably keep them
53:21
longer and you don't have to take up a
53:22
lot of space like you would in
53:24
years past but keep that in mind you
53:26
know once even after you recover from
53:28
you know a disaster and you have your
53:30
trust account issues you close it off
53:31
and you have to wait five years before
53:33
you destroy any records uh
53:34
post uh representation
53:37
and that's my end here of the
53:39
presentation i think we have about five
53:41
or six minutes left and i don't know
53:43
for stuart if you need questions you
53:44
want to cover anything you want to add
53:46
or any horror stories you went through
53:48
learn from
53:51
i think we all have horror stories LANWT
53:53
With emails going
53:55
down
53:56
LSLA which just apparently mother nature
54:00
decided to hate our office building the
54:02
last hurricane um
54:05
i just want to thank everyone for all
54:06
the hard work they put into this we got
54:08
this idea to do this podcast i think
54:10
mid-may
54:11
so it was a bit of a scramble and a
54:13
quick turnaround to get this
54:14
presentation together so just thank you
54:16
for all the hard work
54:18
and hopefully out there you have learned
54:21
the steps to protect yourself and your
54:22
firm in a disaster
54:25
as you can see prepping for a disaster
54:27
takes a lot of mental and physical
54:29
effort
54:30
our clients often have to do that
54:33
everything mentioned above well
54:34
not the ethical obligations but most of
54:36
the stuff above
54:38
except it's their home they're trying to
54:39
save
54:41
Alos with disasters for our clients
54:42
come a lot of the after effects
54:44
some are obvious such as insurance or
54:46
fema claim disputes contractor issues
54:49
replacing lost documents et
54:51
what often gets forgotten are also
54:53
there's probate issues
54:54
for those unfortunately that didn't make
54:57
it through
54:58
even custody visitation issues for
55:00
children that have been
55:01
displaced by the disaster and custodial
55:03
parent no longer lives in the city
55:05
sometimes not even the state
55:08
as the recent texas bar journal stated
55:10
it is our responsibility to use our
55:12
privilege to have
55:13
as lawyers to take on these challenges
55:15
within our communities
55:18
so just as a final message, please visit
55:20
our website at
55:22
texasdisasterlegalhelp.org
55:23
not only to see the resources that we've
55:25
mentioned throughout the podcast
55:27
but to see how you can help a disaster
55:28
survivor today
55:30
click that volunteer button and help us
55:32
help Texans thank you
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