For my first message as your incoming President, I want to sincerely thank and acknowledge Peter Lively, our 2017 President. Peter, you served us honorably. Peter did an unbelievable amount of work during his term as president and his dedication to our organization is unparalleled. Among his many accomplishments, Peter leaves us with a sensible and structured system for providing our members with the ability to live video stream our MCLE programs. We have had as many as 25 member-participants attend the meeting and program via live video stream!

As your new president, I would like to remind you that as 2018 gets underway, it is time to renew your CDCBAA membership.

2017 was chock-full of terrifi c MCLE programs such as Settlements in Bankruptcy and Adversary Cases with the Hon. Neil W. Bason and board-members Stella Havkin, Raymond H. Aver and James Selth; the Fourth Annual James T. King Bankruptcy Symposium - Exemptions: Is Bad Faith a Factor Or Not? with the Hon. Theodor Albert, Prof. Mark S. Scarberry, attorney John N. Tedford, IV and our very own M. Jonathan Hayes; Upcoming Changes in the Chapter 13 Rules and Plan with the Hon. Meredith A. Jury, Akihito Koyama, Senior Staff Attorney to Chapter 13 Trustee Kathy Dockery and our former president Nancy B. Clark; Understanding Midland Funding V. Johnson with Tara Twomey (National Consumer Bankruptcy Rights Center) and attorneys Whitman L. Holt and Robert J. Pfi ster; Meet the Court Clerk: What Goes on Behind the Clerk’s Window with the Hon. Martin Barash, Clerk of the Court Kathy Campbell, Akihito Koyama, and Jeff Cozad, Law Clerk to Hon. Vincent Zurzolo; Bankruptcy Appeals: It’s Not as Hard as it Looks with BAP Staff Attorney Sarah Stevenson and M. Jonathan Hayes; Why Use the Court’s Mediation Program in Consumer Bankruptcy Cases with the Hon. Barry Russell and attorneys David B. Lally and J. Scott Bovitz; and we started out 2017 with M. Jonathan Hayes’ 11th Annual Review of 9th Circuit Decisions on Bankruptcy in 2016 with the Hon. Vincent Zurzolo, Hon. Laura Taylor, Chief Judge, Southern District of California and Judge of the 9th Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel. Many thanks to these excellent panelists!

We concluded 2017 with our 14th Annual Calvin Ashland Awards Dinner – honoring Judge of the Year, Meredith A. Jury. Special thanks to our former president Keith Higginbotham and board member Christian Cooper and for organizing the event. It was well attended by not only our members, but also by the judges and trustees.

2018 promises more of the same! We are hard at work on more excellent programs that will be announced at our meeting and program on January 27, 2018: M. Jonathan Hayes’ 12th Annual Review of 9th Circuit Decisions on Bankruptcy in 2017 with the Hon. Julia Brand, Judge Central District of California and Judge of the 9th Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel, and the Hon. Charles Novack.

And if that were not enough, our listserv is an invaluable opportunity to share interesting issues with fellow members.

For all of the reasons listed above, please consider renewing your cdcbaa membership early. For those of you looking for a wonderful gift for a colleague, consider the gift of cdcbaa membership. Moreover, for those loyal members, consider introducing colleagues to the cdcbaa and encourage them to sign up for what promises to be a fantastic 2018.

I would like to extend a warm welcome to the four new members of cdcbaa’s Board of Directors: James Selth of Weintraub, Selth & Nguyen APC, Gary R. Wallace of the Law Offi ce of Gary R. Wallace, Carolyn M. Afari of the Afari Law Firm, and Lucy Mavyan with Chapter 7 Trustee Wesley H. Avery.

Many thanks to our entire board of directors and our other members who volunteer their time, energy and knowledge to the success of our group! Todd Turoci edited this Newsletter and will be working on publishing at least two more this year. If you have an idea for an article or want to brief a case, please contact him.

Finally, a very special thank you to my mentor and our past president, M. Jonathan Hayes, who has devoted an enormous amount of time and energy into teaching all of us how to be better bankruptcy attorneys. His panels are among our best-attended and we greatly appreciate his hard work and creativity.